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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Constitutional History of England From
+1760 to 1860, by Charles Duke Yonge
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Constitutional History of England From 1760 to 1860
+
+Author: Charles Duke Yonge
+
+Release Date: January 23, 2004 [EBook #10807]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HISTORY OF ENGLAND ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Ted Garvin, David King, and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team
+
+
+
+
+
+THE
+
+CONSTITUTIONAL HISTORY
+
+OF
+
+ENGLAND
+
+from 1760 to 1860
+
+BY CHARLES DUKE YONGE, M.A.
+REGIUS PROFESSOR OF MODERN HISTORY, QUEEN'S COLLEGE, BELFAST
+AND AUTHOR OF "THE HISTORY OF THE BRITISH NAVY"
+"THE LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE" ETC.
+
+
+1882
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+Mr. Hallam's "Constitutional History" closes, as is well known, with the
+death of George II. The Reformation, the great Rebellion, and the
+Revolution, all of which are embraced in the period of which it treats,
+are events of such surpassing importance, and such all-pervading and
+lasting influence, that no subsequent transactions can ever attract
+entirely equal attention. Yet the century which has elapsed since the
+accession of George III. has also witnessed occurrences not only full of
+exciting interest at the moment, but calculated to affect the policy of
+the kingdom and the condition of the people, for all future time, in a
+degree only second to the Revolution itself. Indeed, the change in some
+leading features and principles of the constitution wrought by the
+Reform Bill of 1832, exceeds any that were enacted by the Bill of Rights
+or the Act of Settlement. The only absolutely new principle introduced
+in 1688 was that establishment of Protestant ascendency which was
+contained in the clause which disabled any Roman Catholic from wearing
+the crown. In other respects, those great statutes were not so much the
+introduction of new principles, as a recognition of privileges of the
+people which had been long established, but which, in too many
+instances, had been disregarded and violated.
+
+But the Reform Bill conferred political power on classes which had never
+before been admitted to be entitled to it; and their enfranchisement
+could not fail to give a wholly new and democratic tinge to the
+government, which has been visible in its effect on the policy of all
+subsequent administrations.
+
+And, besides this great measure, the passing of which has often been
+called a new Revolution, and the other reforms, municipal and
+ecclesiastical, which were its immediate and almost inevitable fruits,
+the century which followed the accession of George III. was also marked
+by the Irish Union, the abolition of slavery, the establishment of the
+principle of universal religious toleration; the loss of one great
+collection of colonies, the plantation of and grant of constitutions to
+others of not inferior magnitude, which had not even come into existence
+at its commencement; the growth of our wondrous dominion in India, with
+its eventual transfer of all authority in that country to the crown;
+with a host of minor transactions and enactments, which must all be
+regarded as, more or less, so many changes in or developments of the
+constitution, as it was regarded and understood by the statesmen of the
+seventeenth century.
+
+It has seemed, therefore, to the compiler of this volume, that a
+narrative of these transactions in their historical sequence, so as to
+exhibit the connection which has frequently existed between them; to
+show, for instance, how the repeal of Poynings' Act, and the Regency
+Bill of 1788, necessitated the Irish Union; how Catholic Emancipation
+brought after it Parliamentary Reform, and how that led to municipal and
+ecclesiastical reforms, might not be without interest and use at the
+present time. And the modern fulness of our parliamentary reports
+(itself one not unimportant reform and novelty), since the accession of
+George III., has enabled him to give the inducements or the objections
+to the different enactments in the very words of the legislators who
+proposed them or resisted them, as often as it seemed desirable to do
+so.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+Mr. Hallam's View of the Development of the Constitution.--Symptoms of
+approaching Constitutional Changes.--State of the Kingdom at the
+Accession of George III.--Improvement of the Law affecting the
+Commissions of the Judges.--Restoration of Peace.--Lord Bute becomes
+Minister.--The Case of Wilkes.--Mr. Luttrell is Seated for Middlesex by
+the House of Commons.--Growth of Parliamentary Reporting.--Mr.
+Grenville's Act for trying Election Petitions.--Disfranchisement of
+Corrupt Voters at New Shoreham.
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+The Regency Bill.--The Ministry of 1766 lay an Embargo on Corn.--An Act
+of Indemnity is Passed.--The _Nullum Tempus_ Act concerning Crown
+Property; it is sought to Extend it to Church Property, but the Attempt
+fails.--The Royal Marriage Act.--The Lords amend a Bill imposing Export
+Duties, etc., on Corn.
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+Mr. Grenville imposes a Duty on Stamps in the North American
+Colonies.--Examination of Dr. Franklin.--Lord Rockingham's Ministry
+Repeals the Duty.--Lord Mansfield affirms a Virtual Representation in
+the Colonies.--Mr. C. Townsend imposes Import Duties in America.--After
+some Years, the Civil War breaks out.--Hanoverian Troops are sent to
+Gibraltar.--The Employment of Hanoverian Regiments at Gibraltar and
+Minorca.--End of the War.--Colonial Policy of the Present
+Reign.--Complaints of the Undue Influence of the Crown.--Motions for
+Parliamentary Reform.--Mr. Burke's Bill for Economical Reform.--Mr.
+Dunning's Resolution on the Influence of the Crown.--Rights of the Lords
+on Money-bills.--The Gordon Riots.
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+Changes of Administration.--The Coalition Ministry.--The Establishment
+of the Prince of Wales.--Fox's India Bill.--The King Defeats it by the
+Agency of Lord Temple.--The Ministry is Dismissed, and Succeeded by Mr.
+Pitt's Administration.--Opposition to the New Ministry in the House of
+Commons.--Merits of the Contest between the Old and the New
+Ministry.--Power of Pitt.--Pitt's India Bill.--Bill for the Government
+of Canada.--The Marriage of the Prince of Wales to Mrs.
+Fitzherbert.--The King becomes Deranged.--Proposal of a
+Regency.--Opinions of Various Writers on the Course adopted.--Spread of
+Revolutionary Societies and Opinions.--Bills for the Repression of
+Sedition and Treason.--The Alien Act.--The Traitorous Correspondence
+Act.--Treason and Sedition Bills.--Failure of some Prosecutions under
+them.
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+The Affairs of Ireland.--Condition of the Irish Parliament.--The
+Octennial Bill.--The Penal Laws.--Non-residence of the Lord-
+lieutenant.--Influence of the American War on Ireland.--Enrolment of the
+Volunteers.--Concession of all the Demands of Ireland.--Violence of the
+Volunteers.--Their Convention.--Violence of the Opposition in
+Parliament: Mr. Brownlow, Mr. Grattan, Mr. Flood.--Pitt's Propositions
+Fail.--Fitzgibbon's Conspiracy Bill.--Regency Question.--Recovery of the
+King.--Question of a Legislative Union.--Establishment of Maynooth
+College.--Lord Edward Fitzgerald.--Arguments for and against the
+Union.--It passes the Irish Parliament.--Details of the Measure.--
+General Character of the Union.--Circumstances which Prevented
+its Completeness.
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+A Census is Ordered.--Dissolution of Pitt's Administration.--Impeachment
+of Lord Melville.--Introduction of Lord Ellenborough into the
+Cabinet.--Abolition of the Slave-trade.--Mr. Windham's Compulsory
+Training Bill.--Illness of the King, and Regency.--Recurrence to the
+Precedent of 1788-'89.--Death of Mr. Perceval.--Lord Liverpool becomes
+Prime-minister.--Question of Appointments in the Household.--Appointment
+of a Prime-minister.
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+The Toleration Act.--Impropriety of making Catholic Emancipation (or any
+other Important Matter) an Open Question.--Joint Responsibility of all
+the Ministers.--Detention of Napoleon at St. Helena.--Question whether
+the Regent could Give Evidence in a Court of Law in a Civil
+Action.--Agitation for Reform.--Public Meetings.--The Manchester
+Meeting.--The Seditious Meetings Prevention Bill.--Lord Sidmouth's Six
+Acts.
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+Survey of the Reign of George III.--The Cato Street Conspiracy.--The
+Queen's Return to England, and the Proceedings against her.--The King
+Visits Ireland and Scotland.--Reform of the Criminal Code.--Freedom of
+Trade.--Death of Lord Liverpool.--The Duke of Wellington becomes
+Prime-minister.--Repeal of the Test and Corporation Act.--O'Connell is
+Elected for Clare.--Peel Resigns his Seat for Oxford.--Catholic
+Emancipation.--Question of the Endowment of the Roman Catholic
+Clergy.--Constitutional Character of the Emancipation.--The Propriety of
+Mr. Peel's Resignation of his Seat for Oxford Questioned.
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+Demand for Parliamentary Reform.--Death of George IV., and Accession of
+William IV.--French Revolution of 1830.--Growing Feeling in Favor of
+Reform.--Duke of Wellington's Declaration against Reform.--His
+Resignation: Lord Grey becomes Prime-minister.--Introduction of the
+Reform Bill.--Its Details.--Riots at Bristol and Nottingham.--Proposed
+Creation of Peers.--The King's Message to the Peers.--Character and
+Consequences of the Reform Bill.--Appointment of a Regency.--
+Re-arrangement of the Civil List.
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+Abolition of Slavery.--Abridgment of the Apprenticeship.--The East India
+Company's Trade is Thrown Open.--Commencement of Ecclesiastical
+Reforms.--The New Poor-law.--State of Ireland.--Agitation against
+Tithes.--Coercion Bill.--Beginning of Church Reform.--Sir Robert Peel
+becomes Prime-minister.--Variety of Offices held Provisionally by the
+Duke of Wellington.--Sir Robert Peel Retires, and Lord Melbourne Resumes
+the Government.--Sir Robert Peel Proposes a Measure of Church
+Reform.--Municipal Reform.--Measures of Ecclesiastical Reform.
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+Death of William IV., and Accession of Queen Victoria.--Rise of the
+Chartists.--Resignation of Lord Melbourne in 1839, and his Resumption of
+Office.--Marriage of the Queen, and Consequent Arrangements.--The
+Precedence of the Prince, etc.--Post-office Reform.--War in
+Afghanistan.--Discontent in Jamaica.--Insurrection in Canada.--New
+Constitution for Canada and other Colonies.--Case of Stockdale and
+Hansard.
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+Sir Robert Peel becomes Prime-minister.--Commercial
+Reforms.--Free-trade.--Religious Toleration.--Maynooth.--The Queen's
+University.--Post-office Regulations.--The Opening of Letters.--
+Naturalization of Aliens.--Recall of Lord Ellenborough.--Reversal of the
+Vote on the Sugar Duties.--Refusal of the Crown to Sanction a Bill.--The
+Question of Increase in the Number of Spiritual Peers.--Repeal of the
+Corn-laws.--Revolution in France, and Agitation on the Continent.--Death
+of Sir Robert Peel.--Indifference of the Country to Reform.--Repeal of
+the Navigation Laws.--Resolutions in Favor of Free-trade.--The Great
+Exhibition of 1851.
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+Dismissal of Lord Palmerston.--Theory of the Relation between the
+Sovereign and the Cabinet.--Correspondence of the Sovereign with French
+Princes.--Russian War.--Abolition of the Tax on Newspapers.--Life
+Peerages.--Resignation of two Bishops.--Indian Mutiny.--Abolition of the
+Sovereign Power of the Company.--Visit of the Prince of Wales to
+India.--Conspiracy Bill.--Rise of the Volunteers.--National
+Fortifications.--The Lords Reject the Measure for the Repeal of the
+Paper-duties.--Lord Palmerston's Resolutions.--Character of the Changes
+during the last Century.
+
+
+INDEX.
+
+
+
+
+CONSTITUTIONAL HISTORY OF ENGLAND.
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+
+Mr. Hallam's View of the Development of the Constitution.--Symptoms of
+approaching Constitutional Changes.--State of the Kingdom at the
+Accession of George III.--Improvement of the Law affecting the
+Commissions of the Judges.--Restoration of Peace.--Lord Bute becomes
+Minister.--The Case of Wilkes.--Mr. Luttrell is Seated for Middlesex by
+the House of Commons.--Growth of Parliamentary Reporting.--Mr.
+Grenville's Act for trying Election Petitions.--Disfranchisement of
+Corrupt Voters at New Shoreham.
+
+
+The learned and judicious writer to whom is due the first idea of a
+"Constitutional History of England," and of whose admirable work I here
+venture to offer a continuation, regards "the spirit of the government"
+as having been "almost wholly monarchical till the Revolution of 1688,"
+and in the four subsequent reigns, with the last of which his volumes
+close, as "having turned chiefly to an aristocracy."[1] And it may be
+considered as having generally preserved that character through the long
+and eventful reign of George III. But, even while he was writing, a
+change was already preparing, of which more than one recent occurrence
+had given unmistakable warning. A borough had been disfranchised for
+inveterate corruption in the first Parliament of George IV.[2] Before
+its dissolution, the same House of Commons had sanctioned the principle
+of a state endowment of the Roman Catholic clergy in Ireland, and had
+given a third reading to a bill for the abolition of all civil
+restrictions affecting members of that religion. It was impossible to
+avoid foreseeing that the Parliamentary Reform inaugurated by the
+disfranchisement of Grampound would soon be carried farther, or that the
+emancipation, as it was termed, of all Christian sects was at least
+equally certain not to be long delayed. And it will be denied by no one
+that those measures, which had no very obscure or doubtful connection
+with each other, have gradually imparted to the constitution a far more
+democratic tinge than would have been willingly accepted by even the
+most liberal statesman of the preceding century, or than, in the days of
+the Tudors or of the Stuarts, would have been thought compatible with
+the maintenance of the monarchy.
+
+When George III. came to the throne, he found the nation engaged in a
+war which was occupying its arms not only on the Continent of Europe,
+but in India and America also, and was extending her glory and her
+substantial power in both hemispheres. _Inter arma silent leges_. And,
+while the contest lasted, neither legislators in Parliament nor the
+people outside had much attention to spare for matters of domestic
+policy. Yet the first year of the new reign was not suffered to pass
+without the introduction of one measure limiting the royal prerogative
+in a matter of paramount importance to the liberty of the people, the
+independence of the judges. The rule of making the commissions of the
+judges depend on their good conduct instead of on the pleasure of the
+crown had, indeed, been established at the Revolution; but it was still
+held that these commissions expired with the life of the sovereign who
+had granted them; and, at the accession of Anne, as also at that of
+George II., a renewal of their commissions had been withheld from some
+members of the judicial bench. But now, even before the dissolution of
+the existing Parliament, the new King recommended to it such a change in
+the law as should "secure the judges in the enjoyment of their offices
+during their good behavior, notwithstanding any demise of the crown;"
+giving the proposal, which was understood to have been originally
+suggested by himself, additional weight by the very unusual step of
+making it the subject of a speech to the two Houses in the middle of the
+session. A bill to give effect to it was at once brought in, and, though
+the Houses sat only a fortnight longer, was carried before the
+dissolution.
+
+The close of the year 1762, however, saw the restoration of peace; and
+the circumstances connected with the treaty which re-established it gave
+birth to a degree of political and constitutional excitement such as had
+not agitated the kingdom for more than half a century. That treaty had
+not been concluded by the minister who had conducted the war. When
+George III. came to the throne he found the Duke of Newcastle presiding
+at the Treasury, but the seals of one Secretary of State in the hands of
+Mr. Pitt, who was universally regarded as the guiding genius of the
+ministry. The other Secretary of State was Lord Holdernesse. But, in the
+spring of 1761, as soon as the Parliament was dissolved,[3] that
+statesman retired from office, and was succeeded by the Earl of Bute, a
+Scotch nobleman, who stood high in the favor of the King's mother, the
+Princess Dowager of Wales, but who had not till very recently been
+supposed to be actuated by political ambition, and who was still less
+suspected of any statesman-like ability to qualify him for the office to
+which he was thus promoted. It was presently seen, however, that he
+aspired to even higher dignity. He at once set himself to oppose Pitt's
+warlike policy; and, on the question of declaring war against Spain, he
+was so successful in inducing the rest of the cabinet to reject Pitt's
+proposals, that that statesman resigned his office in unconcealed
+indignation. Having got rid of the real master of the ministry, Bute's
+next step was to get rid of its nominal chief, and in the spring of 1762
+he managed to drive the Duke of Newcastle from the Treasury, and was
+himself placed by the King at the head of the administration. So rapid
+an elevation of a man previously unknown as a politician could hardly
+fail to create very widespread dissatisfaction, which was in some degree
+augmented by the nationality of the new minister. Lord Bute was a
+Scotchman, and Englishmen had not wholly forgiven or forgotten the
+Scotch invasion of 1745. Since that time the Scotch had been regarded
+with general disfavor; Scotch poverty and Scotch greediness for the good
+things of England had furnished constant topics for raillery and
+sarcasm; and more than one demagogue and political writer had sought
+popularity by pandering to the prevailing taste for attacks on the whole
+nation. Foremost among these was Mr. John Wilkes, member for Aylesbury,
+a man of broken fortunes and still more damaged character, but of a wit
+and hardihood that made his society acceptable to some of high rank and
+lax morality, and caused his political alliance to be courted by some
+who desired to be regarded as leaders of a party; many of the
+transactions of the late reign having, unfortunately, not been favorable
+to the maintenance of any high standard of either public or private
+virtue. On Lord Bute's accession to office, Wilkes had set up a
+periodical paper, whose object and character were sufficiently indicated
+by its title, _The North Briton_, and in which the diligence of Lord
+Bute in distributing places among his kinsmen and countrymen furnished
+the staple of almost every number; while in many the Princess of Wales
+herself was not spared, as the cause, for motives not obscurely hinted
+at, of his sudden elevation. So pertinacious and virulent were the
+attacks thus launched at him, coinciding as they did, at least in one
+point, with the prejudices of the multitude, that they were commonly
+believed to have had some share in driving Lord Bute from office, which,
+in the spring of 1763, he suddenly resigned, hoping, as it might almost
+seem, thus to throw on his successor the burden of defending his
+measures. The most important of these measures had been the conclusion
+of the Treaty of Versailles, which, when it was first announced to
+Parliament, had been vehemently attacked in both Houses by Pitt and his
+followers, but had been approved by large majorities. Wilkes, however,
+not without reason, believed it to be still unpopular with the nation at
+large, and, flushed with his supposed victory over Lord Bute, was
+watching eagerly for some occasion of re-opening the question, when such
+an opportunity was afforded him by the King's speech at the prorogation
+of the Parliament, which took place a few days after Lord Bute's
+resignation.
+
+Lord Bute had been succeeded by Mr. George Grenville, who had for a time
+been one of his colleagues as Secretary of State; and on him, therefore,
+the duty devolved of framing the royal speech the opening sentences of
+which referred to "the re-establishment of peace" in terms of warm
+self-congratulation, as having been effected "upon conditions honorable
+to the crown and beneficial to the people." Wilkes at once caught at
+this panegyric, as affording him just such an opportunity as he had been
+seeking of renewing his attacks on the government, which he regarded as
+changed in nothing but the name of the Prime-minister.[4] And, four days
+after the prorogation,[5] he accordingly issued a new number of _The
+North Briton_ (No. 45), in which he heaped unmeasured sarcasm and
+invective on the peace itself, on the royal speech, and on the minister
+who had composed it. As if conscious that Mr. Grenville was less
+inclined by temper than Lord Bute to suffer such attacks without
+endeavoring to retaliate, he took especial pains to keep within the law
+in his strictures, and, accordingly, carefully avoided saying a
+disrespectful word of the King himself, whom he described as "a prince
+of many great and amiable qualities," "ever renowned for truth, honor,
+and unsullied virtue." But he claimed a right to canvass the speech
+"with the utmost freedom," since "it had always been considered by the
+Legislature and by the public at large as the speech of the minister."
+And he kept this distinction carefully in view through the whole number.
+The speech he denounced with bitter vehemence, as "an abandoned instance
+of ministerial effrontery," as containing "the most unjustifiable public
+declarations" and "infamous fallacies." The peace he affirmed to be
+"such as had drawn down the contempt of mankind on our wretched
+negotiators." And he described the present minister as a mere tool of
+"the favorite," by whom "he still meditated to rule the kingdom with a
+rod of iron." But in the whole number there was but one sentence which
+could be represented as implying the very slightest censure on the King
+himself, and even that was qualified by a personal eulogy. "The King of
+England," it said, "is not only the first magistrate of the country, but
+is invested by the law with the whole executive power. He is, however,
+responsible to his people for the due execution of the royal functions
+in the choice of ministers, etc., equally with the meanest of his
+subjects in his particular duty. The personal character of our present
+amiable sovereign makes us easy and happy that so great a power is
+lodged in such hands; but the favorite has given too just cause for him
+to escape the general odium. The prerogative of the crown is to exert
+the constitutional power intrusted to it in such a way, not of blind
+favor and partiality, but of wisdom and judgment. This is the spirit of
+our constitution. The people, too, have their prerogative; and I hope
+the fine words of Dryden will be engraven on our hearts, 'Freedom is the
+English subject's prerogative.'"
+
+These were the last sentences of No. 45. And in the present day it will
+hardly be thought that, however severe or even violent some of the
+epithets with which certain sentences of the royal speech were assailed
+may have been, the language exceeds the bounds of allowable political
+criticism. With respect to the King, indeed, however accompanied with
+personal compliments to himself those strictures may have been, it may
+be admitted that in asserting any responsibility whatever to the people
+on the part of the sovereign, even for the choice of his ministers, as
+being bound to exercise that choice "with wisdom and judgment," it goes
+somewhat beyond the strict theory of the constitution. Undoubtedly that
+theory is, that the minister chosen by the King is himself responsible
+for every circumstance or act which led to his appointment. This
+principle was established in the fullest manner in 1834, when, as will
+be seen hereafter, Sir Robert Peel admitted his entire responsibility
+for the dismissal of Lord Melbourne by King William IV., though it was
+notorious that he was in Italy at the time, and had not been consulted
+on the matter. But as yet such questions had not been as accurately
+examined as subsequent events caused them to be; and Wilkes's assertion
+of royal responsibility to this extent probably coincided with the
+general feeling on the subject.[6] At all events, the error contained in
+it, and the insinuation that due wisdom and judgment had not been
+displayed in the appointment of Mr. G. Grenville to the Treasury, were
+not so derogatory to the legitimate authority and dignity of the crown
+as to make the writer a fit subject for a criminal prosecution. But Mr.
+Grenville was of a bitter temper, never inclined to tolerate any
+strictures on his own judgment or capacity, and fully imbued with the
+conviction that the first duty of an English minister is to uphold the
+supreme authority of the Parliament, and to chastise any one who dares
+to call in question the wisdom of any one of its resolutions. But _The
+North Briton_ had done this, and more. No. 45 had not only denounced the
+treaty which both Houses had approved, but had insinuated in
+unmistakable language that their approval had been purchased by gross
+corruption (a fact which was, indeed, sufficiently notorious). And,
+consequently, Mr. Grenville determined to treat the number which
+contained the denunciation as a seditious libel, the publication of
+which was a criminal offence; and, by his direction, Lord Halifax, as
+Secretary of State, issued what was termed a general warrant--a warrant,
+that is, which did not name the person or persons against whom it was
+directed, but which commanded the apprehension of "the authors,
+printers, and publishers" of the offending paper, leaving the officers
+who were charged with its execution to decide who came under that
+description, or, in other words, who were guilty of the act charged,
+before they had been brought before any tribunal. The warrant was
+executed. Wilkes and some printers were apprehended; Wilkes himself, as
+if the minister's design had been to make the charge ridiculous by
+exaggeration, being consigned to the great state-prison of the Tower,
+such a use of which was generally limited to those impeached of
+high-treason. And, indeed, the commitment did declare that No. 45 of
+_The North Briton_ was "a libel tending to alienate the affections of
+the people from his Majesty, and to excite them to traitorous
+insurrections against the government." Wilkes instantly sued out a writ
+of _habeas corpus_, and was without hesitation released by the Court of
+Common Pleas, on the legal ground that, "as a member of the House of
+Commons, he was protected from arrest in all cases except treason,
+felony, or a breach of the peace;" a decision which, in the next session
+of Parliament, the minister endeavored to overbear by inducing both
+Houses to concur in a resolution that "privilege of Parliament did not
+extend to the case of publishing seditious libels."
+
+In his life of Lord Camden,[7] who was Chief-justice of the Common Pleas
+at the time, Lord Campbell expresses a warm approval of this resolution,
+as one "which would now be considered conclusive evidence of the law."
+But, with all respect to the memory of a writer who was himself a
+Chief-justice, we suspect that in this case he was advancing a position
+as an author engaged in the discussion of what had become a party
+question, which he would not have laid down from the Bench.[8] The
+resolution certainly did not make it law, since it was not confirmed by
+any royal assent; and to interpret the law is not within the province of
+the House of Commons, nor, except when sitting as a Court of Appeal, of
+the House of Lords. We may, however, fully agree with the principle
+which Lord Campbell at the same time lays down, that "privilege of
+Parliament should not be permitted to interfere with the execution of
+the criminal law of the country." And this doctrine has been so fully
+acquiesced in since, that members of both Houses have in more than one
+instance been imprisoned on conviction for libel.
+
+The legality of the species of warrant under which Wilkes had been
+arrested was, however, a question of far greater importance; and on that
+no formal decision was pronounced on this occasion, the Lieutenant of
+the Tower, in his return to the writ of _habeas corpus_, and the counsel
+employed on both sides, equally avoiding all mention of the character of
+the warrant. But it was indirectly determined shortly afterward. The
+leaders of the Opposition would fain have had the point settled by what,
+in truth, would not have settled it--another resolution of the House of
+Commons. But, though it was discussed in several warm debates, Grenville
+always contrived to baffle his adversaries, though on one occasion his
+majority dwindled to fourteen.[9] What, however, the House of Commons
+abstained from affirming was distinctly, though somewhat
+extra-judicially, asserted by Lord Camden, as Chief-justice of the
+Common Pleas. Wilkes, with some of the printers and others who had been
+arrested, had brought actions for false imprisonment, which came to be
+tried in his court; and they obtained such heavy damages that the
+officials who had been mulcted applied for new trials, on the plea of
+their being excessive. But the Chief-justice refused the applications,
+and upheld the verdict, on the ground that the juries, in their
+assessment of damages, had been "influenced by a righteous indignation
+at the conduct of those who sought to exercise arbitrary power over all
+the King's subjects, to violate Magna Charta, and to destroy the liberty
+of the kingdom, by insisting on the legality of this general warrant."
+Such a justification would hardly be admitted now. But, in a subsequent
+trial, a still higher authority, the Chief-justice of the King's Bench,
+Lord Mansfield, held language so similar, that, once more to quote the
+words of Lord Campbell, "without any formal judgment, general warrants
+have ever since been considered illegal."
+
+However, the release of Wilkes on the ground of his parliamentary
+privilege gave him but a momentary triumph, or rather respite. The
+prosecution was not abated by the decision that he could not be
+imprisoned before trial; while one effect of his liberation was to
+stimulate the minister to add another count to the indictment preferred
+against him, on which he might be expected to find it less easy to
+excite the sympathy of any party. Wilkes had not always confined his
+literary efforts to political pamphlets. There was a club named the
+Franciscans (in compliment to Sir Francis Dashwood, Lord Bute's
+Chancellor of the Exchequer, who, as well as Lord Sandwich, the First
+Lord of the Admiralty, was one of its members), which met at Medmenham
+Abbey, on the banks of the Thames, and there held revels whose license
+recalled the worst excesses of the preceding century. To this club
+Wilkes also belonged; and, in indulgence of tastes in harmony with such
+a brotherhood, he had composed a blasphemous and indecent parody on
+Pope's "Essay on Man," which he entitled "An Essay on Woman," and to
+which he appended a body of burlesque notes purporting to be the
+composition of Pope's latest commentator, the celebrated Dr. Warburton,
+Bishop of Gloucester. He had never published it (indeed, it may be
+doubted whether, even in that not very delicate age, any publisher could
+have been found to run the risk of issuing so scandalous a work), but he
+had printed a few copies in his own house, of which he designed to make
+presents to such friends as he expected to appreciate it. He had not,
+however, so far as it appears, given away a single copy, when, on the
+very first day of the next session of Parliament, Lord Sandwich himself
+brought the parody under the notice of the House of Lords. If there was
+a single member of the House whose delicacy was not likely to be
+shocked, and whose morals could not be injured by such a composition, it
+was certainly Lord Sandwich himself; but his zeal as a minister to
+support his chief kindled in him a sudden enthusiasm for the support of
+virtue and decency also; and, having obtained a copy by some
+surreptitious means, he now made a formal complaint of it to the House,
+contending that the use of the name of the Bishop of Gloucester as
+author of the notes constituted a breach of the privileges of the House.
+And he was seconded by the bishop himself, whose temper and judgment
+were, unhappily, very inferior to his learning and piety. It is recorded
+that he actually compared Wilkes to the devil, and then apologized to
+Satan for the comparison. But the Lords were in a humor to regard no
+violence against Wilkes as excessive; and, submitting to the guidance of
+the minister and the prelate, resolved that the "Essay on Woman,"[10] as
+also another poem by the same writer, a paraphrase of the "Veni
+Creator," was "a most scandalous, obscene, and impious libel," and
+presented an address to the King, requesting his Majesty "to give the
+most effectual orders for the immediate prosecution of the author." And,
+in the course of the next few weeks, the House of Commons outran the
+peers themselves in violence and manifest unfairness. They concurred
+with the Lords in ordering No. 45 of _The North Briton_ to be burnt by
+the common hangman, an order which was not carried out without great
+opposition on the part of the London populace, who made it the occasion
+of a very formidable riot, in which the sheriffs themselves incurred no
+little danger; and, by another resolution, they ordered Wilkes to attend
+in his place to answer the charge of having published the two works. But
+at the time when they made this order it was well known that he could
+not obey it. A few days before he had been challenged by a Mr. Martin,
+who till very recently had been one of the Secretaries of the Treasury,
+and who was generally believed to have prepared himself for the conflict
+by diligent practice with a pistol; and in the duel which ensued Wilkes
+had been severely wounded. It was not only notorious that he had been
+thus disabled, but he sent a physician and surgeon of admitted eminence
+in their profession, and of unquestioned honor, to testify to the fact
+at the bar of the House; and subsequently he forwarded written
+certificates to the same purport from some French doctors who had
+special knowledge of gunshot wounds. But the Commons declined to accept
+this evidence as sufficient, and directed two other doctors to examine
+him. Wilkes, however, refused to admit them: his refusal was treated as
+a sufficient ground for pronouncing him "guilty of a contempt of the
+authority of the House," and for deciding on his case in his absence;
+and, on the 19th of January, before the case had come on for trial, a
+resolution was carried that "Mr. Wilkes was guilty of writing and
+publishing _The North Briton_ (No. 45), which this House had voted to be
+a false, scandalous, and seditious libel, and that, for the said
+offence, he be expelled the House." At a later period of the year, he
+was tried on the two charges of publishing No. 45 and the "Essay on
+Woman," was found guilty of both, and, as he did not appear to receive
+judgment, in November, 1764, he was outlawed.
+
+So far, it may be said to have been a drawn battle. If, on the one hand,
+the minister had procured the expulsion of Wilkes, on the other hand
+Wilkes had gained great notoriety and a certain amount of sympathy, and
+had, moreover, enriched himself by considerable damages; and again, if
+the nation at large was a gainer by the condemnation of general
+warrants, even that advantage might be thought to be dearly gained by
+the discredit into which the Parliament had fallen through its
+intemperance. But the contest between Wilkes and the ministry was only
+closed for a time; and when it was revived, a singular freak of fortune
+caused the very minister who had led the proceedings against him on this
+occasion to appear as his advocate. To avoid the consequences of his
+outlawry, he had taken up his abode in Paris, waiting for a change of
+ministry, which, as he hoped, might bring into power some to whom he
+might look for greater favor. But when, though in the course of the next
+two years two fresh administrations were formed, it was seen that
+neither Lord Rockingham, the head of the first, nor the Duke of Grafton
+and Mr. Pitt (promoted to the Earldom of Chatham), the heads of the
+second, had any greater sympathy with him than Mr. Grenville, he became
+desperate, and looked out for some opportunity of giving effect to his
+discontent. He found it in the dissolution of Parliament, which took
+place in the spring of 1768. In spite of his outlawry, he instantly
+returned to England, and offered himself as a candidate for London.
+There, indeed, he did not succeed, though the populace was uproarious in
+his support, and drew his carriage through the streets as if in triumph.
+But, before the end of the month, he was returned at the head of the
+poll for Middlesex, when the mob celebrated his victory by great riot
+and outrages, breaking the windows of Lord Bute, as his old enemy, and
+of the Lord Mayor, as the representative of the City of London, which
+had rejected him, and insulting, and even in some instances beating,
+passers-by who refused to join in their cheers for "Wilkes and Liberty."
+
+He had already pledged himself to take the necessary steps to procure
+the reversal of his outlawry; and, in pursuance of his promise, he
+surrendered in the Court of King's Bench. But his removal to prison
+caused a renewal of the tumults with greater violence than before. The
+mob even rescued him from the officers who had him in custody; and when,
+having escaped from his deliverers, he, with a parade of obedience to
+the law, again surrendered himself voluntarily at the gate of the King's
+Bench Prison, they threatened to attack the jail itself, kindled a fire
+under its walls, which was not extinguished without some danger, and day
+after day assembled in such tumultuous and menacing crowds, that at last
+Lord Weymouth, the Secretary of State, wrote a letter to the Surrey
+magistrates, enjoining them to abstain from no measures which might seem
+necessary for the preservation of peace, even if that could only be
+effected by the employment of the soldiery. The riots grew more and more
+formidable, till at last the magistrates had no resource but to call out
+the troops, who, on one occasion, after they had been pelted with large
+stones, and in many instances severely injured, fired, killing or
+wounding several of the foremost rioters. So tragical an event seemed to
+Wilkes to furnish him with exactly such an opportunity as he desired to
+push himself into farther notoriety. He at once printed Lord Weymouth's
+letter, and circulated it, with an inflammatory comment, in which he
+described it as a composition having for its fruit "a horrid massacre,
+the consummation of a hellish plot deliberately planned." Too angry to
+be prudent, Lord Weymouth complained to the House of Lords of this
+publication as a breach of privilege, and the Lords formally represented
+it to the House of Commons as an insult deliberately offered to them by
+one of its members. There could be no doubt that such language as Wilkes
+had used was libellous. In its imputation of designs of deliberate
+wickedness, it very far exceeded the bitterest passages of _The North
+Briton_; and Lord Weymouth's colleagues, therefore, thought they might
+safely follow the precedent set in 1764, of branding the publication as
+a libel, and again procuring the expulsion of the libeller from the
+House of Commons. There were circumstances in the present case, such as
+the difference between the constituencies of Aylesbury and Middlesex,
+and the enthusiastic fervor in the offender's cause which the populace
+of the City had displayed, which made it very doubtful whether the
+precedent of 1764 were quite a safe one to follow; but the ministers not
+only disregarded every such consideration, but, as if they had wantonly
+designed to give their measure a bad appearance, and to furnish its
+opponents with the strongest additional argument against it, they mixed
+up with their present complaint a reference to former misdeeds of Wilkes
+with which it had no connection. On receiving the message of the Lords,
+they had summoned him to appear at the bar of the House of Commons, that
+he might be examined on the subject; but this proceeding was so far from
+intimidating him, that he not only avowed the publication of his comment
+on Lord Weymouth's letter, but gloried in it, asserting that he deserved
+the thanks of the people for bringing to light the true character of
+"that bloody scroll." Such language was regarded as an aggravation of
+his offence, and the Attorney-general moved that his comment on the
+letter "was an insolent, scandalous, and seditious libel;" and, when
+that motion had been carried, Lord Barrington followed it up with
+another, to the effect that "John Wilkes, Esq., a member of this House,
+who hath at the bar of this House confessed himself to be the author and
+publisher of what the House has resolved to be an insolent, scandalous,
+and seditious libel, and who has been convicted in the Court of King's
+Bench of having printed and published a seditious libel, and three[11]
+obscene and impious libels, and by the judgment of the said Court has
+been sentenced to undergo twenty-two months' imprisonment, and is now in
+execution under the said judgment, be expelled this House." This motion
+encountered a vigorous opposition, not only from Mr. Burke and the
+principal members of the Rockingham party, which now formed the regular
+Opposition, but also from Mr. Grenville, the former Prime-minister, who
+on the former occasion, in 1764, had himself moved the expulsion of the
+same offender. His speech on this occasion is the only one which is
+fully reported; and it deserved the distinction from the exhaustive way
+in which it dealt with every part of the question. It displayed no
+inclination to extenuate Wilkes's present offence, but it pointed out
+with great force the circumstance that the supporters of the motion were
+far from agreement as to the reasons by which they were guided; that
+some members of the greatest authority in the House, while they had
+avowed their intention of voting for the expulsion, had at the same time
+been careful to explain that the comment on Lord Weymouth's letter was
+not the ground of their vote; that so great a lawyer as Mr. Blackstone
+had asserted that that comment "had not been properly and regularly
+brought before the House," but had founded his intention to vote for the
+expulsion solely "upon that article of the charge which related to the
+three obscene and impious libels mentioned in it, disavowing in the most
+direct terms all the other articles." That, on the other hand, other
+members of deserved weight and influence, such as Lord Palmerston and
+Lord F. Campbell, had disdained the idea of regarding "the article of
+the three obscene and impious libels as affording any ground for their
+proceeding." So practised a debater as Mr. Grenville had but little
+difficulty, therefore, in arguing against the advocates of expulsion,
+when they were so divided that one portion of them did, in fact, reply
+to the other. But it would be superfluous here to enter into the
+arguments employed on either side to justify the expulsion, or to prove
+it to be unjustifiable, from a consideration of the character of either
+Wilkes or his publication. The strength and importance of Mr.
+Grenville's speech lay in the constitutional points which it raised.
+
+Some supporters of the ministers had dwelt upon the former expulsion,
+insisting that "a man who had been expelled by a former House of Commons
+could not possibly be deemed a proper person to sit in the present
+Parliament, unless he had some pardon to plead, or some merit to cancel
+his former offences." By a reference to the case of Sir R. Walpole, Mr.
+Grenville proved that this had not been the opinion of former
+Parliaments; and he contended, with unanswerable logic, that it would be
+very mischievous to the nation if such a principle should be now acted
+on, and such a precedent established, since, though employed in the
+first instance against the odious and the guilty, it might, when once
+established, be easily applied to, and made use of against, the
+meritorious and the innocent; and so the most eminent and deserving
+members of the state, under the color of such an example, by one
+arbitrary and discretionary vote of one House of Parliament, the worst
+species of ostracism, might be excluded from the public councils, cut
+off and proscribed from the rights of every subject of the realm, not
+for a term of years alone, but forever. He quoted from "L'Esprit des
+Lois" an assertion of Montesquieu, that "one of the excellences of the
+English constitution was, that the judicial power was separated from the
+legislative, and that there would be no liberty if they were blended
+together; the power over the life and liberty of the citizens would then
+be arbitrary, for the judge would be the legislator." And, having thus
+proved that it would be a violation of the recognized constitution to
+found a second expulsion on the first, he proceeded to argue that to
+expel him for this new offence would be impolitic and inexpedient, as a
+step which would inevitably lead to a contest with the constituency
+which he represented, since, "in the present disposition of the county
+of Middlesex, no one could entertain a doubt that Wilkes would be
+re-elected. The House would then probably think itself under a necessity
+of again expelling him, and he would as certainly be again re-elected.
+The House might, indeed, refuse to issue a new writ, which would be to
+deprive the freeholders of Middlesex of the right of choosing any other
+representative; but he could not believe that the House would think it
+fit to inflict such a punishment on the electors of a great county.
+Should it not do so, the other alternative would be to bring into the
+House as representative and knight of the shire for Middlesex a man
+chosen by a few voters only, in contradiction to the declared sense of a
+great majority of the freeholders on the face of the poll, upon the
+supposition that all the votes of the latter were forfeited and thrown
+away on account of the expulsion of Mr. Wilkes." It seemed premature to
+discuss that point before it arose, and therefore the Speaker contented
+himself for the present with saying that "he believed there was no
+example of such a proceeding; and that, if it should appear to be new
+and unfounded as the law of the land, or even if any reasonable doubt
+could be entertained of its legality, the attempt to forfeit the
+freeholders' votes in such a manner would be highly alarming and
+dangerous."
+
+Few prophecies have been more exactly fulfilled. The House did expel Mr.
+Wilkes; he did offer himself for re-election, and was re-elected; and
+the minister, in consequence, moved and carried a resolution that "John
+Wilkes, Esq., having been, in this session of Parliament, expelled this
+House, was and is incapable of being elected a member to serve in this
+present Parliament." And, in pursuance of this vote, a writ was again
+issued. At the end of another month the proceeding required to be
+repeated. Wilkes had again offered himself for re-election. No other
+candidate had presented himself, and, in answer to an inquiry, the
+under-sheriff reported that "no other candidate had been proposed but
+John Wilkes, Esq., and that no elector had given or tendered his vote
+for any other person." Once more the House resolved that he was
+"incapable of being elected," and issued a new writ. But on this second
+occasion the ministry had provided a rival candidate in the person of
+the Honorable H.K. Luttrell. He was duly proposed and seconded; a poll
+was taken and kept open for several days, and, as it appeared at the
+close that 1143 votes had been given for Wilkes and 296 for Mr.
+Luttrell, the sheriff again returned Wilkes as duly elected.
+
+A debate of singularly angry excitement arose on the reception of this
+return. Even lawyers, such as Mr. De Grey, the Attorney-general, and Sir
+Fletcher Norton, who had been Attorney-general, were not ashamed to
+denounce the conduct of the sheriff in returning Mr. Wilkes as "highly
+improper and indecent," as "a flying in the face of a resolution of the
+House of Commons;" and Sir Fletcher even ventured to advance the
+proposition that, "as the Commons were acting in a judicial capacity,
+their resolutions were equal to law." Lord North, too, the Chancellor of
+the Exchequer, as we learn from the "Parliamentary History," "spoke
+long, but chiefly to the passions. He described Mr. Wilkes and his
+actions in a lively manner; showed the variety of troubles which he had
+given the ministry; and that unless, by voting in Mr. Luttrell, an end
+were put to this debate, the whole kingdom would be in confusion; though
+he owned that he did not think that measure would put an end to the
+distractions. He spoke much more to the expediency than to the legality
+of the measure proposed."
+
+On the other side, it was contended by several members, Burke and Mr.
+Grenville being of the number, that "the House of Commons alone could
+not make a law binding any body but themselves. That, if they could
+disqualify one person, they could disqualify as many as they pleased,
+and thus get into their own hands the whole power of the government;"
+and precedents were produced to prove that votes of the House of Lords,
+and also of the House of Commons, regarding their own members, had been
+disregarded by the judges of the Court of King's Bench as being contrary
+to law. But the minister was secure of the steadiness of his adherents,
+and a majority of 221 to 152 declared that Mr. Luttrell had been duly
+elected.
+
+But Lord North was correct in his anticipation that their vote would not
+put an end to the agitation on the question, and it was renewed in the
+next session in a manner which at one time threatened to produce a
+breach between the two Houses.
+
+The "Parliamentary History" closes its report of the debate on the
+resolution by which Mr. Luttrell was seated with a summary of the
+arguments used in it, taken from the "Annual Register," which, as is
+universally known, was at this time edited by Mr. Burke. It is a very
+fair and candid abstract, which, in fact, puts the whole question on one
+single issue, "that the House of Commons is the sole court of judicature
+in all cases of election, and that this authority is derived from the
+first principles of our government, viz., the necessary independence of
+the three branches of the Legislature." But, though that doctrine was
+fully admitted by the Opposition, they made "that very admission a
+ground for reviving the question in the next session, by moving for a
+resolution which should declare that, 'being a Court of Judicature, the
+House of Commons, in deciding matters of election, was bound to judge
+according to the law of the land, and the known and established law of
+Parliament, which was part thereof.'" It was understood that this
+resolution, if carried, was intended as a stepping-stone to others which
+should condemn the decision of the previous session; yet it seemed such
+a truism that even the ministers could not venture to deny it; but they
+proposed to defeat the object of its framers by adding to it a
+declaration that the late decision was "agreeable to the said law of the
+land." And we might pass on to the subsequent debate, in which the
+constitutional correctness of that addition was distinctly challenged,
+did it not seem desirable to notice two arguments which were brought
+forward against the motion, one by an independent member, Mr. Ongley,
+the other by the Attorney-general. Mr. Ongley contended that "a power of
+preserving order and decency is essentially necessary to every aggregate
+body; and, with respect to this House, if it had not power over its
+particular members, they would be subject to no control at all." The
+answer to this argument is obvious: that a right on the part of the
+House to control the conduct of its members is a wholly different thing
+from a right to determine who are or ought to be members; and that for
+the House to claim this latter right, except on grounds of qualification
+or disqualification legally proved, would be to repeat one of the most
+monstrous of all Cromwell's acts of tyranny, when, in 1656, he placed
+guards at the door of the House, with orders to refuse admission to all
+those members whom, however lawfully elected, he did not expect to find
+sufficiently compliant for his purposes. Mr. De Grey's argument was of a
+different character, being based on what he foretold would be the
+practical result of a decision that expulsion did not involve an
+incapacity to be re-elected. If it did not involve such incapacity, and
+if, in consequence, Mr. Wilkes should be re-elected, he considered that
+the House would naturally feel it its duty to re-expel him as often as
+the constituency re-elected him. But one answer given to this argument
+was, that to expel a second time would be to punish twice for one
+offence, a proceeding at variance not only with English law but with
+every idea of justice. Another, and one which has obtained greater
+acceptance, was, that the legitimate doctrine was, that the issue of a
+new writ gave the expelled member an appeal from the House to the
+constituency, and that the constituency had a constitutional right to
+overrule the judgment of the House, and to determine whether it still
+regarded the candidate as its most suitable representative.
+
+The ministers, however, were, as before, strong enough in the House to
+carry their resolution. But the Opposition returned to the charge,
+taking up an entirely different though equally general position, "That,
+by the law of the land and the known law and usage of Parliament, no
+person eligible by common right can be incapacitated by vote or
+resolution of this House, but by act of Parliament only." It is
+remarkable that, in the debate which ensued, two members who
+successively rose to the dignity of Lord Chancellor, Mr. Thurlow and Mr.
+Wedderburn, took different sides; but nothing could shake the
+ministerial majority. The resolution was rejected. And when Lord
+Rockingham proposed the same resolution in the House of Lords, though it
+was supported by all the eloquence of Lord Chatham, he was beaten by a
+majority of more than two to one, and the ministers even carried a
+resolution declaring "that any interference of the House of Lords with
+any judgment of the House of Commons, in matters of election, would be a
+violation of the constitutional rights of the Commons."
+
+Even these decisive defeats of the Opposition did not finally terminate
+the struggle. The notoriety which Wilkes had gained had answered his
+purpose to no slight extent. The City had adopted his cause with
+continually increasing earnestness and effect. It had made him Sheriff,
+Alderman, Lord Mayor, and had enriched him with the lucrative office of
+City Chamberlain; and, as one of the City magistrates, he subsequently
+won the good opinion of many who had previously condemned him, by his
+conduct during the Gordon Riots, in which he exerted his authority with
+great intrepidity to check and punish the violence of the rioters. And
+when, in 1782, Lord Rockingham became, for the second time,
+Prime-minister, he thought he might well avail himself of the favor he
+had thus acquired, and of the accession to office of those whom the line
+which they had formerly taken bound to countenance him, to bring forward
+a motion for the expunction of the resolutions against him which had
+been passed in 1770. It was carried by a largo majority; and though this
+was as evidently a party division as those had been by which he had been
+defeated twelve years before, still, as the last resolution on the
+subject, it must be regarded as decisive of the law and practice of
+Parliament, and as having settled the doctrine that expulsion does not
+incapacitate a member who has been expelled from immediate
+re-election.[12]
+
+The establishment of this rule, and the abolition of general warrants,
+were, however, not the only nor the most important result of these
+proceedings. They led indirectly to an innovation which, it is hardly
+too much to say, has had a greater influence on the character and
+conduct of Parliament, and indeed on the whole subsequent legislation of
+the country, than can be attributed to any other single cause. Hitherto
+the bulk of the people had enjoyed but very scanty and occasional means
+of acquiring political education. At times of vehement political
+excitement, or any special party conflict, pamphlets and periodical
+essays had enlightened their readers--necessarily a select and small
+body--on particular topics. But standing orders of both Houses, often
+renewed, strictly forbade all publication of the debates which took
+place in either. To a certain extent, these orders had come to be
+disregarded and evaded. Almost ever since the accession of the House of
+Brunswick, a London publisher had given to the world an annual account
+of the Parliamentary proceedings and most interesting discussions of the
+year; and before the middle of the reign of George II, two monthly
+magazines had given sketches of speeches made by leading members of each
+party. The reporters, however, did not venture to give the names of the
+speakers at full length, but either disguised them under some general
+description, or at most gave their initials; and sometimes found that
+even this profession of deference to the standing orders did not insure
+them impunity. As late as the year 1747, Cave, the proprietor and editor
+of the _Gentleman's Magazine_, was brought to the bar of the House of
+Commons for publishing an account of a recent debate, and only obtained
+his release by expressions of humble submission and the payment of heavy
+fees. The awe, however, which his humiliation and peril had been
+intended to diffuse gradually wore off; the keen interest which was
+awakened by the ministerial changes at the beginning of the reign of
+George III., which have been already mentioned, naturally prompted a
+variety of efforts to gratify it by a revelation of the language
+concerning them which was held by statesmen of different parties; and
+these revelations were no longer confined to yearly or monthly
+publications. More than one newspaper had of late adopted the practice
+of publishing what it affirmed to be a correct report of the debates of
+the previous day, though, in fact, each journal garbled them to suit the
+views of the party to which it belonged, and, to quote the words of the
+historian of the period, "misrepresented the language and arguments of
+the speakers in a manner which could hardly be considered
+accidental."[13] The speakers on the ministerial side in the debates on
+the Middlesex election had been especial objects of these
+misrepresentations; and, at the beginning of 1771, one of that party,
+Colonel Onslow, M.P. for Guilford, brought the subject before the House,
+complaining that many speeches, and his own among them, had been
+misrepresented by two newspapers which he named, and that "the practice
+had got to an infamous height, so that it had become absolutely
+necessary either to punish the offenders or to revise the standing
+orders."[14] And he accordingly moved "that the publication of the
+newspapers of which he complained was a contempt of the orders and a
+breach of the privileges of the House, and that the printers be ordered
+to attend the House at its next sitting." The habitual unfairness of the
+reports was admitted by the Opposition; but the publishers complained of
+evidently felt assured of their sympathy (which, indeed, was
+sufficiently, and not very decorously, shown by its leaders inflicting
+on the House no fewer than twenty-three divisions in a single night),
+and, relying on their countenance, they paid no attention to the order
+of the House. A fresh order for their arrest having been issued, the
+Sergeant-at-arms reported that he had been unable to execute it, by
+reason of their absence from their homes; on which the House, not
+disposed to allow itself to be thus trifled with, now addressed his
+Majesty with a request that he would issue his royal proclamation for
+their apprehension. And Colonel Onslow made a fresh motion, with a
+similar complaint of the publishers of six more newspapers--"three
+brace," as he described them in language more sportsman like than
+parliamentary. Similar orders for their appearance and, when these were
+disregarded, for their apprehension, were issued. And at last one of
+those who had been mentioned in the royal proclamation, Mr. Wheble,
+printer of the _Middlesex Journal_, was apprehended by an officer named
+Carpenter, and carried before the sitting magistrate at Guildhall, who,
+by a somewhat whimsical coincidence, happened to be Alderman Wilkes.
+Wilkes not only discharged him, on the ground that there was "no legal
+cause of complaint against him," but when Wheble, in retaliation, made a
+formal complaint of the assault committed on him by Carpenter in
+arresting him, bound Wheble over to prosecute, and Carpenter to answer
+the complaint, at the next quarter sessions, and then reported what he
+had done in an official Letter to the Secretary of State. Thomson,
+another printer, was in like manner arrested; and, when brought before
+Mr. Oliver, another alderman, was discharged by him. And when, a day or
+two afterward, a third (Mr. Miller) was apprehended by Whetham, a
+messenger of the House of Commons, Mr. Brass Crosby, the Lord Mayor, and
+the two Aldermen, signed a warrant committing Whetham to prison for
+assaulting Miller. Whetham was bailed by the Sergeant-at-arms, who
+reported what had occurred to the House; and the House, as the Lord
+Mayor and Alderman Oliver were members of it, as representatives for
+London and Honiton, ordered that they should attend the House in their
+places, to explain their conduct, and that Mr. Wilkes should attend at
+the bar of the House. Wilkes, declining to recognize the validity of the
+resolutions which had seated Colonel Luttrell for Middlesex, refused
+compliance with such an order, writing a letter to the Speaker, in which
+he "observed that no notice was taken of him as a member of the House;
+and that the Speaker's order did not require him to attend in his
+place." And he "demanded his seat in Parliament, and promised, when he
+had been admitted to his seat, to give the House a most exact detail of
+his conduct." But the Lord Mayor pleaded the charters of the City as a
+justification of his act in releasing a citizen of London who had been
+arrested on a warrant which had not been backed by a City magistrate,
+and demanded to be heard by counsel in support of his plea. His demand,
+however, was refused, and he and Alderman Oliver were committed to the
+Tower; but, as if the ministers were afraid of re-opening the question
+of Colonel Luttrell's election for Middlesex, they evaded taking notice
+of Wilkes's disobedience to their order by a singularly undignified
+expedient, issuing a fresh order for his appearance on the 8th of April,
+and adjourning till the 9th.
+
+The ministers now moved the appointment of a select committee to
+investigate the whole affair; and the committee, before the end of the
+month, made an elaborate report, which, however, abstained from all
+mention of the offence committed by the printers, and confined itself to
+an assertion that "the power and authority of the House to compel the
+attendance of any commoner had ever extended as well to the City of
+London, without exception on account of charters from the crown or any
+pretence of separate jurisdiction, as to every other part of the realm."
+And this assertion may be regarded as having been uphold by the refusal
+of the judges to release the Lord Mayor and Alderman when they sued out
+writs of _habeas corpus_; and they consequently remained prisoners in
+the Tower till they were released by the prorogation.
+
+But with this report of the committee the matter was suffered to drop.
+The transaction had caused almost unprecedented excitement, which was
+not confined to the City, for the grand-juries of many English counties
+and a committee of the Dublin merchants showed their sympathy with the
+Opposition by sending up addresses to the imprisoned City magistrates;
+and the ministers had a prudent fear of keeping alive an agitation which
+had not been always free from danger to the public tranquillity.[15] In
+effect, the victory remained with the Opposition. No farther attempt was
+made to punish any of the printers; and, though the standing orders
+which forbid such publication have never been formally repealed, ever
+since that time the publishers of newspapers and other periodicals have
+been in the constant habit of giving regular details of the proceedings
+of both Houses of Parliament. And one enterprising publisher, Mr.
+Hansard, has for many years published a complete record of the debates
+in both Houses, which is continually appealed to in the Houses
+themselves, by members of both parties, as a manual of political and
+parliamentary history.
+
+The practice, as it now prevails, is one of the many instances of the
+practical wisdom with which this nation often deals with difficult
+subjects. The standing order is retained as an instrument which, in
+certain cases, it may possibly be expedient to employ; as, in fact, it
+has been employed in one or two instances in the present reign, when
+matters have been under consideration which, however necessary to be
+discussed, were of such a nature that the publication of the details
+into which some speakers deemed it desirable to go was regarded by
+others as calculated to be offensive to the taste, if not injurious to
+the morals, of the community at large. But the very fact of such an
+occasional enforcement of the standing orders under very peculiar
+circumstances implies a recognition of the propriety of its more
+ordinary violation; of the principle that publication ought to be the
+general rule, and secrecy the unusual exception. And, indeed, it is,
+probably, no exaggeration to say that such publication is not only
+valuable, as the best and chief means of the political education of the
+people out-of-doors, but is indispensable to the working of our
+parliamentary system such as it has now become. The successive Reform
+Bills, which have placed the electoral power in the hands of so vast a
+body of constituents as was never imagined in the last century, have
+evidently regarded the possession by the electors of a perfect knowledge
+of the language held and the votes given by their representatives as
+indispensable to the proper exercise of the franchises which they have
+conferred. And, even if there had previously been no means provided for
+their acquisition of such information, it is certain that the electors
+would never have consented to be long kept in the dark on subjects of
+such interest. In another point of view, the publication of the debates
+is equally desirable, in the interest of the members themselves, whether
+leaders or followers of the different parties. Not to mention the
+stimulus that it affords to the cultivation of eloquence--an incentive
+to which even those least inclined or accustomed to put themselves
+forward are not entirely insensible--it enables the ministers to
+vindicate their measures to the nation at large, the leaders of the
+Opposition to explain their objections or resistance to those measures
+in their own persons, and not through the hired agency of pamphleteers,
+and each humbler member to prove to his constituents the fidelity with
+which he has acted up to the principles his assertion of which induced
+them to confide their interests and those of the kingdom to his judgment
+and integrity. Secrecy and mystery may serve, or be supposed to serve,
+the interests of arbitrary rulers; perfect openness is the only
+principle on which a free constitution can be maintained and a free
+people governed.
+
+It seems convenient to take all the measures which, in this first
+portion of the reign before us, affected the proceedings or constitution
+of Parliament together; and, indeed, one enactment of great importance,
+which was passed in 1770, it is hardly unreasonable to connect in some
+degree with the decision of the House which adjudged the seat for
+Middlesex to Colonel Luttrell. Ever since the year 1704 it had been
+regarded as a settled point that the House of Commons had the exclusive
+right of determining every question concerning the election of its
+members. But it was equally notorious that it had exercised that right
+in a manner which violated every principle of justice and even of
+decency. Election petitions were decided by the entire House, and were
+almost invariably treated as party questions, in which impartiality was
+not even professed. Thirty years before, the Prime-minister himself (Sir
+Robert Walpole) had given notice to his supporters that "no quarter was
+to be given in election petitions;" and it was a division on one
+petition which eventually drove him from office. There was not even a
+pretence made of deciding according to evidence, for few of the members
+took the trouble to hear it. A few years after the time of which we are
+speaking, Lord George Germaine thus described the mode of proceeding
+which had previously prevailed: "The managers of petitions did not ask
+those on whose support they calculated to attend at the examination of
+witnesses, but only to let them know where they might be found when the
+question was going to be put, that they might be able to send them word
+in time for the division." The practice had become a public scandal, by
+which the constituencies and the House itself suffered equally--the
+constituencies, inasmuch as they were liable to be represented by one
+who was in fact only the representative of a minority; the House itself,
+since its title to public confidence could have no solid or just
+foundation but such as was derived from its members being in every
+instance the choice of the majority. Yet, so long as petitions were
+judged by the whole House, there seemed no chance of the abuse being
+removed, the number of judges conferring the immunity of shamelessness
+on each individual. To remedy such a state of things, in the spring of
+1770 Mr. G. Grenville brought in a bill which provided for the future
+trial of all such petitions by a select committee of fifteen members,
+thirteen of whom should be chosen by ballot, one by the sitting member
+whose seat was petitioned against, and one by the petitioner. The
+members of the committee were to take an oath to do justice similar to
+that taken by jurymen in the courts of law; and the committee was to
+have power to compel the attendance of witnesses, to examine them on
+oath, and to enforce the production of all necessary papers; it was also
+to commence its sittings within twenty-four hours of its appointment,
+and to sit from day to day till it should be prepared to present its
+report. It was not to the credit of the ministers that they made the
+passing of such a bill a party question. The abuse which it was designed
+to remedy was notorious, and Mr. Grenville did not exaggerate its
+magnitude when he declared that, "if it were not checked, it must end in
+the ruin of public liberty." He was supported by Burke, and by two
+lawyers, Mr. Dunning and Mr. Wedderburn, both destined to rise to some
+of the highest offices in their profession; but he was opposed by the
+Attorney-general, by Lord North, as leader of the House, and by Mr.
+Fox--not yet turned into a patriot by Lord North's dismissal of him from
+office. The debates, both in the whole House and in committee, were long
+and earnest. Some of the ministerial underlings were not ashamed to deny
+the necessity of any alteration in the existing practice; but their more
+favorite argument was founded on the impropriety of the House
+"delegating its authority to a committee," which was asserted to be "an
+essential alteration of the constitution of the House of Commons." Lord
+North himself had too keen an instinct of propriety to deny the
+existence of a great evil, and contented himself with pleading for time
+for farther consideration; while the Attorney-general confined his
+objections to some details of the bill, which it would be easy to amend.
+Others, with too accurate a foresight, doubted the efficacy of the
+measure, and prophesied that the additional sanction of the oath, by
+which its framer hoped to bind the committees to a just and honest
+decision, would, "like oaths of office and Custom-house oaths, soon fall
+into matters of form, and lose all sanction, and so make bad worse." On
+the other hand, besides the arguments founded on the admitted greatness
+of the evil to be remedied, it was shown that the institution of
+committees, such as the bill proposed the appointment of, was sanctioned
+by numerous precedents; and though the committees--sometimes consisting
+of as many as two hundred members--were by far too large to make it
+probable that all would bestow a careful attention on the whole case,
+there was "nothing in the journals of the House to show that their
+decisions were not regarded as final, or as requiring no subsequent
+confirmation from the whole House." Generally speaking, Lord North could
+trust the steadiness of his majority; but, to his great surprise, on
+this occasion he found himself deserted by the country gentlemen, who
+voted in a body for the bill, although their spokesman, Sir W. Bagot,
+had been in no slight degree offended by some remarks of Burke, who,
+with a strange imprudence, had claimed a monopoly of the title of
+"friends of the constitution" for himself and his party, and had sneered
+at the country gentlemen, as "statesmen of a very different description,
+though, by a late description given of them, a Tory was now the best
+species of Whig." And the union of the two bodies proved irresistible;
+the bill was carried by a majority of sixty-two, and the government did
+not venture to carry on their resistance to it in the House of Lords,
+any interference by which would, indeed, have been resented by the
+Commons, as a violation of their privileges.
+
+At first the duration of the bill was limited to seven years; but in
+1774 it was made perpetual by a still larger majority, the experience of
+its working having converted many who had at first opposed it, but who
+now bore willing testimony to its efficacy. Unhappily, though the House
+could make the bill perpetual, at least till formally repealed, it could
+not invest its good effects with equal durability. After a time, the
+same complaints were advanced against the decision of election
+committees that had formerly been employed to discredit the judgments of
+the whole House. The success or failure of a petition again became a
+party question; and as in a committee of an odd number the
+ministerialists or the Opposition must inevitably have a majority of at
+least one member, before the end of the reign it had become as easy to
+foretell the result of a petition from the composition of the committee
+as it had been in the time of Walpole. And it was with the approval of
+almost all parties--an approval extorted only by the absolute necessity
+of the case--that, after one or two modifications of Mr. Grenville's act
+had been tried, Mr. Disraeli induced the House to surrender altogether
+its privilege of judging of elections, and to submit the investigations
+of petitions on such subjects to the only tribunal sufficiently above
+suspicion to command and retain the confidence of the nation, the judges
+of the high courts of law.
+
+We shall probably be doing the House of Commons of the day no injustice,
+if we surmise that the degree in which public attention had recently
+been directed to the representation, and the interest which the people
+were beginning to show in the purity of elections, as the principle on
+the maintenance of which the very liberties of all might depend, had
+some share in leading the House to establish the wholly new, though most
+necessary, precedent of punishing a constituency for habitual and
+inveterate corruption. It may be called the first fruits of Mr.
+Grenville's act. At the end of the same year in which that statute had
+been passed, a select committee had sat to try the merits of a petition
+which complained of an undue return for the borough of New Shoreham. And
+its report brought to light an organized system of corruption, which
+there was too much reason to fear was but a specimen of that which
+prevailed in many other boroughs as yet undetected. It appeared from the
+report, founded as it was on the evidence and confession of many of the
+persons inculpated, that a society had long existed in New Shoreham,
+entitled the Christian Club, which, under this specious name, was
+instituted, as they frankly acknowledged, for the express purpose of
+getting as much money as possible at every election from the candidates
+they brought in. The members of the club were under an oath and bond of
+£500 not to divulge the secrets of the club, and to be bound by the
+majority. On every election, a committee of five persons was nominated
+by the club to treat with the candidates for as much money as they could
+get. And, in pursuance of this system, when, on the death of Sir Stephen
+Cornish, one of the members for the borough, five candidates offered
+themselves to supply the vacancy, this committee of five opened
+negotiations with them all. The offers of the rival purchasers were
+liberal enough. One (General Smith) proposed to buy the entire club in
+the lump for £3000, adding a promise to build 600 tons of shipping in
+the town. A second (a Mr. Rumbold) was willing to give every freeman
+£35; and his offer was accepted by the committee, who, however,
+cautioned him that no freeman was entitled to the money who was not a
+member of the Christian Club. He willingly agreed to this limitation of
+his expenditure, and both he and the club regarded the matter as
+settled. He paid every freeman who belonged to the club his stipulated
+bribe, and on the polling day they tendered eighty-seven votes in his
+favor, the entire constituency being something under one hundred and
+fifty. The general, finding his £3000 declined, did not go to the poll;
+but a Mr. Purling and Mr. James did, the latter polling only four votes,
+the former only thirty-seven. What bribe Mr. Purling had given was never
+revealed; but by some means or other he had contrived to render himself
+the most acceptable of all the candidates to Mr. Roberts, the returning
+officer. Roberts had himself been a member of the Christian Club, but
+had quarrelled with it, and on the day of the election, as Rumbold's
+voters came up, he administered to each of them the oath against
+bribery. They took it without scruple; but he took it on himself to
+pronounce seventy-six of them disqualified, and to refuse their votes;
+and, having thus reduced Mr. Rumbold's voters to eleven, he returned Mr.
+Purling as duly elected.
+
+Mr. Rumbold, not unnaturally, petitioned against such a return; when Mr.
+Roberts admitted the facts alleged against him, but pleaded that he had
+acted under the advice of counsel, who had assured him that it was
+within his own discretion to admit or to refuse any votes that might be
+tendered, and that he might lawfully refuse any "which in his own mind
+he thought illegal." It is a striking proof of the laxity which
+prevailed on every quarter in electioneering practices, that the House,
+to a great extent, admitted his justification or excuse as valid. By a
+strange stretch of lenity, they gave him credit for an honest intention,
+and contented themselves with ordering him to be reprimanded by the
+Speaker. But the case of the bribed freemen and of the borough generally
+was too gross to be screened by any party. All agreed that the borough
+must be regarded as incurably corrupt, and deserving of heavy
+punishment. The Attorney-general was ordered to prosecute the five
+members of the managing committee for "an illegal and corrupt
+conspiracy;" and a bill was brought in to disfranchise and declare
+forever incapable of voting at any election eighty-one freemen who had
+been proved to have received bribes, and to punish the borough itself,
+by extending the right of voting at future elections to all the
+freeholders in the rape of Bramber, the district of Sussex in which New
+Shoreham lies, an arrangement which reduced the borough itself to
+comparative insignificance. Mr. Fox opposed the bill, on the ground that
+the offence committed could be sufficiently punished by the ordinary
+courts of law. But he stood alone in his resistance; the bill was
+passed, and a salutary precedent was established; the penalty inflicted
+on New Shoreham being for many years regarded as the most proper
+punishment for all boroughs in which similar practices were proved to
+prevail.
+
+And it might have continued to be thought so, had corruption been
+confined to the smaller boroughs; but there was no doubt that in many
+large towns corruption was equally prevalent and inveterate, while there
+were also many counties in which the cost of a contest was by far too
+large to be accounted for by any legitimate causes of expenditure. And
+consequently, as time wore on, severer measures were considered
+necessary. Some boroughs were deprived of the right of election
+altogether; in others, whose population or constituency was too numerous
+to make their permanent disfranchisement advisable, the writ was
+suspended for a time, that its suspension might serve both as a
+punishment and as a warning, a practice which is still not unfrequently
+adopted. But no plan could be devised for dealing with the evil in
+counties, till what seemed hopeless to achieve by direct legislation
+was, in a great degree, effected by the indirect operation of the Reform
+Bill of 1832. The shortening of the duration of an election, which was
+henceforth concluded in a single day, and the multiplication of polling
+places, which rendered it impossible to ascertain the progress of the
+different candidates till the close of the poll, were provisions having
+an inevitable and most salutary effect in diminishing alike the
+temptation to bribe on the part of the candidate, and the opportunity of
+enhancing the value of his vote by the elector. The vast increase of
+newspapers, by diffusing political education and stimulating political
+discussion, has had, perhaps, a still greater influence in the same
+direction. And, as bribery could only be brought to bear on electors too
+ignorant to estimate the importance of the exercise of the franchise by
+any higher test than the personal advantage it might bring to
+themselves, it is to the general diffusion of education among the poorer
+classes, and their gradually improved and improving intelligence that a
+complete eradication of electoral corruption can alone be looked for.
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 1: "Constitutional History," vol. iii., p. 380; ed. 3, 1832.
+The first edition was published in 1827.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Grampound. Corrupt voters had been disfranchised in New
+Shoreham as early as 1771, and the franchise of the borough of Cricklade
+had been transferred to the adjoining hundreds in 1782.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Parliament was dissolved March 19. Lord Bute succeeded Lord
+Holdernesse March 25.]
+
+[Footnote 4: The greater part of Lord Bute's colleagues did, in fact,
+retain their offices. Lord Egremont and Lord Halifax continued to be
+Secretaries of State; Lord Henley (afterward Lord Northington) retained
+the Great Seal; Lord North and Sir John Turner remained as Lords of the
+Treasury; and Mr. Yorke and Sir Fletcher Norton were still Attorney and
+Solicitor General.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Parliament was prorogued April 19, and _The North Briton_
+(No. 45) was published April 23.]
+
+[Footnote 6: A letter of the Prince Consort examines the principle of
+ministerial responsibility with so remarkable a clearness of perception
+and distinctness of explanation, that we may be excused for quoting it
+at length: "The notion that the responsibility of his advisers impairs
+the monarch's dignity and importance is a complete mistake. Here we have
+no law of ministerial responsibility, for the simple reason that we have
+no written constitution; but this responsibility flows as a logical
+necessity from the dignity of the crown and of the sovereign. 'The King
+can do no wrong,' says the legal axiom, and hence it follows that
+somebody must be responsible for his measures, if these be contrary to
+law or injurious to the country's welfare. Ministers here are not
+responsible _quâ_ ministers, that is, _quâ_ officials (as such they are
+responsible to the crown), but they are responsible to Parliament and
+the people, or the country, as 'advisers of the crown.' Any one of them
+may advise the crown, and whoever does so is responsible to the country
+for the advice he has given. The so-called accountability of ministers
+to Parliament does not arise out of an abstract principle of
+responsibility, but out of the practical necessity which they are under
+of obtaining the consent of Parliament to legislation and the voting of
+taxes, and, as an essential to this end, of securing its confidence. In
+practice, ministers are liable to account for the way and manner in
+which they have administered the laws which they, conjointly with the
+Parliament, have made, and for the way they have expended the moneys
+that have been voted for definite objects. They are bound to furnish
+explanations, to justify their proceedings, to satisfy reasonable
+scruples, and the answer, 'We have, as dutiful subjects, obeyed the
+sovereign,' will not be accepted. 'Have you acted upon conviction, or
+have you not?' is the question. 'If you have not, then you are civil
+servants of the crown, who counsel and do what you consider wrong or
+unjust, with a view to retain your snug places or to win the favor of
+the sovereign.' And this being so, Parliament withdraws its confidence
+from them. Herein, too, lies that ministerial power of which sovereigns
+are so much afraid. They can say, 'We will not do this or that which the
+sovereign wishes, because we cannot be responsible for it.' But why
+should a sovereign see anything here to be afraid of? To him it is, in
+truth, the best of safeguards. A really loyal servant should do nothing
+for which he is not prepared to answer, even though his master desires
+it. This practical responsibility is of the utmost advantage to the
+sovereign. Make independence, not subservience, the essential of
+service, and you compel the minister to keep his soul free toward the
+sovereign, you ennoble his advice, you make him staunch and patriotic,
+while time-servers, the submissive instruments of a monarch's extreme
+wishes and commands, may lead, and often have led, him to destruction.
+
+"But to revert to the law of responsibility. This ought not to be in
+effect a safeguard for law itself. As such, it is superfluous in this
+country, where law reigns, and where it would never occur to any one
+that this could be otherwise. But upon the Continent it is of the
+highest importance; as, where the government is an outgrowth of a
+relation of supremacy and subordination between sovereign and subject,
+and the servant, trained in ideas natural to this relation, does not
+know which to obey, the law of the sovereign, the existence of such a
+law would deprive him of the excuse which, should he offend the law, and
+so be guilty of a crime, is ready to his hand in the phrase, 'The
+sovereign ordered it so, I have merely obeyed,' while it would be a
+protection to the sovereign that his servants, if guilty of a crime,
+should not be able to saddle him with the blame of it."--_Life of the
+Prince Consort_, v., 262.]
+
+[Footnote 7: "Lives of the Lord Chancellors," c. cxliii.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Indeed, the opinion which Lord Campbell thus expresses is
+manifestly at variance with that which he had previously pronounced in
+his life of Lord Northington, where he praised the House of Lords for
+"very properly rejecting the bill passed by the Commons declaring
+general warrants to be illegal, leaving this question to be decided (as
+it was, satisfactorily) by the Courts of Common Law."]
+
+[Footnote 9: From a speech of Mr. Grenville delivered at a later period
+(February 3, 1769, "Parliamentary History," xvi., 548), it appears that
+the Secretaries of State who signed this general warrant did so against
+their own judgment. "They repeatedly proposed to have Wilkes's name
+inserted in the warrant of apprehension, but were overruled by the
+lawyers and clerks of the office, who insisted that they could not
+depart from the long-established precedents and course of proceeding."
+And in one of these debates, Mr. Pitt, while denouncing with great
+severity Grenville's conduct in procuring the issue of this particular
+warrant, was driven to a strange confession of his own inconsistency,
+since he was forced to admit that, while Secretary of State, he had
+issued more than one general warrant in exactly similar form.]
+
+[Footnote 10: Strange to say, it does not seem absolutely certain that
+Wilkes was the author of the "Essay on Woman." Horace Walpole eventually
+learned, or believed that he had learned, that the author was a Mr.
+Thomas Potter. (See Walpole's "George III.," i., 310; and Cunningham's
+"Note on his Correspondence," iv., 126.)]
+
+[Footnote 11: These are the words of the resolution.--_Parliamentary
+History_, xvi., 537. But it does not appear what the three libels were.
+The "Essay on Woman" was one, the paraphrase of "Veni Creator" was a
+second; no third of that character is mentioned.]
+
+[Footnote 12: The last resolution is approved by Mr. Hallam. "If a few
+precedents were to determine all controversies of constitutional law, it
+is plain enough from the journals that the House has assumed the power
+of incapacitation. But as such authority is highly dangerous and
+unnecessary for any good purpose, and as, according to all legal rules,
+so extraordinary a power could not be supported except by a sort of
+prescription that cannot be shown, the final resolution of the House of
+Commons, which condemned the votes passed in times of great excitement,
+appears far more consonant to first principles."--_Constitutional
+History_, iii., 357.]
+
+[Footnote 13: Adolphus, "History of England," i., 484.]
+
+[Footnote 14: An idea of the license which the newspapers complained of
+had permitted themselves at this time may be derived from the manner in
+which one of them had introduced a speech of Mr. Jeremiah Dyson, M.P.
+for Weymouth, and a Commissioner of the Treasury: "Jeremiah Weymouth,
+the d----n of the kingdom, spoke as follows." And it may seem that the
+Opposition (for the affair was made a party question) can hardly be
+acquitted of a discreditable indifference to the dignity of the House in
+supporting a resolution of Colonel Barré, that "Jeremiah Weymouth, the
+d----n of this kingdom, is not a member of this House." On which the
+previous question was moved by the ministers, and carried by 120 to
+38.--_Parliamentary History_, xvii., 78. And an instance of rather the
+opposite kind, of the guarded way in which the most respectable
+publications were as yet accustomed to relate the transactions of
+Parliament, may be gathered from the account of the proceedings in the
+case of Wilkes, given in the "Annual Register" for 1770--drawn up,
+probably, by Burke himself--in which Lord Camden is only mentioned as "a
+great law lord;" Lord Chatham as "Lord C----m;" Lord Rockingham as "a
+noble Marquis who lately presided at the head of public affairs;" the
+King as "the K----;" Parliament as "P.;" and the House of Commons as the
+"H. of C."--_Annual Register_, 1770, pp. 59-67.]
+
+[Footnote 15: On more than one occasion there had been disturbances in
+the City, and in the streets adjacent to the Houses of Parliament, which
+were little short of riot. One day the mob paraded effigies of the
+principal ministers, which, after hanging and beheading them, they
+committed to the flames with great uproar. On another day Mr. Charles
+Fox (as yet a vehement Tory) complained to the House that the mob in
+Palace Yard had insulted him, breaking the glasses of his chariot, and
+pelting him with oranges, stones, etc.--_Parliamentary History_, xvii.,
+163.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+
+The Regency Bill.--The Ministry of 1766 lay an Embargo on Corn.--An Act
+of Indemnity is Passed.--The _Nullum Tempus_ Act concerning Crown
+Property; it is sought to Extend it to Church Property, but the Attempt
+fails.--The Royal Marriage Act.--The Lords amend a Bill imposing Export
+Duties, etc., on Corn.
+
+
+The prosecution of Wilkes was not the only act of Mr. Grenville's
+administration which excited both the Parliament and the people. In 1764
+the King was attacked by a serious illness, and, as the Prince of Wales
+was an infant scarcely two years old, it was manifestly necessary to
+make arrangements for a Regency, in the event of the throne becoming
+vacant while the heir was still a minor. A similar necessity had arisen
+in the preceding reign on the death of the present King's father, and a
+bill had accordingly been introduced by Mr. Pelham, the minister of the
+day, which, in the event of the reigning sovereign dying during the
+minority of the boy who had now become the immediate heir to the throne,
+vested both the guardianship of his person and the Regency of the
+kingdom in his mother, the Princess Dowager of Wales, who, however, in
+the latter capacity, was only to act with the advice of a council,
+composed of her brother-in-law, the Duke of Cumberland, and nine
+principal officers of state. It was not concealed by either the King or
+the Duke that they would have preferred a different arrangement, one
+which would have conferred an uncontrolled Regency on the Duke himself;
+but the bill was passed by great majorities in both Houses, and served
+in some respects as a model for that which was now to be brought
+forward, the difference being that the Regent was not to be expressly
+named in it. To quote the words of the royal speech, the King "proposed
+to the consideration of the two Houses whether, under the present
+circumstances, it would not be expedient to vest in him the power of
+appointing from time to time, by instrument in writing under his
+sign-manual, either the Queen or any other member of the royal family
+usually residing in Great Britain, to be the guardian of the person of
+his successor, and the Regent of these kingdoms, until such successor
+should attain the age of eighteen years, subject to such restrictions
+and regulations as were specified and contained in an act passed on a
+similar occasion in the fourteenth year of the late King; the Regent so
+appointed to be assisted by a council, composed of the several persons
+who, by reason of their dignities and offices, were constituted members
+of the council established by that act, together with those whom the
+Parliament might think proper to leave to his nomination."
+
+It may be doubted whether such a power as his Majesty desired was quite
+consistent with the principles of the constitution. Parliament had,
+indeed, granted Henry VIII. the still greater power of nominating a
+series of successors; but the appointment which he consequently made by
+will was eventually superseded, when, on the failure of his immediate
+descendants, the representative of his elder sister, whom he had passed
+over, was seated on the throne, to the exclusion of the descendants of
+his younger sister, to whom he had given the preference. In France, the
+last two kings, Louis XIII. and XIV., had both, when on their
+death-beds, assumed the right of making the arrangements for the Regency
+which would become necessary, the heir to the throne being in each case
+a minor; but in each instance the arrangements which they had made were
+disregarded.
+
+However, on the present occasion the minister (who must be taken to have
+framed the King's speech) and the Parliament agreed in the propriety of
+conferring the nomination of the Regent on the King himself;[16] and the
+bill might have passed almost without notice, had it not been for a
+strange display of the Prime-minister's ill-temper and mismanagement.
+Mr. Grenville was at all times uncourtly and dictatorial in his manner,
+even to the King himself; he was also of a suspicious disposition; and
+though he was universally believed to have owed his promotion to his
+present office to the recommendation of Lord Bute,[17] he was extremely
+jealous of his predecessor. He professed to believe, and probably did
+believe, that the King was still greatly under Lord Bute's influence
+(though, in fact, they had never met since that minister had quitted the
+Treasury), that Lord Bute was still as closely connected with the
+Princess of Wales as scandal had formerly reported him to be, and that
+George III., under the pressure of their combined influence, would be
+induced to name his mother rather than his wife as the future Regent.
+And he was so entirely swayed by this ridiculous and wholly groundless
+fear, that, when the bill to give effect to the royal recommendation was
+introduced into the House of Lords, he instigated one of his friends to
+raise the question who were included in the general term "the royal
+family," which Lord Halifax, as Secretary of State, answered by saying
+that he regarded it as meaning "those only who were in order of
+succession to the throne." Such a definition would have excluded the
+Queen as effectually as the Princess Dowager; and when Mr. Grenville
+found the peers reluctant to accept this view (which, indeed, his own
+Lord Chancellor pronounced untenable), he then sent another of his
+colleagues to represent to the King that his mother was so unpopular
+that, even if the Lords should pass the bill in such a form as rendered
+her eligible for nomination, the Commons would introduce a clause to
+exclude her by name. With great unwillingness, and, it is said, not
+without tears, George III. consented to the bill being so drawn as to
+exclude her, and it passed the Lords in such a form. But when it reached
+the Commons it was found that if the leaders of the Opposition hated
+Bute much, they hated Grenville more. They moved the insertion of the
+name of the Princess Dowager as one of the members of the royal family
+whom the King might nominate Regent, if it should please him. Even
+Grenville had not the boldness publicly to disparage his royal master's
+royal mother; the Princess's name was inserted by a unanimous vote in
+the list of those from whom the King was empowered to select the Regent,
+and the amendment was gladly accepted by the House of Lords.[18]
+
+In spite, however, of the unanimity of the two Houses on the question,
+it will probably be thought that the authors of the amendment, by which
+it was proposed to address the King with an entreaty to name in the bill
+the person to whom he desired to intrust the Regency, acted more in the
+spirit of the constitution than those who were contented that the name
+should be omitted; indeed, that statesmen of the present century agree
+in holding that an arrangement of such importance should be made by the
+Houses of Parliament, in concurrence with the sovereign, and not by the
+sovereign alone, is shown by the steps taken to provide for a Regency in
+the event of the demise of the reigning sovereign while the heir was a
+minor, in the last and in the present reign, the second bill (that of
+1840) being in this respect of the greater authority, since Lord
+Melbourne, the Prime-minister, did not propose it without previously
+securing the approval of the Duke of Wellington, in his character of
+leader of the Opposition.
+
+We pass over for a moment the administration of Lord Rockingham, as we
+have already passed over the taxation of our North American Colonies by
+Mr. Grenville, because it will be more convenient to take all the
+transactions relating to that subject together when we arrive at the
+time when the troubles arising out of the policy of the different
+administrations toward those Colonies were brought to a head by the
+breaking out of civil war. Lord Rockingham's ministry, which succeeded
+Mr. Grenville's, had, as is well known, but a brief existence, and was
+replaced by the cabinet so whimsically composed by Mr. Pitt, who
+reserved to himself the office of Privy Seal, with the Earldom of
+Chatham; the Duke of Grafton being the nominal head of the Treasury, but
+the direction of affairs being wholly in the hands of the new Earl, till
+the failure of his health compelled his temporary retirement from public
+life. Lord Chatham was brother-in-law to Mr. Grenville, to whom in the
+occasional arrogance and arbitrariness of his disposition he bore some
+resemblance; and one of the earliest acts of his administration, when
+coupled with the language which he held on the subject in the House of
+Lords, displayed that side of his character in a very conspicuous light.
+
+The summer of 1766 had been unusually wet and cold, both at home and
+abroad, and the harvest had, in consequence, been so deficient as to
+cause a very general apprehension of scarcity, while rumors were spread
+that the high prices which the shortness of the crops could not fail to
+produce were artificially raised by the selfish covetousness of some of
+the principal corn-dealers, who were buying up all the grain which came
+into the market, and storing it, with the object of making an exorbitant
+profit out of the necessities of the consumer, not only at home but
+abroad. The poorer classes, seeing themselves, as they believed,
+threatened with famine, rose in riotous crowds, in some places attacking
+the barns in which the corn was stored, and threatening destruction to
+both the storehouses and the owners. The ministry first tried to repress
+the discontent by the issue of a proclamation against "forestallers and
+regraters," framed in the language and spirit of the Middle Ages; and,
+when that proved ineffectual to restore confidence, they issued an Order
+in Council absolutely prohibiting the exportation of any kind of grain,
+and authorizing the detention of any vessels lying in any British harbor
+which might be loaded with such a cargo. Our annals furnished no
+instance of such an embargo having been laid on any article of commerce
+in time of peace; but the crisis was difficult, the danger to the
+tranquillity of the kingdom was great and undeniable, the necessity for
+instant action seemed urgent, and probably few would have been inclined
+to cavil at Lord Chatham's assertion, that the embargo "was an act of
+power which, during the recess of Parliament, was justifiable on the
+ground of necessity," had the ministry at once called Parliament
+together to sanction the measure by an act of indemnity. But Lord
+Chatham was at all times inclined to carry matters with a high hand, and
+willingly adopted the opinion advanced by the Chancellor (Lord
+Northington), that "the measure was strictly legal, and that no
+indemnity was necessary." Lord Northington's language on the subject
+Lord Campbell describes as "exhibiting his characteristic rashness and
+recklessness, which seemed to be aggravated by age and experience,"[19]
+and the censure does not seem too severe, since he presently "went so
+far as to maintain that the crown had a right to interfere, even against
+a positive act of parliament, and that proof of the necessity amounted
+to a legal justification." But, however ill-considered his language may
+have been, Lord Chatham adopted it, and acted on it so far as to decline
+calling the Parliament together before the appointed time, though, when
+the Houses did meet, he allowed General Conway, as Secretary of State,
+to introduce a bill of indemnity in the House of Commons. It was warmly
+opposed in that House, partly on the ground that, if such a measure as
+the embargo had been necessary, it would have been easy to have
+assembled Parliament before the Order in Council was issued (for, in
+fact, the proclamation against forestallers and regraters had been
+issued on the 10th of September, when Parliament, if not farther
+prorogued, would have met within a week). But on that same day
+Parliament was farther prorogued from the 16th of September till the
+11th of November,[20] and it was not till after that prorogation, on the
+24th of September, that the Order in Council was issued.
+
+In the House of Lords it seems to have been admitted that the embargo
+was, under all the circumstances, not only desirable, but "indispensably
+necessary."[21] But the Opposition in that House, being led by a great
+lawyer (Chief-justice Lord Mansfield), took a wider view of the whole
+case; and, after denouncing the long prorogation of Parliament as having
+been so culpably advised that there was no way left of meeting the
+emergency but by an interposition of the royal power, directed the
+principal weight of their argument against the doctrine of the existence
+of any dispensing power. It was urged that the late Order in Council
+could only be justified by "the general proposition that of any, and, if
+of any, of every, act of parliament the King, with the advice of the
+Privy Council, may suspend the execution and effect whenever his
+Majesty, so advised, judges it necessary for the immediate safety of the
+people." And this proposition was denounced as utterly inconsistent with
+the principles of the Revolution, which had been "nothing but a most
+lawless and wicked invasion of the rights of the crown," if such a
+dispensing power were really one of the lawful prerogatives of the
+sovereign. Reference was made to the powers in more than one instance,
+and especially in the case of ship-money claimed and exercised by
+Charles I.; and it was affirmed that "the dispensing and suspending
+power, and that of raising money without the consent of Parliament, were
+precisely alike, and stood on the very same ground. They were born
+twins; they lived together, and together were buried in the same grave
+at the Revolution, past all power of resurrection." It was even argued
+that the dispensing or suspending power was yet more dangerous than that
+of raising money without a Parliamentary vote, since it was a power
+which might do the most mischief, and with the greatest speed, so many
+were the subjects which it included. It would be a return to the maxims
+of the idolators of prerogative as understood in those earlier days,
+that is, of absolute and arbitrary power, _a Deo Rex, a Rege Lex_. It
+was farther argued that, unless it could be said that the moment
+Parliament breaks up the King stands in its place, and that the
+continuance of acts is consigned into his hands, he cannot of right
+suspend any more than he can make laws, both acts requiring the same
+power. The law is above the King, and the crown as well as the subject
+is bound by it as much during the recess as in the session of
+Parliament; and therefore the wisdom of the constitution has excluded
+every discretion in the crown over a positive statute, and has
+emancipated Parliament from the royal prerogative, leaving the power of
+suspension, which is but another name for a temporary repeal, to reside
+where the legislative power is lodged--that is, in King, Lords, and
+Commons, who together constitute the only supreme authority of this
+government. Precedents were cited to prove that in former times
+different ministries had avoided thus taking the law into their own
+hands, as when, in 1709 and again in 1756, there was a similar
+apprehension of scarcity, even though both those years were years of
+war. And the Bill of Rights was quoted as the statute in which every
+sort of dispensing power was condemned, though, as exercised by James
+II., it had only been exerted in dispensing with penal laws and
+remitting penalties.
+
+"Finally," said one speaker, who perhaps was Lord Mansfield himself, "he
+is not a moderate minister who would rashly decide in favor of
+prerogative in a question where the rights of Parliament are involved,
+nor a prudent minister who, even in a doubtful case, commits the
+prerogative, by a wanton experiment, to what degree the people will bear
+the extent of it. The opposite course was that by which a minister would
+consult the best interests of the crown, as well as of the people. The
+safety of the crown, as well as the security of the subject, requires
+the closing up of every avenue that can lead to tyranny."[22]
+
+These arguments prevailed, and the indemnity bill was passed, to quote
+the words of the "Annual Register"--at that time written by Burke--"very
+much to the satisfaction of the public." And that it should have been so
+accepted is creditable to the good-sense of both parties. The precedent
+which was thus established does, indeed, seem to rest on a principle
+indispensable to the proper working of a constitutional government. In
+so extensive an empire as ours, it is scarcely possible that sudden
+emergencies, requiring the instant application of some remedy, should
+not at times arise; and, unless Parliament be sitting at the time, such
+can only be adequately dealt with if the ministers of the crown have the
+courage to take such steps as are necessary, whether by the suspension
+of a law or by any other expedient, on their own responsibility,
+trusting in their ability to satisfy the Parliament, instantly convoked
+to receive their explanation, of the necessity or wisdom of their
+proceedings; and in the candor of the Parliament to recognize, if not
+the judiciousness of their action, at all events the good faith in which
+it has been taken, and the honest, patriotic intention which has
+dictated it. The establishment of the obligation instantly to submit the
+question to the judgment of Parliament will hardly be denied to be a
+sufficient safeguard against the ministerial abuse of such a power; and
+the instances in which such a power has since been exercised, coupled
+with the sanction of such exercise by Parliament, are a practical
+approval and ratification by subsequent Parliaments of the course that
+was now adopted.[23]
+
+The next year a not very creditable job of the ministry led to the
+enactment of a statute of great importance to all holders of property
+which had ever belonged to the crown. In the twenty-first year of James
+I. a bill had been passed giving a secure tenure of their estates to all
+grantees of crown lands whose possession of them had lasted sixty years.
+The Houses had desired to make the enactment extend to all future as
+well as to all previous grants. But to this James had refused to
+consent; and, telling the Houses that "beggars must not be choosers," he
+had compelled them to content themselves with a retrospective statute.
+Since his time, and especially in the reigns of Charles II. and William
+III., the crown had been more lavish and unscrupulous than at any former
+period in granting away its lands and estates to favorites. And no one
+had been so largely enriched by its prodigality as the most grasping of
+William's Dutch followers, Bentinck, the founder of the English house of
+Portland. Among the estates which he had obtained from his royal
+master's favor was one which went by the name of the Honor of Penrith.
+Subsequent administrations had augmented the dignities and importance of
+his family. Their Earldom had been exchanged for a Dukedom; but the
+existing Duke was an opponent of the present ministry, who, to punish
+him, suggested to Sir James Lowther, a baronet of ancient family, and of
+large property in the North of England, the idea of applying to the
+crown for a grant of the forest of Inglewood, and of the manor of
+Carlisle, which hitherto had been held by Portland as belonging to the
+Honor of Penrith, but which, not having been expressly mentioned in the
+original grant by William III., it was now said had been regarded as
+included in the honor only by mistake. It was not denied that Portland
+had enjoyed the ownership of these lands for upward of seventy years
+without dispute; and, had the statute of James been one of continual
+operation, it would have been impossible to deprive him of them. But, as
+matters stood, the Lords of the Treasury willingly listened to the
+application of Sir James Lowther; they even refused permission to the
+Duke to examine the original deed and the other documents in the office
+of the surveyor, on which he professed to rely for the establishment of
+his right; and they granted to Sir James the lands he prayed for at a
+rent which could only be regarded as nominal. The injustice of the
+proceeding was so flagrant, that in the beginning of 1768 Sir George
+Savile brought in a bill to prevent any repetition of such an act by
+making the statute of James I. perpetual, so that for the future a
+possession for sixty years should confer an indisputable and
+indefeasible title. The ministers opposed it with great vehemence, even
+taking some credit to themselves for their moderation in not requiring
+from the Duke a repayment of the proceeds of the lands in question for
+the seventy years during which he had held them. But the case was so bad
+that they could only defeat Sir George Savile by a side-wind and a
+scanty majority, carrying an amendment to defer any decision of the
+matter till the next session. Sir George, however, was not discouraged;
+he renewed his motion in 1769, when it was carried by a large majority,
+with an additional clause extending its operation to the Colonies in
+North America; and thus, in respect of its territorial rights, the crown
+was placed on the same footing as any private individual, and the same
+length of tenure which enabled a possessor to hold a property against
+another subject henceforth equally enabled him to hold it against the
+crown. The policy not less than the justice of such an enactment might
+have been thought to commend it to every thinking man as soon as the
+heat engendered by a party debate had passed away. It had merely placed
+the sovereign and the subject on the same footing in respect of the
+security which prescription gave to possession. And it might, therefore,
+have been thought that the vote of 1769 had settled the point in every
+case; since what was the law between one private individual and another,
+and between the sovereign and a subject, might well have been taken to
+be of universal application. But the ministry were strangely unwilling
+to recognize such a universal character in the late act, and found in
+the peculiar character of ecclesiastical bodies and ecclesiastical
+property a pretext for weakening the force of the late enactment, by
+denying the applicability of the principle to the claims of
+ecclesiastical chapters. In 1772 Mr. Henry Seymour, one of the members
+for Huntingdon, moved for leave to bring in a bill, which he described
+as one "for quieting the subjects of the realm against the dormant
+claims of the Church;" or, in other words, for putting the Church on the
+same footing with respect to property which had passed out of its
+possession as the crown had been placed in by the act of 1769. He
+contended that such a bill ought to be passed, not only on the general
+principle that possessors who derived their property from one source
+ought not to be less secure than they who derived it from another, but
+also on the grounds that, as ecclesiastical bodies occasionally used
+their power, "length of possession, which fortified and strengthened
+legal right and just title in every other case, did in this alone render
+them more weak and uncertain," from the difficulty which often occurred
+in finding documentary proof of very ancient titles; and that this was
+not an imaginary danger, since a member of the House then present had
+recently lost £120,000 by a bishop reviving a claim to an estate after
+the gentleman's family had been in undisturbed possession of it above a
+hundred years. The defence of the Church, however, was taken up by Mr.
+Skinner, Attorney-general for the Duchy of Lancaster, who argued that
+though, in the case of the crown, the _nullum tempus_ which it had
+formerly claimed, and which had been put an end to in 1769, was "an
+engine in the hands of the strong to oppress the weak, the _nullum
+tempus_ of the Church was a defence to the weak against the strong," as
+its best if not its sole security "against the encroachment of the
+laity." The "Parliamentary History" records that in the course of a long
+debate Lord North opposed the bringing in of the bill, as did "the
+Lord-advocate of Scotland, who gave as a reason in favor of the bill,
+though he voted against it, that a law of similar nature had passed in
+Scotland, and that the whole kingdom, clergy as well as laity, found the
+very best effects from it."[24] Burke argued in favor of the bill with
+great force, declaring that in so doing "he did not mean anything
+against the Church, her dignities, her honor, her privileges, or her
+possessions; he should wish even to enlarge them all; but this bill was
+to take nothing from her but the power of making herself odious." But
+the ministerial majority was too well disciplined to be broken, and Mr.
+Seymour could not even obtain leave to bring in the bill.
+
+The year 1772 was marked by the discussion of a measure which the King
+seems to have regarded as one of private interest only, affecting his
+personal rights over his own family. But it is impossible to regard
+transactions which may affect the right of succession to the throne as
+matters of only private interest. And indeed the bill was treated as one
+involving a constitutional question by both sides of both Houses, and as
+such was discussed with remarkable earnestness, and with vehemence
+equalling that of any other debate which had as yet taken place since
+the commencement of the reign. The bill had its origin in the personal
+feelings of the King himself, who had been greatly annoyed at the
+conduct of his brother, the Duke of Cumberland, in marrying a widow of
+the name of Horton, daughter of Lord Irnham, and sister of the Colonel
+Luttrell whom the vote of the House of Commons had seated as member for
+Middlesex; and perhaps still more at the discovery that his other
+brother, the Duke of Gloucester, to whom he was greatly attached, had
+married another subject, the widowed Lady Waldegrave. His Majesty's
+dissatisfaction was, perhaps, heightened by the recollection that he
+himself, in early manhood, had also been strongly attracted by the
+charms of another subject, and had sacrificed his own inclinations to
+the combined considerations of pride of birth and the interests of his
+kingdom. And, though there was a manifest difference between the
+importance of the marriage of the sovereign himself and that of princes
+who were never likely to become sovereigns, he thought it not
+unreasonable that he should be empowered to exercise such a general
+guardianship over the entire family, of which he was the head, as might
+enable him to control its members in such arrangements, by making his
+formal sanction indispensable to the validity of any matrimonial
+alliances which they might desire to contract. A somewhat similar
+question had been raised in 1717, when George I., having quarrelled with
+the Prince of Wales (afterward George II.), asserted a claim to control
+and direct the education of all the Prince's children, and, when they
+should be of marriageable age, to arrange their marriages. The Prince,
+on the other hand, insisted on his natural and inalienable right, as
+their father, to have the entire government of his own offspring, a
+right which, as he contended, no royal prerogative could be enabled or
+permitted to override. That question was not, however, brought before
+Parliament, to which, at that time, the King could, probably, not have
+trusted for any leanings in his favor; but he referred it, in an
+informal way, to the Lord Chancellor (Lord Cowper) and the Common-law
+Judges. They investigated it with great minuteness. A number of
+precedents were adduced for the marriage and education of the members of
+the royal family being regulated by the sovereign, beginning with Henry
+III., who gave his daughter Joan, without her own consent, in marriage
+to the King of Scotland, and coming down to the preceding century, at
+the commencement of which the Council of James I. committed the Lady
+Arabella Stuart and Mr. Seymour to the Tower for contracting a secret
+marriage without the King's permission, and at the end of which King
+William exercised the right of selecting a tutor for the Duke of
+Gloucester, the son of the Princess Anne, without any consultation with
+the Princess herself; and finally the judges, with only two dissenting
+voices, expressed their conviction that the King was entitled to the
+prerogative which he claimed. The case does not, however, seem to have
+been regularly argued before them; there is no trace of their having
+been assisted in their deliberations by counsel on either side, and
+their extra-judicial opinion was clearly destitute of any formal
+authority;[25] so that it came before Parliament in some degree as a new
+question.
+
+But George III. was not of a disposition to allow such matters to remain
+in doubt, and, in compliance with his desire, a bill was, in 1772,
+introduced by Lord Rochfort, as Secretary of State, which proposed to
+enact that no descendants of the late King, being children or
+grandchildren, and presumptive heirs of the sovereign, male or female,
+other than the issue of princesses who might be married into foreign
+families, should be capable of contracting a valid marriage without the
+previous consent of the reigning sovereign, signified under his
+sign-manual, and that any marriage contracted without such consent
+should be null and void. The King or the ministers apparently doubted
+whether Parliament could be prevailed on to make such a prohibition
+life-long, and therefore a clause was added which provided that if any
+prince or princess above the age of twenty-five years should determine
+to contract a marriage without such consent of the sovereign, he or she
+might do so on giving twelve months' notice to the Privy Council; and
+such marriage should be good and valid, unless, before the expiration of
+the twelve months, both Houses of Parliament should declare their
+disapproval of the marriage. The concluding clause of the bill made it
+felony "to presume to solemnize, or to assist, or to be present, at the
+celebration of any such marriage without such consent being first
+obtained."
+
+The bill was stoutly resisted in both Houses at every stage, both on the
+ground of usage and of general principle. It was positively denied that
+the "sovereign's right of approving of all marriages in the royal
+family," which was asserted in the preamble of the bill, was either
+founded in law, or established by precedent, or warranted by the opinion
+of the judges. And it was contended that there never had been a time
+when the possession of royal rank had been considered necessary to
+qualify any one to become consort of an English prince or princess. It
+had not even been regarded as a necessary qualification for a queen.
+Three of the wives of Henry VIII. had been English subjects wholly
+unconnected with the royal family; nor had the Parliament nor the people
+in general complained of any one of those marriages; moreover, two of
+his children, who had in their turn succeeded to the crown, had been the
+offspring of two of those wives; and in the last century James II.,
+while Duke of York, had married the daughter of an English gentleman;
+and, though it had not been without notorious reluctance that his royal
+brother had sanctioned that connection, it was well known that Charles
+II. himself had proposed to marry the niece of Cardinal Mazarin. In the
+House of Peers, Lord Camden especially objected to the clause annulling
+a marriage between persons of full age; and in the Commons, Mr.
+Dowdeswell, who had been Chancellor of the Exchequer in Lord
+Rockingham's administration, dwelt with especial vigor on the
+unreasonableness of the clause which fixed twenty-five as the age before
+which no prince or princess could marry without the King's consent.
+"Law, positive law," he argued, "and not the arbitrary will of an
+individual, should be the only restraint. Men who are by law allowed at
+twenty-one[26] to be fit for governing the realm may well be supposed
+capable of choosing and governing a wife."[27] Lord Folkestone condemned
+with great earnestness the expression in the preamble that the bill was
+dictated "by the royal concern for the honor and dignity of the crown,"
+as implying a doctrine that an alliance of a subject with a branch of
+the royal family is dishonorable to the crown--a doctrine which he
+denounced as "an oblique insult" to the whole people, and which, as
+such, "the representatives of the people were bound to oppose." And he
+also objected to the "vindicatory part," as he termed the clause which
+declared those who might assist, or even be present, at a marriage
+contracted without the royal permission guilty of felony.[28]
+
+The ministry, however, had a decided majority in both Houses, and the
+bill became and remains the law of the land, though fourteen peers,
+including one bishop, entered a protest against it on nine different
+grounds, one of which condemned it as "an extension of the royal
+prerogative for which the great majority of the judges found no
+authority;" while another, with something of prophetic sagacity, urged
+that the bill "was pregnant with civil discord and confusion, and had a
+natural tendency to produce a disputed title to the crown."
+
+It may be doubted whether the circumstances which had induced George
+III. to demand such a power as that with which the bill invested him
+justified its enactment. He was already the father of a family so
+numerous as to render it highly improbable that either of his brothers
+or any of their children would ever come to the throne; while, as a
+previously existing law barred any prince or princess who might marry a
+Roman Catholic from the succession, the additional restraint imposed by
+the new statute practically limited their choice to an inconveniently
+small number of foreign royal houses, many of which, to say the least,
+are not superior in importance or purity of blood to many of our own
+nobles.
+
+Nor can it be said to have been successful in accomplishing his
+Majesty's object. It is notorious that two of his sons, and very
+generally believed that one of his daughters, married subjects; the
+Prince of Wales having chosen a wife who was not only inferior in rank
+and social position to Lady Waldegrave or Mrs. Horton, but was moreover
+a Roman Catholic; and that another of his sons petitioned more than once
+for permission to marry an English heiress of ancient family. And our
+present sovereign may be thought to have pronounced her opinion that the
+act goes too far, when she gave one of her younger daughters in marriage
+to a nobleman who, however high in rank, has no royal blood in his
+veins. The political inconvenience which might arise from the
+circumstance of the reigning sovereign being connected by near and
+intimate relationship with a family of his British subjects will,
+probably, always be thought to render it desirable that some restriction
+should be placed on the marriage of the heir-apparent; but where the
+sovereign is blessed with a numerous offspring, there seems no
+sufficient reason for sending the younger branches of the royal house to
+seek wives or husbands in foreign countries. And as the precedent set in
+the case of the Princess Louise has been generally approved, it is
+probable that in similar circumstances it may be followed, and that such
+occasional relaxation of the act of 1772 will be regarded as justified
+by and consistent with the requirements of public policy as well as by
+the laws of nature.[29] Generally speaking, the two Houses agreed in
+their support of the ministerial policy both at home and abroad; but, in
+spite of this political harmony, a certain degree of bad feeling existed
+between them, which on one occasion led to a somewhat singular scene in
+the House of Commons. The Commons imputed its origin to the discourtesy
+of the Lords, who, when members of the Commons were ordered by their
+House to carry its bills up to the peers, sometimes kept them "waiting
+three hours in the lobby among their lordships' footmen before they
+admitted them." Burke affirmed that this had happened to himself, and
+that he "spoke of it, not out of any personal pride, nor as an indignity
+to himself, but as a flagrant disgrace to the House of Commons, which,
+he apprehended, was not inferior in rank to any other branch of the
+Legislature, but co-ordinate with them." And the irritation which such
+treatment excited led the Commons, perhaps not very unnaturally, to seek
+some opportunity to vindicate their dignity. They found it in an
+amendment which the Lords made on a corn bill. In the middle of April,
+1772, resolutions had been passed by the Commons, in a committee of the
+whole House, imposing certain duties on the importation of wheat[30] and
+other grain when they were at a certain price, which was fixed at 48s.,
+and granting bounties on exportation when the price fell below 44s. The
+Lords made several amendments on the bill, and, among others, one to
+strike out the clause which granted bounties. But when the bill thus
+amended came back to the Commons, even those who disliked the principle
+of bounties resented this act of the Lords in meddling with that
+question, which they regarded as a violation of their peculiar and most
+cherished privilege, the exclusive right of dealing with questions of
+taxation. Governor Pownall, who had charge of the bill, declared that
+the Lords had forgotten their duty when they interfered in raising money
+by the insertion of a clause that "no bounty should be paid upon
+exported corn." And on this ground he moved the rejection of the
+bill.[31] In the last chapter of this volume, a more fitting occasion
+for examining the rights and usages of the House of Lords with respect
+to money-bills will be furnished by a series of resolutions on the
+subject, moved by the Prime-minister of the day. It is sufficient here
+to say that the power of rejection is manifestly so different from that
+of originating grants--which is admitted to belong exclusively to the
+Commons--and that there were so many precedents for the Lords having
+exerted this power of rejection in the course of the preceding century,
+that they probably never conceived that in so doing now they were
+committing any encroachment on the constitutional rights and privileges
+of the Lower House. But on this occasion the ill-feeling previously
+existing between the two Houses may be thought to have predisposed the
+Commons to seek opportunity for a quarrel. And there never was a case in
+which both parties in the House were more unanimous. Governor Pownall
+called the rejection of the clause by the Lords "a flagrant encroachment
+upon the privileges of the House," and affirmed that the Lords had
+"forgotten their duty." Burke termed it "a proof that the Lords did not
+understand the principles of the constitution, an invasion of a known
+and avowed right inherent in the House as the representatives of the
+people," and expressed a hope that "they were not yet so infamous and
+abandoned as to relinquish this essential right," or to submit to "the
+annihilation of all their authority." Others called it "an affront which
+the House was bound to resent, and the more imperatively in consequence
+of the absence of a good understanding between the two Houses." And the
+Speaker, Sir John Cust, went beyond all his brother members in violence,
+declaring that "he would do his part in the business, and toss the bill
+over the table." The bill was rejected _nem. con._, and the Speaker
+tossed it over the table, several of the members on both sides of the
+question kicking it as they went out;[32] and to such a pitch of
+exasperation had they worked themselves up, that "the Game Bill, in
+which the Lords had made alterations, was served in a similar manner,"
+though those alterations only referred to the penalties to be imposed
+for violations of the Game-law, and could by no stretch of ingenuity be
+connected with any question of taxation.
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 16: A motion was, indeed, made (but the "Parliamentary
+History," xvi., 55, omits to state by whom) that the House should
+"humbly entreat his Majesty, out of his tender and paternal regard for
+his people, that he would be graciously pleased to name the person or
+persons whom, in his royal wisdom, he shall think fit to propose to the
+consideration of Parliament for the execution of those high trusts, this
+House apprehending it not warranted by precedent nor agreeable to the
+principles of this free constitution to vest in any person or persons
+not particularly named and approved of in Parliament the important
+offices of Regent of these kingdoms and guardian of the royal offspring
+heirs to the crown." But "it passed in the negative," probably, if we
+may judge by other divisions on motions made by the same party, by an
+overwhelming majority.]
+
+[Footnote 17: No one doubted that this choice had been made under the
+influence of Lord Bute, and was designed for the preservation of that
+influence.--Lord Stanhope, _History of England_, v., 41.]
+
+[Footnote 18: In his speech in the House of Lords on the Regency Bill of
+1840, the Duke of Sussex stated that George III. had nominated the Queen
+as Regent in the first instance, and, in the event of her death, the
+Princess Dowager.]
+
+[Footnote 19: "Lives of the Chancellors," c. cxli.]
+
+[Footnote 20: It appears from these dates that it was not yet understood
+that Parliament could not be prorogued for a longer period than forty
+days.]
+
+[Footnote 21: These words occur in a speech attributed to Lord
+Mansfield. There is no detailed account of the debates on this subject
+in either House. All that exists in the "Parliamentary History" is a
+very brief abstract of the discussion in the Commons, and a document
+occupying above sixty pages of the same work (pp. 251-314), entitled "A
+Speech on behalf of the Constitution against the Suspending and
+Dispensing Prerogative," etc., with a foot-note explaining that "this
+speech was supposed to be penned by Lord Mansfield, but was, in fact,
+written by Mr. Macintosh, assisted by Lord Temple and Lord Lyttleton."
+It certainly seems to contain internal evidence that it was not written
+by any lawyer, from the sneers at and denunciations of lawyers which it
+contains, as a class of men who "have often appeared to be the worst
+guardians of the constitution, and too frequently the wickedest enemies
+to, and most treacherous betrayers of, the liberties of their country."
+But, by whomsoever it was "penned" and published, the arguments which it
+contains against the dispensing power were, probably, those which had
+been urged by the great Chief-justice, and as such I have ventured to
+cite them here.]
+
+[Footnote 22: In his "Lives of the Chief-justices" (c. xxxvi., life of
+Lord Mansfield), Lord Campbell says, with reference to this case: "The
+Chief-justice's only considerable public exhibition during this period
+was his attack on the unconstitutional assertion of Lord Chatham and
+Lord Camden, that, in a case of great public emergency, the crown could
+by law dispense with an act of parliament. The question arising from the
+embargo on the exportation of corn, in consequence of apprehended
+famine, he proved triumphantly that, although the measure was expedient
+and proper, it was a violation of law, and required to be sanctioned by
+an act of indemnity." And Lord Campbell adds, in a note: "This doctrine,
+acted upon in 1827, during the administration of Mr. Canning, and on
+several subsequent occasions, is now universally taken for
+constitutional law" (ii., 468).]
+
+[Footnote 23: To adduce a single instance, worthy of remark as affecting
+the personal liberty of the subject, in 1818 a bill of indemnity was
+passed to sanction the action of the ministry in arresting and detaining
+in prison, without bringing them to trial, several persons accused of
+being implicated in seditious proceedings (_vide infra_).]
+
+[Footnote 24: Vol. xvii., 304.]
+
+[Footnote 25: The case is mentioned by Lord Campbell in his "Lives of
+the Chancellors," c. cxxi. (life of Lord Macclesfield) and c. cxxiv.
+(life of Lord Chancellor King).]
+
+[Footnote 26: In fact, however, the age at which a young prince was
+considered competent to exercise the royal authority in person had been
+fixed at eighteen; and it is so stated in the speech in which the King,
+in 1765, recommended the appointment of a Regent to Parliament.--
+_Parliamentary History_, xvi., 52.]
+
+[Footnote 27: This idea was expanded into an epigram, which appeared in
+most of the daily papers, and has been thought worthy of being preserved
+in the "Parliamentary History," xvii., 401 (note):
+
+  "Quoth Dick to Tom, 'This act appears
+    Absurd, as I'm alive,
+  To take the crown at eighteen years,
+    A wife at twenty-five.
+  The mystery how shall we explain?
+    For sure, as Dowdeswell said,
+  Thus early if they're fit to _reign_,
+    They must be fit to _wed_.'
+  Quoth Tom to Dick, 'Thou art a fool,
+    And nothing know'st of life;
+  Alas! it's easier far to rule
+    A kingdom than a wife.'"]
+
+[Footnote 28: It is remarkable that this clause on one occasion proved
+an obstacle to the punishment of the abettors of such a marriage. In
+1793 the Duke of Sussex married Lady Augusta Murray, first at Rome, and
+afterward, by banns, at St. George's, Hanover Square. And when the
+affair came to be investigated by the Privy Council, Lord Thurlow
+denounced the conduct of the pair in violent terms, and angrily asked
+the Attorney-general, Sir John Scott, why he had not prosecuted all the
+parties concerned in this abominable marriage. Sir John's reply, as he
+reported it himself, was sufficiently conclusive: "I answered that it
+was a very difficult business to prosecute; that the act, it was
+understood, had been drawn by Lord Mansfield, the Attorney-general
+Thurlow, and the Solicitor-general Wedderburn, who, unluckily, had made
+all persons present at the marriage guilty of felony. And as nobody
+could prove the marriage except a person who had been present at it,
+there could be no prosecution, because nobody present could be compelled
+to be a witness."--THORP'S _Life of Eldon_, i., 235.]
+
+[Footnote 29: A protest against the bill, entered by fourteen peers,
+including one bishop (of Bangor), denounced it, among other objections,
+as "contrary to the original inherent rights of human nature ...
+exceeding the power permitted by Divine Providence to human legislation
+... and shaking many of the foundations of law, religion, and public
+security."--_Parliamentary History_, xvii., 391.]
+
+[Footnote 30: The import duty on wheat was fixed at 6_d_. a quarter on
+grain, and 2_d_. per cwt. on flour, when the price of wheat in the
+kingdom should be at or above 48s.; when it was at or above 44s., the
+exportation was to be altogether prohibited.--_Parliamentary History_,
+xvii., 476.]
+
+[Footnote 31: See Hallam, "Constitutional History," iii., 38-46, ed.
+1833, where, as far as the imperfection of our early Parliamentary
+records allows, he traces the origin of the assertion of this peculiar
+privilege by the Commons, especially referring to a discussion of the
+proper limits of this privilege in several conferences between the two
+Houses; where, as on some other occasions, he sees, in the assertion of
+their alleged rights by the Commons, "more disposition to make
+encroachments than to guard against those of others." A few years before
+(in 1763), the House of Lords showed that they had no doubt of their
+right to reject a money-bill, since they divided on the Cider Bill,
+which came under that description. As, however, the bill was passed,
+that division was not brought under the notice of the House. But in
+1783, in the time of the Coalition Ministry, the peers having made
+amendments on the American Intercourse Bill, "the Speaker observed that,
+as the bill empowered the crown to impose duties, it was, strictly
+speaking, a money-bill, and therefore the House could not, consistently
+with its own orders, suffer the Lords to make any amendments on it, and
+he recommended that the consideration of their amendments should be
+postponed for three months, and in the mean time a new bill framed
+according to the Lords' amendments should be passed." The recommendation
+was approved by Mr. Pitt, as leader of the Opposition, and approved and
+acted on by Mr. Fox, as leader of the ministry in that House. But, at
+the same time, Mr. Fox fully admitted the right of the Lords to discuss
+such questions, "for it would be very absurd indeed to send a loan bill
+to the Lords for their concurrence, and at the same time deprive them of
+the right of deliberation. To lay down plans and schemes for loans
+belonged solely to the Commons; and he was willing, therefore, that the
+amended bill should be rejected, though he was of opinion that the order
+of the House respecting money-bills was often too strictly construed."
+And he immediately moved for leave to bring in a new bill, which was
+verbatim the same with the amended bill sent down by the
+Lords.--_Parliamentary History_, xxiii., 895. The question was revived
+in the present reign, on the refusal of the Lords to concur in the
+abolition of the duty on paper, when the whole subject was discussed
+with such elaborate minuteness, and with so much more command of temper
+than was shown on the present occasion, that it will be better to defer
+the examination of the principle involved till we come to the history of
+that transaction.]
+
+[Footnote 32: "Parliamentary History," xvii., 515.]
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+
+Mr. Grenville imposes a Duty on Stamps in the North American
+Colonies.--Examination of Dr. Franklin.--Lord Rockingham's Ministry
+Repeals the Duty.--Lord Mansfield affirms a Virtual Representation in
+the Colonies.--Mr. C. Townsend imposes Import Duties in America.--After
+some Years, the Civil War breaks out.--Hanoverian Troops are sent to
+Gibraltar.--The Employment of Hanoverian Regiments at Gibraltar and
+Minorca.--End of the War.--Colonial Policy of the Present
+Reign.--Complaints of the Undue Influence of the Crown.--Motions for
+Parliamentary Reform.--Mr. Burke's Bill for Economical Reform.--Mr.
+Dunning's Resolution on the Influence of the Crown.--Rights of the Lords
+on Money-bills.--The Gordon Riots.
+
+
+But during these years another matter had been gradually forcing its way
+to the front, which, though at first it attracted but comparatively
+slight notice, when it came to a head, absorbed for several years the
+whole attention, not only of these kingdoms, but of foreign countries
+also. It was originally--in appearance, at least--merely a dispute
+between Great Britain and her Colonies in North America on the mode of
+obtaining a small revenue from them. But, in its progress, it eventually
+involved us in a foreign war of great magnitude, and thus became the one
+subject of supreme interest to every statesman in Europe. England had
+not borne her share in the seven years' war without a considerable
+augmentation of the national debt, and a corresponding increase in the
+amount of yearly revenue which it had become necessary to raise;[33] and
+Mr. Grenville, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, had to devise the means
+of meeting the demand. A year before, he had supported with great warmth
+the proposal of Sir Francis Dashwood, his predecessor at the Exchequer,
+to lay a new tax upon cider. Now that he himself had succeeded to that
+office, he cast his eyes across the Atlantic, and, on the plea that the
+late war had to a certain extent been undertaken for the defence of the
+Colonies in North America, he proposed to make them bear a share in the
+burden caused by enterprises from which they had profited. Accordingly,
+in March, 1764, he proposed a series of resolutions imposing a variety
+of import duties on different articles of foreign produce imported into
+"the British Colonies and plantations in America," and also export
+duties on a few articles of American growth when "exported or conveyed
+to any other place except to Great Britain." Another resolution affirmed
+"that, toward defraying the said expense, it might be proper to charge
+certain stamp-duties in the said Colonies and plantations."
+
+The resolutions imposing import and export duties were passed by both
+Houses almost without comment. That relating to a stamp-duty he did not
+press at the moment, announcing that he postponed it for a year, in
+order to ascertain in what light it would be regarded by the Colonists
+themselves; and as most, if not all, of the Colonies had a resident
+agent in London, he called them together, explained to them the object
+and anticipated result of the new imposition (for such he admitted it to
+be), and requested them to communicate his views to their constituents,
+adding an offer that, if they should prefer any other tax likely to be
+equally productive, he should be desirous to consult their wishes in the
+matter.
+
+He probably regarded such language on his part as a somewhat superfluous
+exercise of courtesy or conciliation, so entire was his conviction of
+the omnipotence of Parliament, and of the impossibility of any loyal man
+or body of men calling its power in question. But he was greatly
+deceived. His message was received in America with universal
+dissatisfaction. Of the thirteen States which made up the body of
+Colonies, there was scarcely one whose Assembly did not present a
+petition against the proposed measure, and against any other which might
+be considered as an alternative. Grenville, however, was not a man to be
+moved by petitions or remonstrances. He was rather one whom opposition
+of any kind hardened in his purpose; and, as no substitute had been
+suggested, at the opening of the session of 1765 he proposed a series of
+resolutions requisite to give effect to the vote of the previous year,
+and imposing "certain stamp-duties and other duties" on the settlements
+in America, perhaps thinking to render his disregard of the objections
+which had been made less unpalatable by the insertion of words binding
+the government to apply the sums to be thus raised to "the expenses of
+defending, protecting, and securing" the Colonies themselves. The
+resolutions were passed, as the "Parliamentary History" records, "almost
+without debate," on the 6th of March.[34] But the intelligence was
+received in every part of the Colonies with an indignant
+dissatisfaction, which astonished even their own agents in England.[35]
+Formidable riots broke out in several provinces. In Massachusetts the
+man who had been appointed Distributor of Stamps was burnt in effigy;
+the house of the Lieutenant-governor was attacked by a furious mob, who
+avowed their determination to murder him if he fell into their hands;
+and resolutions were passed by the Assemblies of the different States to
+convene a General Congress at New York in the autumn, to organize a
+resistance to the tax, and to take the general state of affairs into
+consideration.
+
+Before, however, that time came, a series of events having no connection
+with these transactions had led to a change of ministry in England, and
+the new cabinet was less inclined to carry matters with a high hand.
+Indeed, even the boldest statesman could hardly have learned the state
+of feeling which had been excited in America without apprehension, and
+those who had the chief weight in the new administration were not men to
+imperil the state by an insistance on abstract theories of right and
+prerogative. Accordingly, when, after Lord Rockingham had become
+Prime-minister, Parliament met in December, 1765, the royal speech
+recommended the state of affairs in America to the consideration of
+Parliament (a recommendation which manifestly implied a disposition on
+the part of the King's advisers to induce the House of Commons to
+retrace its steps), papers were laid before Parliament, and witnesses
+from America were examined, and among them a man who had already won a
+high reputation by his scientific acquirements, but who had not been
+previously prominent as a politician, Dr. Benjamin Franklin. He had come
+over to England as agent for Pennsylvania, and his examination, as
+preserved in the "Parliamentary History," may be taken as a complete
+statement of the matter in dispute from the American point of view, and
+of the justification which the Colonists conceived themselves to have
+for refusing to submit to pay such a tax as had now been imposed upon
+them. At a later day he was one of the most zealous, as he was probably
+one of the earliest, advocates of separation from England; but as yet
+neither his language nor his actions afforded any trace of such a
+feeling.
+
+He affirmed[36] the general temper of the Colonists toward Great Britain
+to have been, till this act was passed, the best in the world. They
+considered themselves as a part of the British empire, and as having one
+common interest with it. They did not consider themselves as foreigners.
+They were jealous for the honor and prosperity of this nation, and
+always were, and always would be, ready to support it as far as their
+little power went. They considered the Parliament of Great Britain as
+the great bulwark and security of their liberties and privileges, and
+always spoke of it with the utmost respect and veneration. They had
+given a practical proof of their goodwill by having raised, clothed, and
+paid during the last war nearly 25,000 men, and spent many millions; nor
+had any Assembly of any Colony ever refused duly to support the
+government by proper allowances from time to time to public officers.
+They had always been ready, and were ready now, to tax themselves. The
+Colonies had Assemblies of their own, which were their Parliaments. They
+were, in that respect, in the same situation as Ireland. Their
+Assemblies had a right to levy money on the subject, then to grant to
+the crown, and, indeed, had constantly done so; and he himself was
+specially instructed by the Assembly of his own State to assure the
+ministry that, as they always had done, so they should always think it
+their duty to grant such aids to the crown as were suitable to their
+circumstances and abilities, whenever called upon for the purpose in a
+constitutional manner; and that instruction he had communicated to the
+ministry. But the Colonies objected to Parliament laying on them such a
+tax as that imposed by the Stamp Act. Some duties, they admitted, the
+Parliament had a right to impose, but he drew a distinction between
+"those duties which were meant to regulate commerce and internal taxes."
+The authority of Parliament to regulate commerce had never been disputed
+by the Colonists. The sea belonged to Britain. She maintained by her
+fleets the safety of navigation on it; she kept it clear of pirates; she
+might, therefore, have a natural and equitable right to some toll or
+duty, on merchandise carried through that part of her dominions, toward
+defraying the expenses she was at in ships to maintain the safety of
+that carriage. But the case of imposition of internal taxes was wholly
+different from this. The Colonists held that, by the charters which at
+different times had been granted to the different States, they were
+entitled to all the privileges and liberties of Englishmen. They found
+in the Great Charters, and the Petition and Declarations of Right, that
+one of the privileges of English subjects is that they are not to be
+taxed but by their common consent; and these rights and privileges had
+been confirmed by the charters which at different times had been granted
+to the different States. In reply to a question put to him, he allowed
+that in the Pennsylvania charter there was a clause by which the King
+granted that he would levy no taxes on the inhabitants unless it were
+with the consent of the Colonial Assembly, or by an act of Parliament;
+words which certainly seemed to reserve a right of taxation to the
+British Parliament; but he also demonstrated that, in point of fact, the
+latter part of the clause had never been acted on, and the Colonists
+had, therefore, relied on it, from the first settlement of the province,
+that the Parliament never would nor could, by the color of that clause
+in the charter, assume a right of taxing them till it had qualified
+itself to exercise such right by admitting representatives from the
+people to be taxed. And, in addition to objections on principle, he
+urged some that he regarded as of great force as to the working of this
+particular tax imposed by the Stamp Act. It was not an equal tax, as the
+greater part of the revenue derived from it must arise from lawsuits for
+the recovery of debts, and be paid by the lower sort of people; it was a
+heavy tax on the poor, and a tax on them for being poor. In the back
+settlements, where the population was very thin, the inhabitants would
+often be unable to get stamps without taking a long journey for the
+purpose. The scarcity of specie, too, in the country would cause the
+pressure to be felt with great severity, as, in his opinion, there was
+not gold and silver enough in the Colonies to pay the stamp-duty for a
+single year. In reply to another question, whether the Colonists would
+be satisfied with a repeal of the Stamp Act without a formal
+renunciation of the abstract right of Parliament to impose it, he
+replied that he believed they would be satisfied. He thought the
+resolutions of right would give them very little concern, if they were
+never attempted to be carried into practice. The Colonies would probably
+consider themselves in the same situation in that respect as Ireland.
+They knew that the English Parliament claimed the same right with regard
+to Ireland, but that it never exercised it; and they might believe that
+they would never exercise it in the Colonies any more than in Ireland.
+Indeed, they would think that it never could exercise such a right till
+representatives from the Colonies should be admitted into Parliament,
+and that whenever an occasion arose to make Parliament regard the
+taxation of the Colonies as indispensable, representatives would be
+ordered.
+
+This last question put to the witness, like several others in the course
+of his examination, had been framed with the express purpose of
+eliciting an answer to justify the determination on the subject to which
+Lord Rockingham and his colleagues had come. It could not be denied that
+the government was placed in a situation of extreme difficulty--
+difficulty created, in part, by the conduct of the Colonists themselves.
+That, as even their most uncompromising advocate, Mr. Pitt, admitted,
+had been imprudent and intemperate, though it was the imprudence of men
+who "had been driven to madness by injustice." On the one hand, to
+repeal an act the opposition to which had been marked by fierce riots,
+such as those of Boston, and even in the Assemblies of some of the
+States by language scarcely short of treason,[37] seemed a concession to
+intimidation scarcely compatible with the maintenance of the dignity of
+the crown or the legitimate authority of Parliament. On the other hand,
+to persist in the retention of a tax which the whole population affected
+by it was evidently determined to resist to the uttermost, was to incur
+the still greater danger of rebellion and civil war. In this dilemma,
+the ministers resolved on a course calculated, as they conceived, to
+avoid both evils, by combining a satisfaction of the complaints of the
+Colonists with an assertion of the absolute supremacy of the British
+crown and Parliament for every purpose. And on February 24, 1766, the
+Secretary of State brought in a bill which, after declaring, in its
+first clause, "that the King's Majesty, by and with the consent of the
+Lords spiritual and temporal, and Commons of Great Britain, in
+Parliament assembled, had, hath, and of right ought to have, full power
+and authority to make laws and statutes of sufficient force and validity
+to bind the Colonists and people of America, subjects of the crown of
+Great Britain, in all cases whatsoever," proceeded to repeal the Stamp
+Act, giving a strong proof of the sincerity of the desire to conciliate
+the Colonists by the unusual step of fixing the second reading of the
+bill for the next day.
+
+But in its different clauses it encountered a twofold opposition, which
+he had, probably, not anticipated. It is unnecessary to notice that
+which rested solely on the inexpediency of repealing the Stamp Act, "the
+compulsory enforcement of which was required by the honor and dignity of
+the kingdom." But the first clause was even more strenuously resisted,
+on grounds which its opponents affirmed to rest on the fundamental
+principles of the constitution. It was urged in the House of Commons by
+Mr. Pitt that, "as the Colonies were not represented in Parliament,
+Great Britain had no legal right nor power to lay a tax upon them--that
+taxation is no part of the governing or legislative power. Taxes," said
+the great orator, "are the voluntary gift and grant of the Commons
+alone. In legislation the three estates of the realm are alike
+concerned; but the concurrence of the peers and the crown to a tax is
+only necessary to clothe it with the form of a law; the gift and grant
+is in the Commons alone.... The distinction between legislation and
+taxation is essentially necessary to liberty."
+
+Mr. Pitt had no claim to be considered as a great authority in the
+principles of constitutional law. George II., slight as was his
+political knowledge or wisdom, complained on one occasion of the
+ignorance of a Secretary of State who had never read Vattel; and in this
+very debate he even boasted of his ignorance of "law-cases and acts of
+Parliament." But his coadjutor in the House of Lords (Lord Camden, at
+this time Chief-justice of the Common Pleas) owed the chief part of the
+respect in which he was held to his supposed excellence as a
+constitutional lawyer, and he fully endorsed and expanded Pitt's
+arguments when the bill came up to the House of Lords. He affirmed that
+he spoke as "the defender of the law and the constitution; that, as the
+affair was of the greatest consequence, and in its consequences might
+involve the fate of kingdoms, he had taken the strictest review of his
+arguments, he had examined and re-examined all his authorities; and that
+his searches had more and more convinced him that the British Parliament
+had no right to tax the Americans. The Stamp Act was absolutely illegal,
+contrary to the fundamental laws of nature, contrary to the fundamental
+laws of this constitution--a constitution governed on the eternal and
+immutable laws of nature. The doctrine which he was asserting was not
+new; it was as old as the constitution; it grew up with it; indeed, it
+was its support. Taxation and representation are inseparably united. God
+hath joined them; no British government can put them asunder. To
+endeavor to do so is to stab our very vitals." And he objected to the
+first clause (that which declared the power and right to tax), on the
+ground that if the ministers "wantonly pressed this declaration,
+although they were now repealing the Stamp Act, they might pass it again
+in a month." He even argued that "they must have future taxation in
+view, or they would hardly assert their right to enjoy the pleasure of
+offering an insult." He was answered by Lord Northington (the
+Chancellor) and by Lord Mansfield (the Chief-justice), both of whom
+supported the motion to repeal the tax, but who also agreed in denying
+the soundness of his doctrine that, as far as the power was concerned,
+there was any distinction between a law to tax and a law for any other
+purpose; and Lord Mansfield farther denied the validity of the argument
+which it had been attempted to found on the circumstance that the
+Colonies were not represented in Parliament, propounding, on the
+contrary, what Lord Campbell calls "his doctrine of virtual
+representation." "There can," said he, "be no doubt but that the
+inhabitants of the Colonies are represented in Parliament, as the
+greatest part of the people of England are represented, among nine
+millions of whom there are eight who have no votes in electing members
+of Parliament. Every objection, therefore, to the dependency of the
+Colonies upon Parliament which arises upon the ground of representation
+goes to the whole present constitution of Great Britain.... For what
+purpose, then, are arguments drawn from a distinction in which there is
+no real difference of a virtual and an actual representation? A member
+of Parliament chosen for any borough represents not only the
+constituents and inhabitants of that particular place, but he represents
+the inhabitants of every other borough in Great Britain. He represents
+the City of London and all the other Commons of the land, and the
+inhabitants of all the colonies and dominions of Great Britain, and is
+in duty and conscience bound to take care of their interests."
+
+Lord Mansfield's doctrine of a virtual representation of the Colonies
+must be admitted to be overstrained. The analogy between the case of
+colonists in a country from no part of which representatives are sent to
+Parliament, and that of a borough or county where some classes of the
+population which may, in a sense, be regarded as spokesmen or agents of
+the rest form a constituency and return members, must be allowed to
+fail; yet the last sentences of this extract are worth preserving, as
+laying down the important constitutional principle, subsequently
+expanded and enforced with irresistible learning and power of argument
+by Burke, that a member of the House of Commons is not a delegate,
+bound, under all circumstances, to follow the opinions or submit to the
+dictation of his constituents, but that from the moment of his election
+he is a councillor of the whole kingdom, bound to exercise an
+independent judgment for the interests of the whole people, rather than
+to guide himself by the capricious or partial judgments of a small
+section of it. But in its more immediate objects--that of establishing
+the two principles, that the constitution knows of no limitation to the
+authority of Parliament, and of no distinction between the power of
+taxation and that of any other kind of legislation--Lord Mansfield's
+speech is now universally admitted to have been unanswerable.[38]
+
+The abstract right was unquestionably on the side of the minister and
+the Parliament who had imposed the tax. But he is not worthy of the name
+of statesman who conceives absolute rights and metaphysical distinctions
+to be the proper foundation for measures of government, and pays no
+regard to custom, to precedent, to the habits and feelings of the people
+to be governed; who, disregarding the old and most true adage, _summum
+jus summa injuria_, omits to take into his calculations the expediency
+of his actions when legislating for a nation which he is in the daily
+habit of weighing in his private affairs. The art or science of
+government are phrases in common use; but they would be void of meaning
+if all that is requisite be to ascertain the strict right or power, and
+then unswervingly to act upon it in all its rigor. And, therefore, while
+it must be admitted that the character of the power vested in King,
+Lords, and Commons assembled in Parliament is unlimited and illimitable,
+and that the legal competency to enact a statute depends in no degree
+whatever on the wisdom or folly, the justice or wickedness, of the
+statute, the advice given to a constitutional sovereign by his advisers
+must be guided by other considerations. To quote by anticipation the
+language addressed to the Commons on this subject by Burke eight years
+afterward, the proper policy was "to leave the Americans as they
+anciently stood ... To be content to bind America by laws of trade.
+Parliament had always done it. And this should be the reason for binding
+their trade. Not to burden them by taxes; Parliament was not used to do
+so from the beginning; and this should be the reason for not taxing.
+These are the arguments of states and kingdoms."[39]
+
+The ministry were strong enough to carry their resolutions through both
+Houses. Their measure was divided into two acts, one known as the
+Declaratory Act, asserting the absolute and universal authority of
+Parliament; the other repealing the Stamp Act of the preceding year. And
+both were passed without alteration, though the Lords divided against
+them on both the second and third readings of the bill for repeal
+founded on them,[40] some of them entering long protests in the journals
+of the House. The right to tax was asserted, but the tax itself was
+repealed. And Franklin's estimate of the feelings on the subject
+entertained by his countrymen was fully verified by the reception which
+the intelligence met with in the Colonies. To quote the description of
+Lord Stanhope: "In America the repeal of the Stamp Act was received with
+universal joy and acclamation. Fireworks and festivals celebrated the
+good news, while addresses and thanks to the King were voted by all the
+Assemblies.... The words of the Declaratory Act, indeed, gave the
+Americans slight concern. They fully believed that no practical
+grievance could arise from it. They looked upon it merely as a salve to
+the wounded pride of England; as only that 'bridge of gold' which,
+according to the old French saying, should always be allowed to a
+retreating assailant."[41]
+
+A recent writer, however, has condemned the addition of the declaration
+of the abstract right to tax with great vehemence. "Nothing," says Lord
+Campbell,[42] "could exceed the folly of accompanying the repeal of the
+Stamp Act with the statutable declaration of the abstract right to tax."
+But it does not seem difficult to justify the conduct of the ministry in
+this particular. For, besides the great weight deservedly attached to
+Franklin's assurance that the declaration would not be objected to by
+the Colonists, and besides the consideration that, on a general view, it
+was desirable, if not indispensable, to impress on all classes of
+subjects, whether at home or abroad, the constitutional doctrine of the
+omnipotence of Parliament, the line of argument adopted by Mr. Pitt and
+Lord Camden, in denying that omnipotence, left the ministers no
+alternative but that of asserting it, unless they were prepared to
+betray their trust as guardians of the constitution. Forbearance to
+insist on the Declaratory Act could not fail to have been regarded as an
+acquiescence on their part in a doctrine which Lord Campbell in the same
+breath admits to be false. It may be added, as a consideration of no
+small practical weight, that, without such a Declaratory Act, the King
+would have been very reluctant to consent to the other and more
+important Repealing Act. And, on the whole, the conduct of the ministry
+may, we think, be regarded as the wisest settlement both of the law and
+of the practice. It asserted the law in a manner which offended no one;
+and it made a precedent for placing the spirit of statesmanship above
+the letter of the law, and for forbearing to put forth in its full
+strength the prerogatives whose character was not fully understood by
+those who might be affected by them, and also could plead that
+Parliament itself had contributed to lead them to misunderstand it by
+its own conduct in never before exerting it.
+
+For the moment, then, contentment and tranquillity were restored in the
+Colonies. Unhappily, they were not lasting. The same year which saw the
+triumph of the Rockingham administration in the repeal of the Stamp Act,
+witnessed also its fall before a discreditable intrigue. And the
+ministry which succeeded it had not been a year in office before the new
+Chancellor of the Exchequer, Charles Townsend, revived the discontents
+in America which Lord Rockingham had appeased. It cannot be said,
+however, that the blame should all belong to him; or that the Rockingham
+party in the House of Commons were entirely free from a share in it.
+They were--not unnaturally, perhaps--greatly irritated at the intrigue
+by which Lord Chatham had superseded them, and were not disinclined to
+throw difficulties in the way of their successors, for which the events
+of the next year afforded more than one opportunity. Lord Chatham, as
+has been mentioned, was universally recognized as the chief of the new
+ministry, though he abstained from taking the usual office of First Lord
+of the Treasury, and contented himself with the Privy Seal; but he had
+constructed it of such discordant elements[43] that no influence but his
+own could preserve consistency in its acts or harmony among its members,
+as nothing but his name could give it consideration either in Parliament
+or in the country. In the first months of the next year, 1767, he was
+attacked with an illness which for a time disabled him from attending
+the cabinet, being, apparently, the forerunner of that more serious
+malady which, before the end of the summer, compelled his long
+retirement from public life; and the Opposition took advantage of the
+state of disorganization and weakness which his illness caused among his
+colleagues, to defeat them on the Budget in the House of Commons, by an
+amendment to reduce the land-tax, which caused a deficiency in the
+supplies of half a million. This deficiency it, of course, became
+necessary to meet by some fresh tax; and Townsend--who, though endowed
+with great richness of eloquence, was of an imprudent, not to say rash,
+temper, and was possessed of too thorough a confidence in his own
+ingenuity and fertility of resource ever to be inclined to take into
+consideration any objections to which his schemes might be
+liable--proposed to raise a portion of the money which was needed by
+taxes on glass, paper, tea, and one or two other articles, to be paid as
+import duties in the American Colonies. His colleagues, and especially
+the Duke of Grafton himself, the First Lord of the Treasury, and as such
+the nominal Prime-minister, having been also, as Secretary of State, a
+member of Lord Rockingham's ministry, which had repealed the former
+taxes, did not consent to the measure without great and avowed
+reluctance; but yielded their own judgment to the strong feeling in its
+favor which notoriously existed in the House of Commons.[44] Indeed,
+that House passed the clauses imposing these import duties without
+hesitation, being, probably, influenced in no small degree by the
+evidence given in the preceding year by Dr. Franklin, who, as has been
+already seen, had explained that the Colonists drew a distinction
+between what he called "internal taxes" and import duties "intended to
+regulate commerce," and that to the latter class they were not inclined
+to object. And a second consideration was, that these new duties were
+accompanied and counterbalanced by a reduction of some other taxes; so
+that the ministry contended that the effect of these financial measures,
+taken altogether, would be to lower to the Colonists the price of the
+articles affected by them rather than to raise it. But one of the
+resolutions adopted provided that the whole of the money to be raised
+from these taxes should not be spent in America, but that, after making
+provision for certain Colonial objects specified, "the residue of such
+duties should be paid into the receipt of his Majesty's Exchequer, and
+there reserved, to be from time to time disposed of by Parliament toward
+defraying the necessary expenses of defending, protecting, and securing
+the said Colonies and plantations." And this clause seems to have been
+understood as designed to provide means for augmenting the number of
+regular troops to be maintained in the Colonies, whose employment in the
+recent disturbances had made them more unpopular than formerly.[45]
+
+At all events, the intelligence of these new taxes, though only import
+duties, found the Colonists in a humor to resist any addition of any
+kind to their financial burdens. The events of the last two years had
+taught them their strength. It was undeniable that the repeal of the
+Stamp Act had been extorted by the riots in Boston and other places, and
+the success of this system of intimidation could not fail to encourage
+its repetition. Accordingly, the news of this fresh attempt at taxation
+was met by a unanimous determination to resist it. Newspaper writers and
+pamphleteers denounced not only the duties but the ministry which
+imposed them. Petitions from almost every State were sent over to
+England, addressed to the King and to the Parliament; but the violent
+temper of the leaders of the populace was not content to wait for
+answers to them. Associations were at once formed in Boston and one or
+two other cities, where resolutions were adopted in the spirit of
+retaliation (as their framers avowed), to desist from the importation of
+any articles of British commerce, and to rely for the future on American
+manufactures. The principal Custom-house officers at Boston were badly
+beaten, and others were compelled to seek refuge in a man-of-war which
+happened to be in the harbor.
+
+It would be painful, and at the present day useless, to trace the steps
+by which these local disturbances gradually grew into one general
+insurrection. The spirit of resistance was undoubtedly fanned by a party
+which from the first contemplated a total separation from England as its
+ultimate result,[46] if, indeed, they had not conceived the design even
+before Grenville had given the first provocation to discontent. But the
+Colonists were not without advocates in England, even among the members
+of the government. The Duke of Grafton, while he remained
+Prime-minister, was eager to withdraw all the duties of which they
+complained; but he was overruled by the majority of his colleagues. He
+prevailed, however, so far that Lord Hillsborough, the Secretary of
+State, was authorized to write a circular-letter to the governors of the
+different provinces, in which he disowned, in the most distinct language
+possible, "a design to propose to Parliament to lay any farther taxes
+upon America for the purpose of raising a revenue," and promised for the
+next session a repeal of all the taxes except that on tea; and when the
+Duke retired from the Treasury, and was succeeded by Lord North, that
+statesman himself brought forward the promised repeal in an elaborate
+speech,[47] in which he explained that the duty on tea, which he alone
+proposed to retain, had been originally a boon to the Americans rather
+than an injury, as being accompanied by the removal of a far heavier
+tax. But he admitted that even that consideration was not the one which
+influenced him in his opinion that that duty should be maintained, so
+greatly was the perception that the real object of those who complained
+of it was, not the redress of a grievance, but the extinction of a right
+which was an essential part of "the controlling supremacy of England."
+The fact that the right to tax had been denied made it a positive duty
+on the part of the English minister to exert that right. "To temporize
+would be to yield, and the authority of the mother country, if now
+unsupported, would be relinquished forever." And he avowed his idea of
+the policy proper to be pursued to be "to retain the right of taxing
+America, but to give it every relief that might be consistent with the
+welfare of the mother country." He carried his resolution, though the
+minority--which on this occasion was led by Mr. Pownall, who had himself
+been Governor of Massachusetts, and who moved an amendment to include
+tea in the list of taxes proposed to be repealed--was stronger than
+usual.[48] But the concession failed to conciliate a single Colonist; it
+had become, as Burke said four years afterward, a matter of feeling,[49]
+and the irritation fed on itself, till, in 1773, a fresh act, empowering
+the East India Company to export tea to the Colonies direct from their
+own warehouses without its being subject to any duty in England--which
+Lord North undoubtedly intended as a boon to the Colonists--only
+increased the exasperation. The ships which brought the tea to Boston
+were boarded and seized by a formidable body of rioters disguised as
+native savages, and the tea was thrown into the sea. The intelligence
+was received in England with very different feelings by the different
+parties in the state. The ministers conceived themselves forced to
+assert the dignity of the crown, and proposed bills to inflict severe
+punishment on both the City of Boston and the whole Province of
+Massachusetts. The Opposition insisted on removing the cause of these
+disturbances by a total repeal of the tea-duty. The minister prevailed
+by a far larger majority than before, but his success only increased the
+exasperation in the Colonies; and it was an evil omen for peace that the
+leaders of the resistance began to search the records of the English
+Long Parliament "for the revolutionary precedents and forms of the
+Puritans of that day."[50] The next year saw fresh attempts to procure
+the repeal of the obnoxious tax rejected by the House of Commons; but,
+before the news of this division reached America, blood had already been
+shed.[51] Civil war began. The next year the Colonies, now united in one
+solid body, asserted their Independence, taking the title of the United
+States; and, though the government at home made more than one effort to
+recall the Colonists to their allegiance, and sent out commissioners of
+high rank, with large powers of concession; and though in one remarkable
+instance the mission of Mr. Penn, in the summer of 1775, with the
+petition to the King known as "the Olive Branch," seemed to show a
+desire for a maintenance of the union on the part of the Colonial
+Congress,[52] from the moment that the sword was drawn all hope of
+preserving the connection of the Colonies must have been seen by all
+reasonable men to be at an end.
+
+It is beside our present purpose to recapitulate the military operations
+of the war, though they verified another of Burke's warnings, that,
+supposing all moral difficulties to be got over, the ocean
+remained--that could not be dried up; and, as long as it continued in
+its present bed, so long all the causes which weakened authority by
+distance must continue. In fact, distance from England was one of the
+main circumstances which decided the contest. The slowness of
+communication--almost inconceivable to the present generation--rendered
+impossible that regularity in the transport of re-enforcements and
+supplies which was indispensable to success; and, added to the strange
+absence of military skill shown by every one of the British generals,
+soon placed the eventual issue of the war beyond a doubt. But one
+measure by which Lord North's government endeavored to provide for the
+strengthening of the army employed in America was so warmly challenged
+on constitutional grounds, that, though the fortunate separation of
+Hanover from Great Britain has prevented the possibility of any
+recurrence of such a proceeding, it would be improper to pass it over.
+
+In his speech at the opening of the autumnal session of 1775, the King
+announced to the Houses that, in order to leave a larger portion of the
+established forces of the kingdom available for service in North
+America, he "had sent a part of his Electoral troops to the garrisons of
+Gibraltar and Port Mahon." And the announcement aroused a vehement
+spirit of opposition, which found vent in the debates of both Houses on
+the address, and in two substantive motions condemning the measure as a
+violation of the constitution as established by the Bill of Rights and
+the Act of Settlement. It was strenuously maintained that both these
+statutes forbade the raising or keeping on foot a standing army in the
+kingdom in time of peace, and also the introduction of foreign troops
+into this kingdom, without the previous consent of Parliament, on any
+pretence whatever; and that "the fact that Gibraltar and Minorca were
+detached from these islands did not exclude them from the character of
+forming a part of the British dominion." And on these grounds Lord
+Shelburne, who supported Lord Rockingham on an amendment to the address,
+did not hesitate to denounce this employment of the Hanoverian
+regiments, as "fundamentally infringing the first principles of our
+government," and to declare it "high-treason against the constitution."
+He asked, "if there were a settled plan to subdue the liberties of this
+country, what surer means could be adopted than those of arming Roman
+Catholics and introducing foreign troops?"[53] and compared the measure
+under discussion to the case of the Dutch regiments of William III.,
+"which the Parliament wisely refused to allow him to retain." In the
+House of Commons, the Opposition was led by Sir James Lowther and
+Governor Johnstone, the latter of whom "appealed to the clause in the
+Act of Settlement which enacted that no person born of other than
+English parents should enjoy any office or place of trust, civil or
+military, within the kingdom;" and argued that to employ foreign
+officers in the protection of a British fortress was to place them in an
+"office of great military trust."
+
+The discussion brought to light strange divisions and weakness in the
+ministry. The ministerial lawyers differed on the grounds on which they
+relied, the Attorney-general, Thurlow, denying that the expression "this
+kingdom" in the Bill of Rights included the foreign dependencies of the
+crown[54] (a narrowing of its force which the Chancellor, Lord Bathurst,
+wholly repudiated), while the argument on which he himself insisted most
+strongly, that the existence of rebellion in America put end to all
+conditions which supposed the kingdom to be at peace, could not obtain
+the support of any one of his colleagues. But a plea urged by an
+independent member, Lord Denbigh, was regarded by some of the speakers
+with greater favor; his contention being that neither the Bill of Rights
+nor the Act of Settlement had been violated, since both those great
+statutes must be interpreted with reference to the time at which they
+were framed, and to the recent acts of James II. and William III., the
+recurrence of which they had been designed to prevent, acts to which the
+present proceeding bore no resemblance.
+
+A stronger justification, however, might have been found in very recent
+precedents. In 1745 the ministers had brought over six thousand Dutch
+troops to re-enforce the army of the Duke of Cumberland, and their act
+had been subsequently approved by Parliament. And in 1756, at the
+commencement of the seven years' war, when the loss of Minorca had led
+to such a distrust of our fleets that a French invasion was very
+generally apprehended, both Houses presented addresses to George II.,
+begging him to bring over some Hanoverian regiments; and, in the course
+of the next year, other addresses to thank him for compliance with their
+entreaty.
+
+Looking at the strict law of the question, few lawyers doubt that the
+expression "this kingdom" in the Bill of Rights includes the entire
+dominions of the crown, or that that great statute was undoubtedly
+intended to protect the privileges of all their inhabitants, whether
+within the four seas or in foreign settlements. But it also seems that
+the clause against raising and keeping on foot a standing army without
+the consent of Parliament was not more violated by keeping a mixed
+garrison in Gibraltar and Port Mahon than garrisons consisting of native
+soldiers only; and undoubtedly the keeping of an armed force in both
+these fortresses had been sanctioned by Parliament. Nor could the
+colonel of a foreign regiment in garrison under the command of a British
+governor be fairly said to be in an office of great military trust. So
+far, therefore, the charge against the ministry may be thought to have
+failed. But the accusation of having transgressed the clause which
+prohibits "the introduction of foreign troops into this kingdom without
+the previous consent of Parliament on any pretence whatever," must, on
+the other hand, be regarded as proved. And, indeed, Lord North himself
+may be taken to have shown some consciousness that it was so, since he
+justified his conduct in omitting to procure that previous consent by
+the necessity of the case, by the plea that, as Parliament was in
+vacation, the time which would have been consumed in waiting for its
+sanction would have neutralized the advantage desired from the
+employment of the Hanoverians, since the regiments which they were to
+replace at Gibraltar and Port Mahon could not, after such delay, have
+reached America in time to be of service; and since he also consented
+eventually to ask Parliament for an Act of Indemnity, the preamble of
+which affirmed the existence of doubts as to the legality of the step
+which had been taken. And the fate of this act afforded a still more
+striking proof of the divisions in the ministry, since, after Lord North
+himself had proposed it in the House of Commons, and it had been passed
+there by a large majority, it was rejected in the House of Lords, where
+his own colleagues, Lord Gower, Lord Suffolk, and Lord Weymouth, spoke
+and voted against it as needless, because, in their judgment, no doubt
+of the state of the law on the subject could exist.
+
+From a statesman-like point of view, the employment of the Hanoverians
+seems abundantly defensible, if force were still to be employed to bring
+back the Colonists to their obedience. The circumstance of their being
+subjects of our sovereign in his other character of Elector of Hanover,
+clearly distinguished it from the hiring of the Hessian and Brunswick
+mercenaries, which has been deservedly condemned. And, as the entire
+number fell short of two thousand,[55] Lord Shelburne's expression of
+fear for the liberties and religion of Englishmen was an absurd
+exaggeration. Moreover, the warm approval which, less than twenty years
+before, Parliament had given to the introduction of a far larger body of
+the same troops into England itself, justified the anticipation that a
+similar sanction would now be cheerfully given. That sanction--which,
+indeed, might have been thought to be invited by the announcement of the
+measure in the King's speech--was undoubtedly requisite. And, if it was,
+a Bill of Indemnity for having acted without it was equally necessary.
+But, as has been seen in the last chapter, for an administration, on
+urgent occasions, to take action on its own responsibility, and then to
+apply for indemnity, is a course in strict harmony with the practice of
+the constitution; and if in this instance the ministers are in any
+respect blamable, their error would seem to have been limited to their
+abstaining from instantly calling Parliament together to sanction their
+act, and being contented to wait for the ordinary time of the Houses
+meeting.
+
+The war, therefore, went on. The assertion of their independence by the
+Colonies divided, and, so far, weakened, the advocates of their cause in
+Parliament, one section of whom, led by Lord Chatham, regarded any
+diminution of our dominion as not only treasonable, but ruinous; on the
+other hand, it procured them the alliance of France and Spain. But it
+cannot be said that either of these incidents produced any practical
+effect on the result of the war. Lord Chatham's refusal to contemplate
+their independence could not retard its establishment; and the alliance
+of France and Spain, which brought nothing but disaster to those
+countries, could not accelerate it by a single moment. For nearly six
+years the war continued with alternations of success, the victories
+gained by the British arms being the more numerous, the triumphs of the
+Americans being incomparably the more important, involving as they did
+the surrender of two entire armies, the latter of which, that of Lord
+Cornwallis, in 1781, did, in fact, terminate the war, and with the war
+the existence of the ministry which had conducted it. A singularly rapid
+succession of new administrations ensued--so rapid that the negotiations
+for peace which the first, that of Lord Rockingham, opened, were not
+formally completed till the third,[56] known as the Coalition Ministry,
+was on the point of dismissal. It would be beside our purpose to enter
+into the details of the treaty which constituted the United States, as
+they were now called, a nation by our formal recognition of their
+independence. Even in that recognition, which was the most important
+article of the treaty, no constitutional principle was involved, though
+it affords the only instance in our history which can seem to throw a
+doubt on our inheritance of that capacity for government which the Roman
+poet claimed as, in ancient times, the peculiar attribute of his own
+countrymen. It presents the only instance of a loss of territory peopled
+by men who came of our blood, and who still spoke our language. It was a
+stern and severe lesson; and yet, fraught with discredit and disaster as
+it was, it nevertheless bore fruit in a later age which we may be
+excused for regarding as an example of the generally predominating
+influence of sober practical sense in our countrymen, when not led away
+by the temporary excitement of passion, as shown in our capacity to take
+home to ourselves and profit by the teachings of experience. The loss of
+the American Colonies was caused by the submission of the Parliament and
+nation to men of theory rather than of practice; ideologists, as
+Napoleon called them; doctrinaires, to use the modern expression; men
+who, because Parliament had an abstract right of universal legislation,
+regarded it as a full justification for insisting on its exercise,
+without giving a thought to the feelings, or prejudices, or habits of
+those who might be affected by their measures. Abstractedly considered,
+Lord Chatham and Lord Camden were undoubtedly wrong in denying the power
+of Parliament to tax the Colonies; but there was better judgment in
+their counsels, though founded on false premises, than in those of
+Grenville and Townsend, though theirs was the more correct view of the
+constitutional power of legislation. The two peers were wrong in their
+principle; the two Chancellors of the Exchequer were unwise in their
+application of their principle; and the practical error was the more
+disastrous one.
+
+It is now generally admitted that the true statesman-like course toward
+the Colonies was that adopted by Lord Rockingham and his colleagues in
+1765--to avoid weakening the supreme power of Parliament by any
+disavowal of the right to tax but to avoid imperilling the sovereign
+authority of the King by a novel exertion of it. As much of our common
+English law is made up of precedent, so, in a still greater degree, are
+our feelings and ideas of our rights and privileges regulated by
+precedent. And we lost America because in 1764 and 1767 neither minister
+nor Parliament took men's feelings and prejudices into account. The loss
+of the United States, therefore, was a lesson not undeserved; and by our
+statesmen since that day it has been taken in the right spirit of
+profiting by its teaching as a guide to their own conduct. Since that
+day the enterprise of our people has planted our flag in regions far
+more distant, and has extended the dominion of our sovereign over
+provinces far more extensive than those which we then lost. And on some
+of the administrations of the present reign the duty has fallen of
+framing schemes of government for those new acquisitions, as also for
+some of those previously possessed. In how different a spirit from that
+which actuated the early ministers of George III.[57] those to whom the
+task was committed by Queen Victoria applied themselves to their task
+may be seen in a maxim laid down by the present Lord Grey, when he
+presided at the Colonial Office (1846-1852), that "the success of free
+institutions in any country depends far less upon the particular form of
+those institutions than upon the character of the people on whom they
+are conferred." But how he and others in the same office carried out
+that principle must be reserved for a later chapter.
+
+Besides the numerous motions which were brought forward by the
+Opposition respecting the continuance and conduct of the war, there were
+several also which were indirectly prompted by it. The Opposition
+claimed to be on this subject not only the champions of the real
+interests of the nation, but also its spokesmen, who expressed the
+opinions and feelings of all the thinking and independent portion of the
+people. That their efforts were overborne they attributed to the
+subservience of the Parliament to the ministers, and of the ministers to
+the crown.[58] And consequently several motions were made by members of
+that party, the object of which was, in one way or another, to diminish
+what they regarded as the undue influence of the crown. In one instance,
+and that the most successful, a direct denunciation of that influence
+was employed, but the earlier and more frequent proposals were directed
+to the purification of the House of Commons, and to the strengthening of
+its independence. It is remarkable that of these the two which related
+to a subject of which the Commons are usually most especially and most
+rightly jealous, the interference of peers in elections, had the worst
+fortune. In 1780 complaints were made and substantiated that the Duke of
+Bolton and the Duke of Chandos (who was also Lord-lieutenant of the
+county) had exerted themselves actively in the last election for
+Hampshire. And, in support of motions that these peers "had been guilty
+of a breach of the privileges of the House, and an infringement of the
+liberties and privileges of the Commons of Great Britain," a case was
+adduced in which Queen Anne had dismissed the Bishop of Worcester from
+the office of Almoner for similar interference. Nor did Lord Nugent, a
+relative of the Duke of Chandos, deny the facts alleged; on the
+contrary, he avowed them, and adopted a line of defence which many must
+have thought an aggravation of the charge, since it asserted that to
+prevent such interference was impossible, and therefore the House would
+but waste its time in trying. However, on this occasion the House took
+the view which he thus suggested to it, postponing all farther
+consideration of the matter for four months; and the charge the Duke of
+Bolton was shelved in a somewhat similar manner.
+
+Even had these peers and such practices been censured with the very
+greatest severity, the censures could have had but a very limited
+effect. But it was on measures of a wider scope, embracing what began to
+be called a Reform of Parliament, that the more zealous members of the
+Opposition placed their chief reliance. As far as our records of the
+debates can be trusted, Lord Chatham, ten years before, had given the
+first hint of the desirableness of some alteration of the existing
+system. On one occasion he denounced the small boroughs as "the rotten
+part of the constitution," thus originating the epithet by which they in
+time came to be generally described; but more usually he disavowed all
+idea of disfranchising them, propounding rather a scheme for diminishing
+their importance by a large addition to the county members. However, he
+never took any steps to carry out his views, thinking, perhaps, that it
+was not in the Upper House that such a subject should be first broached.
+But he had not been long in the grave, when a formal motion for a reform
+of a different kind was brought forward by one of the members for the
+City of London, Alderman Sawbridge,[59] who, in May, 1780, applied for
+leave to bring in "a bill for shortening the duration of Parliaments."
+His own preference he avowed to be for annual Parliaments; but his
+suspicion that the House would think such a measure too sweeping had
+induced him to resolve to content himself with aiming at triennial
+Parliaments. As leave was refused, the bill proposed to be introduced
+may, perhaps, be thought disentitled to mention here, were it not that
+the circumstance that proposals for shortening the duration of
+Parliaments are still occasionally brought forward seems to warrant an
+account of a few of the arguments by which those who took the leading
+parts in the debate which ensued resisted it. The minister, Lord North,
+declared that the Alderman had misunderstood the views of our ancestors
+on the subject; as their desire had been, not that Parliament should be
+elected annually, but that it should sit every year, an end which had
+now been attained. Fox, on the other hand, while avowing that hitherto
+he had always opposed similar motions, declared his wish now to see not
+only triennial but annual Parliaments, as the sole means of lessening
+the influence of the crown. "If any of his constituents were to ask him
+to what our present misfortunes were ascribable, he should say the first
+cause was the influence of the crown; the second, the influence of the
+crown; and the third, the influence of the crown." But it was replied by
+Burke, who usually exhausted every question he took in hand, that such a
+bill would rather tend to augment that influence, since "the crown, by
+its constant stated power, influence, and revenue, would be able to wear
+out all opposition at elections; that it would not abate the interest or
+inclination of ministers to apply that interest to the electors; on the
+contrary, it would render it more necessary to them, if they desired to
+have a majority in Parliament, to increase the means of that influence,
+to redouble their diligence, and to sharpen dexterity in the
+application. The whole effect of the bill would, therefore, be to remove
+the application of some part of that influence from the elected to the
+electors, and farther to strengthen and extend a court interest already
+great and powerful in boroughs. It must greatly increase the cost of a
+seat in Parliament; and, if contests were frequent, to many they would
+become a matter of expense totally ruinous, which no fortunes could
+bear. The expense of the last general election was estimated at
+£1,500,000; and he remembered well that several agents for boroughs said
+to candidates, 'Sir, your election will cost you £3000 if you are
+independent; but, if the ministry supports you, it may be done for
+£2000, and even less.'" And he adduced the case of Ireland, where
+formerly, when "a Parliament sat for the King's life, the ordinary
+charge for a seat was £1500; but now, when it sat for eight years, four
+sessions, the charge was £2500 and upward." Such a change as was
+proposed would cause "triennial corruption, triennial drunkenness,
+triennial idleness, etc., and invigorate personal hatreds that would
+never be allowed to soften. It would even make the member himself more
+corrupt, by increasing his dependence on those who could best support
+him at elections. It would wreck the fortunes of those who stood on
+their own private means. It would make the electors more venal, and
+injure the whole body of the people who, whether they have votes or not,
+are concerned in elections." Finally, it would greatly impair the proper
+authority of the House itself. "It would deprive it of all power and
+dignity; and a House of Commons without power and without dignity,
+either in itself or its members, is no House of Commons for this
+constitution."
+
+The applicability of some of his arguments--those founded on the
+disorders at times of election--has been greatly diminished, if not
+destroyed, at the present day, by the limitation of the polling to a
+single day. The disfranchisement of the smaller boroughs has neutralized
+others; but the expense of a general election is not believed to have
+diminished, and that alone seems a strong objection to a system which
+would render them more frequent than they are at present. Mr. Sawbridge
+could not obtain the support of a third of his hearers.[60] But his
+notions had partisans in the other House who were not discouraged by
+such a division; and three weeks later the Duke of Richmond brought
+forward a Reform Bill on so large a scale that, as the "Parliamentary
+History" records, "it took him an hour and a half to read it," and which
+contained provisions for annual Parliaments and universal suffrage. But
+he met with even less favor than the Alderman, and his bill was rejected
+without a division.
+
+Still the subject was not allowed to rest. Even after Lord North had
+been replaced by Lord Rockingham, the demand for Parliamentary Reform
+was continued; the young Mr. Pitt making himself the mouth-piece of the
+Reformers, and founding a motion which he made in May, 1782, on "the
+corrupt influence of the crown; an influence which has been pointed at
+in every period as the fertile source of all our miseries; an influence
+which has been substituted in the room of wisdom, of activity, of
+exertion, and of success; an influence which has grown up with our
+growth and strengthened with our strength, but which, unhappily, has not
+diminished with our diminution, nor decayed with our decay." He brought
+forward no specific plan, but denounced the close boroughs, and asked
+emphatically whether it were "representation" for "some decayed
+villages, almost destitute of population, to send members to Parliament
+under the control of the Treasury, or at the bidding of some great lord
+or commoner." He, however, was defeated, though by the small majority of
+twenty. And it is remarkable that when, the next year, he revived the
+subject, developing a more precise scheme--akin to that which his father
+had suggested, of increasing the number of county members, and including
+provisions for the disfranchisement of boroughs which had been convicted
+of systematic corruption--he was beaten by a far larger majority,[61]
+the distinctness of his plan only serving to increase the numbers of his
+adversaries. A kinsman of Pitt's, Lord Mahon, made an equally futile
+attempt to diminish the expenses of elections, partly by inflicting very
+heavy penalties on parties guilty of either giving or receiving
+bribes,[62] and partly by prohibiting candidates from providing
+conveyances for electors; and more than one bill for disfranchising
+revenue-officers, as being specially liable to pressure from the
+government, and to prevent contractors from sitting in Parliament, was
+brought forward, but was lost, the smallness of the divisions in their
+favor being not the least remarkable circumstance in the early history
+of Reform. It was made still more evident that as yet the zeal for
+Reform was confined to a few, when, two years afterward, Pitt, though
+now invested with all the power of a Prime-minister, was as unable as
+when in opposition to carry a Reform Bill, which in more than one point
+foreshadowed the measure of 1832; proposing, as it did, the
+disfranchisement of thirty-six small boroughs, which were to be
+purchased of their proprietors nearly on the principle adopted in the
+Irish Union Act, and on the other hand the enfranchisement of
+copyholders; but it differed from Lord Grey's act in that it distributed
+all the seats thus to be obtained among the counties, with the exception
+of a small addition to the representatives of London and Westminster.
+However, his supporters very little exceeded the number who had divided
+with him in 1783, and Lord North, who led the Opposition in a speech
+denouncing any change, had a majority of seventy-four. After this second
+defeat, Pitt abandoned the question, at all events for the time; being
+convinced, to quote Earl Stanhope's description of his opinion on the
+subject, "that nothing but the pressure of the strongest popular
+feeling, such as did not then exist, could induce many members to vote
+against their own tenure of Parliament, or in fact against
+themselves."[63] What, perhaps, weighed with him more, on deciding to
+acquiesce in this vote as final, was the perception that as yet the
+question excited no strong interest out-of-doors; and when, a few years
+later, some who sought to become leaders of the people endeavored to
+raise an agitation on the subject, their teachings were too deeply
+infected with the contagion of the French Revolution to allow a wise
+ruler to think it consistent with his duty to meet them with anything
+but the most resolute discouragement.
+
+But, concurrently with the first of these motions for Parliamentary
+Reform, two more direct attacks on the royal influence, and on what was
+alleged to be the undue exertion of it, were made in the session of
+1780. The first was made by Burke, who brought forward a measure of
+economical reform, demonstrating, in a speech of extraordinary power, a
+vast mass of abuses, arising from corrupt waste in almost every
+department of the state, and in every department of the royal household,
+without exception, and proposing a most extensive plan of reform, which
+dealt with royal dignities, such as the Duchy of Lancaster and the other
+principalities annexed to the crown; with the crown-lands, a great
+portion of which he proposed to sell; with the offices of the royal
+household, a sufficient specimen of the abuses on which was furnished by
+the statement, that the turnspit in the King's kitchen was a member of
+Parliament; and with many departments of state, such as the Board of
+Works and the Pay-office, etc. He was studiously cautious in his
+language, urging, indeed, that his scheme of reform would "extinguish
+secret corruption almost to the possibility of its existence, and would
+destroy direct and visible influence equal to the offices of at least
+fifty members of Parliament," but carefully guarding against any
+expressions imputing this secret corruption, this influence which it was
+so desirable to destroy, to the crown. But his supporters were less
+moderate; and Mr. Thomas Townsend declared that facts which he mentioned
+"contained the most unquestionable presumptive evidence of the influence
+of the crown; he meant the diverting of its revenues to purposes which
+dared not be avowed, in corrupting and influencing the members of both
+Houses of Parliament;" and he asserted that "the principle and objects
+of the bill were the reduction of the influence of the crown." The bill
+was not opposed by the ministers on its principle; but Lord North, even
+while consenting to its introduction, "did not pledge himself not to
+oppose it in some or other of its subsequent stages;" and, in fact, his
+supporters resisted it in almost every detail, some of them utterly
+denying the right of the House to interfere at all with the expenditure
+of the civil list; others contesting the propriety of alienating the
+crown-lands; and a still greater number objecting to the abolition of
+some of the offices which it was proposed to sweep away, such as that of
+the "third Secretary of State, or Secretary for the Colonies," that of
+"Treasurer of the Chamber," and others of a similar character. And, as
+the minister succeeded in defeating him on several, though by no means
+all, of these points, Burke at last gave up the bill, Fox warning the
+House at the same time that it should be renewed session after session,
+and boasting that even the scanty success which it had met with had been
+worth the struggle.
+
+The other direct attack was made by Mr. Dunning, who, perhaps, did not
+then foresee that he himself was destined soon to fill one of the
+offices which had come under the lash of Burke's sarcasm, and who a few
+days afterward, in moving that it was necessary to declare "that the
+influence of the crown had increased, was increasing, and ought to be
+diminished" rested no small portion of his argument on the treatment
+that Burke's bill had received. He affirmed that, though Lord North had
+declared that "the influence of the crown was not too great," the
+divisions on that bill, and on many other measures which had been under
+discussion, were irrefragable proofs of the contrary. He quoted Hume and
+Judge Blackstone as testifying to the existence and steady increase of
+that influence, and "could affirm of his own knowledge, and pledge his
+honor to the truth of the assertion, that he knew upward of fifty
+members in that House who always voted in the train of the noble lord in
+the blue ribbon,[64] but who reprobated and condemned, out of the House,
+the measures they had supported and voted for in it." Mr. T. Pitt even
+instanced "the present possession of office by Lord North as an
+indubitable proof of the enormous influence of the crown."
+
+It was not strange that Lord North opposed a resolution supported by
+such arguments with all the power of the government, basing his own
+opposition chiefly on the wisdom "of maintaining the rule long since
+established by Parliament, never to vote abstract propositions." But he
+presently saw that he was in a minority, and was forced to be content
+with adopting and carrying an amendment of Mr. Dundas, one of the
+members for Edinburgh, who flattered himself that by the insertion of
+_now_ he converted a general assertion into a temporary declaration,
+which might at a future time be disavowed as no longer applicable. A
+majority of eighteen[65] affirmed the resolution; and when the mover
+followed it up by a second, declaring that "it is competent to this
+House to examine into and to correct abuses in the expenditure of the
+civil list revenues, as well as in every other branch of the public
+revenue, whenever it shall seem expedient to the wisdom of this House to
+do so," though the minister, with what was almost an appeal _ad
+misericordiam_, "implored the House not to proceed," he did not venture
+to take a division, and that resolution also, with one or two others
+designed to give instant effect to them, were adopted and reported by
+the committee to the House in a single evening.[66] The first resolution
+did, in fact, embody a complaint, or at least an assertion, which the
+Rockingham party had constantly made ever since the close of the
+Marquis's first administration. In a speech which he had made only a few
+weeks before,[67] Lord Rockingham himself had declared that "it was
+early in the present reign promulgated as a court axiom that the power
+and influence of the crown alone was sufficient to support any set of
+men his Majesty might think proper to call to his councils." And Burke,
+in his "short account" of his administration of 1765, had not only
+imputed both its formation and its dismissal to the "express request"
+and "express command of their royal master," but in the sentence, "they
+discountenanced and, it is to be hoped, forever abolished, the dangerous
+and unconstitutional practice of removing military officers for their
+votes in Parliament," condemned with unmistakable plainness some acts of
+the preceding ministry which were universally understood to have been
+forced upon it by the King himself. General Conway had been deprived of
+the colonelcy of his regiment; Lord Rockingham himself, with several
+other peers, had been dismissed from Lord-lieutenancies, as a punishment
+for voting against the ministry; such dismissals being a flagrant
+attempt to put down all freedom of debate in Parliament, which of all
+its privileges is the one most essential to its usefulness, if not to
+its very existence. But, as Burke said, the practice had been abandoned,
+and the first resolution, therefore, as Lord North said, involved no
+practical result. It is the second resolution that confers a
+constitutional character and importance on this debate. And it is not
+too much to say that no vote of greater value had been come to for many
+years. It might have been considered almost as the assertion of a truism
+included in the power of granting supplies, to declare that the
+Parliament has the right and authority to examine into and correct
+abuses in the expenditure, if it had not been denied by more than one
+speaker on the ministerial side, though not by the Prime-minister
+himself. But that denial made the assertion of the right an imperative
+duty; for certainly the exclusive right of authorizing a levy of money
+would lose half its value, if unaccompanied by the other right of
+preventing the waste of the revenue thus raised.
+
+It may likewise be said that another principle of the parliamentary
+constitution is, by implication, contained in Mr. Dunning's second
+resolution, and that the words, "it is competent to this House to
+examine into and to correct abuses in the expenditure," were meant to
+imply a denial of the competency of the other House to institute, or
+even to share in, such an examination. Even if that were the object of
+its framer, it only coincided with the view of the peers themselves, a
+very considerable majority[68] of whom had, a few weeks before, rejected
+a motion made by Lord Shelburne for the appointment of "a committee of
+members of both Houses to examine without delay into the public
+expenditure," principally on the ground urged by the Secretary of State,
+Lord Stormont, and by several other peers, that "to inquire into,
+reform, and control the public expenditure" would be an improper
+interference with the privileges of the Commons; the Chief-justice, Lord
+Mansfield, even going the length of warning his brother peers that such
+interference might probably lead the Commons "to dispute in their turn
+the power of judicature in the last resort exercised by the peers." Lord
+Camden, on the contrary, affirmed, as a proposition which "no noble lord
+present would deny, that that House had a right to inquire so far as the
+disposal of public moneys came under their cognizance as a deliberative
+body." And in the Lower House itself, Burke, in his speech in favor of
+his Bill for Economical Reform, went even farther than Lord Camden, and
+blamed the House of Lords for rejecting Lord Shelburne's motion on such
+a ground. "They had gone," he said, "farther in self-denial than the
+utmost jealousy of the Commons could have required. A power of examining
+accounts, of censuring, correcting, and punishing the Commons had never,
+that he knew of, thought of denying to the Lords. It was something more
+than a century ago that the Commons had voted the Lords a useless body.
+They had now voted themselves so." And it would seem that the Lords
+themselves, to a certain extent, retracted this, their self-denying
+vote, when, before the end of the same session, they discussed Burke's
+Bill for Economical Reform, and passed it, though it was a money-bill,
+"containing extraneous enactments," and as such contravened one of their
+own standing orders which had been passed in the beginning of Queen
+Anne's reign, when the system of "tacking," as it was called, had
+excited great discontent, which was not confined to themselves. The
+propriety of rejecting the bill on that ground was vigorously urged by
+the only two lawyers who took part in the debate, the Chancellor, Lord
+Thurlow, and Lord Loughborough, whose object was avowedly thus to give a
+practical proof that the Lords "had not voted themselves useless." But
+even those who disregarded their advice fully asserted the right of the
+peers "to exercise their discretion as legislators." We have noticed
+this matter on a previous occasion. The privilege claimed by the
+Commons, both as to its origin and its principle, has been carefully
+examined by Hallam, who has pointed out that in its full exclusiveness
+it is not older than Charles II., since the Convention Parliament of
+1660 "made several alterations in undoubted money-bills, to which the
+Commons did not object."[69] And, though his attachment to Whig
+principles might have inclined him to take their part in any dispute on
+the subject, he nevertheless thinks that they have strained both
+"precedent and constitutional analogy" in their assertion of this
+privilege, which is "an anomaly that can hardly rest on any other ground
+of defence than such a series of precedents as establish a
+constitutional usage." The usage which for two centuries was established
+in this case by the good-sense of both parties clearly was, that the
+Lords could never originate a money-bill, nor insert any clause in one
+increasing or even altering the burden laid by one on the people, but
+that they were within their right in absolutely rejecting one. But such
+a right has a tendency to lapse through defect of exercise; and we shall
+hereafter see that "the disposition to make encroachments," which in
+this matter Hallam imputes to the Commons, has led them in the present
+reign to carry their pretensions to a height which at a former period
+had been practically ignored by the one House, and formally disclaimed
+by the other.
+
+It may be remarked that Mr. Dunning's success in carrying his first
+resolution did in itself, to a certain extent, disprove the truth of
+that resolution, since, if the influence of the crown had been such as
+he represented it, it must have been sufficient to insure its rejection.
+But that resolution, and a new statute, of which in a previous session
+he had been one of the principal promoters, are reckoned by Lord
+Stanhope as among the chief causes of the disgraceful riots of 1780. In
+the summer of 1778 he had seconded and supported with great eloquence
+the repeal of some of the penal statutes against the Roman Catholics
+which had been passed in the reign of William III. It was the first blow
+at that system of religious intolerance which for nearly a century had
+been one of the leading principles, as it had been also the chief
+disgrace, of the constitution; and it was passed with scarcely any
+opposition by both Houses. As, however, the statute which it repealed
+had been enacted before the Scotch Union, the repeal did not extend to
+Scotland, and it was necessary, therefore, to bring in a separate
+measure for that kingdom. But the intelligence that such a proceeding
+was in contemplation excited great wrath among the Scotch Presbyterians,
+who, in the hope of defeating it, established a Protestant Association
+for the defence of what they called the Protestant interest, and elected
+as its president Lord George Gordon, a young nobleman whose acts on more
+than one occasion gave reason to doubt the soundness of his intellect.
+Against any relaxation whatever of the restrictions on the Roman
+Catholics the Association sent up petitions to the House and to the
+King, couched in language the wildness of which was hardly consistent
+with the respect due to Parliament or to the sovereign. Apparently in
+the hope of mitigating its opposition, the Houses the next year passed
+an act, similar in principle, to relax some of the restrictions still
+imposed on Protestant dissenting ministers by some of the subscriptions
+which were required of them. But, as in the reign of Charles II., the
+Presbyterian hatred of the Roman Catholics was too uncompromising to be
+appeased in such a manner. And when Lord George found the House of
+Commons itself acknowledging the danger with which the constitution was
+threatened by the influence of the crown, he saw in their vote a
+justification for all his alarms, since he had adopted as one of his
+most settled opinions the belief that George III. was himself a Papist
+at heart; and, under the influence of this strange idea, he drew up a
+petition to Parliament which he invited all the members of the
+Association to accompany him to present. His summons was received with
+enthusiasm by his followers. The number who, in obedience to it,
+mustered in St. George's Fields, which he had appointed as the place of
+rendezvous, was not reckoned by any one at less than fifty thousand, and
+some calculations even doubled that estimate. Whatever the number may
+originally have been, it was speedily swelled by the junction of large
+bands of the worst characters in the metropolis, who soon began to
+display their strength by every kind of outrage. They commenced by
+attacking some of the Roman Catholic chapels, which they burnt; and,
+their audacity increasing at the sight of their exploits, they proceeded
+to assault the houses of different members of Parliament who had voted
+for the measures which had offended them. Because the Chief-justice,
+Lord Mansfield, had lately presided at a trial where a Roman Catholic
+had been acquitted, they sacked and burnt his house, and tried to murder
+himself. The magistrates, afraid of exposing themselves to the fury of
+such a mob, kept for the most part out of the way; and though the troops
+had been put under arms, and several regiments from the rural districts
+had been brought up to London in haste, the military officers were
+afraid to act without orders. Left to work their pleasure almost without
+resistance, the rioters attacked the different prisons, burnt Newgate
+and released all the prisoners, and made more than one attack on the
+Bank of England, where, however, fortunately the guard was strong enough
+to repel them. But still no active measures were taken to crush the
+riot. The belief was general that the soldiers might not act at all, or,
+at all events, not fire on rioters, till an hour after the Riot Act had
+been read and the mob had been warned to disperse; and no magistrate
+could be found to brave its fury by reading it. There seemed no obstacle
+to prevent the rioters from making themselves masters of the whole
+capital, had it not been for the firmness of the King himself, who, when
+all the proper authorities failed, showed himself in fact as well as in
+name the Chief Magistrate of the kingdom.[70] He summoned a Privy
+Council, and urged the members to adopt instant measures of repression;
+and, when some of the ministers seemed to waver, he put the question
+himself to the Attorney-general whether the interpretation put on the
+Riot Act, which seemed to him inconsistent with common-sense, were
+justified by the law. Wedderburn unhesitatingly replied that it was not;
+that "if a mob were committing a felony, as by burning dwelling-houses,
+and could not be prevented by other means, the military, according to
+the law of England, might and ought to be immediately ordered to fire
+upon them, the reading of the Riot Act being wholly unnecessary under
+such circumstances."[71] The King insisted on this opinion being
+instantly acted on; a proclamation was issued, and orders were sent from
+the Adjutant-general's office that the soldiers were to act at once
+without waiting for directions from the civil magistrates. A few hours
+now sufficed to restore tranquillity. The Chief-justice, in his place in
+the House of Lords, subsequently declared Wedderburn's opinion, and the
+orders given in reliance upon it, to be in strict conformity with the
+common law, laying down, as the principle on which such an
+interpretation of the law rested, the doctrine that in such a case the
+military were acting, "not as soldiers, but as citizens; no matter
+whether their coats were red or brown, they were legally employed in
+preserving the laws and the constitution;"[72] and Wedderburn, who
+before the end of the year became Chief-justice of the Common Pleas,
+repeated the doctrine more elaborately in a charge from the Bench. It
+was a lesson of value to the whole community. It was quite true that the
+constitution placed the army in a state of dependence on the civil
+power. But, when that doctrine was so misunderstood as to be supposed to
+give temporary immunity to outrage, it was most important that such a
+misconstruction should be corrected, and that it should be universally
+known that military discipline does not require the soldier to abstain
+from the performance of the duty incumbent on every citizen, the
+prevention of crime.
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 33: It is worth while to preserve the amount, if for no other
+reason, for the contrast that the expenditure and resources of the
+kingdom a hundred years ago present to those of the present day. The
+supply required in 1764 was in round numbers £7,712,000; in 1755, before
+the war broke out, £4,073,000, and even that included a million for the
+augmentation of the army and navy. In 1761, when the war was at its
+height, the sum voted was £19,616,000.]
+
+[Footnote 34: The report in the "Parliamentary History," xvi., 37, says:
+"This act (the Stamp Act) passed the Commons almost without debate; two
+or three members spoke against it, but without force or apparent
+interest, except a vehement harangue from Colonel Barré (date, March 6,
+1765)."]
+
+[Footnote 35: Lord Stanhope ("History of England," v., 131) quotes a
+letter of Dr. Franklin to one of his friends in America, in which, after
+deploring the impossibility of preventing the act from being passed, he
+expresses a hope that "frugality and industry will go a great way toward
+indemnifying us." And he complied with Mr. Grenville's request to select
+a person to act as Distributor of Stamps in Pennsylvania whom he thought
+likely to be generally acceptable.]
+
+[Footnote 36: These statements and arguments of Franklin are taken from
+different parts of his examination before the House of Commons, as
+preserved in the "Parliamentary History," xvi., 137-160.]
+
+[Footnote 37: In the Assembly of Virginia, one of the members--Patrick
+Henry--after declaiming with bitterness against the supposed arbitrary
+measures of the present reign, exclaimed, "Caesar had his Brutus,
+Charles I. his Oliver Cromwell, and George III.--" A cry of "Treason!"
+was uttered. The Speaker called Mr. Henry to order, and declared he
+would quit the chair unless he were supported by the House in
+restraining such intemperate speeches.--Adolphus, _History of England_,
+i., 188.]
+
+[Footnote 38: On this point the law has been affirmed by a judge of high
+reputation to be still what Lord Rockingham and his colleagues asserted.
+In 1868, on the trial of Governor Eyre for an indictment arising out of
+disturbances in Jamaica, Judge Blackburne laid it down "that, although
+the general rule is that the Legislative Assembly has the sole right of
+imposing taxes in the colony, yet, when the Imperial Legislature chooses
+to impose taxes, according to the rule of English law they have a
+_right_ to do it."]
+
+[Footnote 39: See his speech on American taxation in April, 1774.]
+
+[Footnote 40: The chief divisions were: in the Commons, 275 to 167; in
+the Lords, 105 to 71.]
+
+[Footnote 41: "History of England," vol. v., c. xlv., p. 218, ed. 1862.]
+
+[Footnote 42: "Lives of the Chancellors," c. cxliii., life of Lord
+Camden.]
+
+[Footnote 43: Every political student will recollect Burke's description
+of it as "a cabinet so variously inlaid, such a piece of diversified
+mosaic, such a tessellated pavement without cement--here a bit of black
+stone, there a bit of white--patriots and courtiers, King's friends and
+republicans, Whigs and Tories, treacherous friends and open enemies,"
+etc.--_Speech on American Taxation_.]
+
+[Footnote 44: In a debate in the year 1776, on some measures adopted for
+the conduct of the war, the Duke of Grafton said: "In that year (1767),
+when the extraordinary expenses incurred on account of America were laid
+before the House of Commons, the House rose as one man and insisted that
+that country should contribute to the burdens brought on by the military
+establishment there, and a motion was made for bringing in a bill for
+that purpose. I strenuously opposed the measure, as big with the
+consequences it has since, unfortunately, produced. I spoke to my
+friends upon the occasion, but they all united in the opinion that the
+tide was too strong to expect either to stem or turn it, so as to
+prevent whatever might be offered in that shape from passing into a law.
+Finding that all my efforts would be vain, I was compelled to submit,
+but was resolved, as far as lay in my power, to prevent the effect; and,
+while I gave way, to do it in such a manner as would cause the least
+harm. I accordingly proposed the tea-duty as the most palatable;
+because, though it answered the main purpose of those with whom taxation
+was a favorite measure, it was doing America an immediate benefit, for I
+procured the shilling a pound duty to be taken off, and threepence to be
+laid on in lieu thereof; so that, in fact, it was ninepence a pound
+saved to America. However, the attempt was received in America as I
+expected it would be--it immediately caused disturbances and universal
+dissatisfaction."--_Parliamentary History_, xviii., 134.]
+
+[Footnote 45: This unpopularity had been aggravated by another measure
+which was among the last acts of Mr. Grenville's ministry. The Mutiny
+Act in the Colonies was renewed for two years at a time, and, at its
+renewal in the spring of 1765, a clause was added which required the
+Colonists to furnish the troops with "fire, candles, vinegar, salt,
+bedding, utensils for cooking, and liquors, such as beer, cider, and
+rum." The Assemblies of several States passed resolutions strongly
+condemning this new imposition; but, as the dissatisfaction did not lead
+to any overt acts of disturbance, it seems to have been unnoticed in
+England at the time, or the clause would probably have been repealed by
+Lord Rockingham; and eventually the Assembly of New York seems to have
+withdrawn its objections to it, presenting an address to Sir H. Moore,
+the Governor, in which "they declared their intention of making the
+required provision for the troops."--Lord E. Fitzmaurice, _Life of Lord
+Shelburne_, ii., 61.]
+
+[Footnote 46: The "Memoirs of Judge Livingstone" record his expression
+of opinion as early as 1773, that "it was intolerable that a continent
+like America should be governed by a little island three thousand miles
+distant." "America," said he, "must and will be independent." And in the
+"Memoirs of General Lee" we find him speaking to Mr. Patrick Henry, who
+in 1766 had been one of the most violent of all the denouncers of the
+English policy (see _ante_, p. 63), of "independence" as "a golden
+castle in the air which he had long dreamed of."]
+
+[Footnote 47: See the whole speech, "Parliamentary History," xvi., 853.
+Many of the taxes he denounced as so injurious to the British
+manufacturers, "that it must astonish any reasonable man to think how so
+preposterous a law could originally obtain existence from a British
+Legislature."]
+
+[Footnote 48: The division was: for the amendment, 142; against it,
+204.]
+
+[Footnote 49: The words of the "preamble," on which Burke dwelt in 1774,
+were: "Whereas it is expedient that a revenue should be raised in your
+Majesty's dominions in America for making a more certain and adequate
+provision for defraying the charge of the administration of justice and
+support of civil government in such provinces where it shall be found
+necessary, and toward farther defraying the expenses of defending,
+protecting, and securing: the said dominions, be it enacted," etc.]
+
+[Footnote 50: "Memoirs and Correspondence of Jefferson." Quoted by Lord
+Stanhope, "History of England," vi., 14.]
+
+[Footnote 51: At Lexington, April 19, 1775.]
+
+[Footnote 52: Lord Stanhope, however, has reason on his side when he
+calls the words of this petition "vague and general," though "kindly and
+respectful;" and when he points to the language of extreme bitterness
+against England indulged in by Franklin at the very time that this
+petition was voted. He, however, expresses a belief that even then "the
+progress of civil war might have been arrested," which seems doubtful.
+But it is impossible not to agree with his lordship in condemning the
+refusal by the ministry to take any notice of the petition, on the
+ground that the Congress was a self-constituted body, with no claim to
+authority or recognition, and one which had already sanctioned the
+taking up arms against the King.--_History of England_, vi., 93, 95,
+105.]
+
+[Footnote 53: It is probable, however, that the greater part of the
+Hanoverian soldiers were Protestants.]
+
+[Footnote 54: Lord Campbell, who, in his "Life of Lord Bathurst,"
+asserts that the legality of the measure turns upon the just
+construction of the Act of Settlement, adduces Thurlow's language on
+this subject as "a proof that he considered that he had the privilege
+which has been practised by other Attorney-generals and Chancellors too,
+in debate, of laying down for law what best suited his purpose at the
+moment." It does not seem quite certain that the noble and learned
+biographer has not more than once in these biographies allowed himself a
+similar license in the description of questions of party politics.]
+
+[Footnote 55: In the debates on the subject it was stated that the
+number of Hanoverians quartered in the two fortresses was nineteen
+hundred, and the number of British troops left in them was two thousand.
+Moreover, as has been already remarked, though Lord Shelburne spoke of
+arming Roman Catholics, it is probable that the Hanoverians were mostly
+Protestants.]
+
+[Footnote 56: The Preliminary or Provisional Articles, as they were
+called, of which the Definitive Treaty was but a copy, were signed at
+Paris, November 30, 1782, during Lord Shelburne's administration. But
+the Definitive Treaty was not signed till the 3d of September of the
+following year, under the Coalition Ministry, which was turned out a few
+weeks afterward.]
+
+[Footnote 57: We shall see in a subsequent chapter that even in this
+reign of George III. Pitt laid down the true principles of our
+legislation for the colonies in his bill for the better government of
+Canada.]
+
+[Footnote 58: An admirably reasoned passage on the influence of the
+crown, especially in the reigns of the two first Hanoverian Kings, will
+be found in Hallam, "Constitutional History," c. xvi., vol. iii., p.
+392, ed. 1832.]
+
+[Footnote 59: The "Parliamentary History" shows that he had brought
+forward the same motion before 1780; since Lord Nugent, who replied to
+him, said "the same motion had been made for some years past, and had
+been silently decided on." From which it seems that it was never
+discussed at any length till May 8, 1780.]
+
+[Footnote 60: On the division the numbers were: for the motion, 90;
+against it, 182.]
+
+[Footnote 61: The division in 1782 was: 161 to 141; in 1783, 293 to
+149.]
+
+[Footnote 62: How systematic and open bribery was at this time is shown
+by an account of Sheridan's expenses at Stafford in 1784, of which the
+first item is--248 burgesses, paid £5 5s. each, £1302.--Moore's _Life of
+Sheridan_, i., 405.]
+
+[Footnote 63: "Life of Pitt," i., 359.]
+
+[Footnote 64: Lord North was a Knight of the Garter, the only commoner,
+except Sir R. Walpole, who received that distinction in the last
+century, and the latest, with the exception of Lord Castlereagh. on whom
+it has been conferred.]
+
+[Footnote 65: 233 to 315.]
+
+[Footnote 66: It is perhaps worth pointing out, as a specimen of the
+practical manner in which parliamentary business was transacted at that
+time, that this great debate--in which (the House being in committee)
+Mr. Dunning himself spoke three times, and Lord North, Mr. T. Pitt, Mr.
+Fox, the Speaker (Sir F. Norton), the Attorney-general, General Conway,
+Governor Pownall, the Lord-advocate, and several other members took
+part--was concluded by twelve o'clock.]
+
+[Footnote 67: February 8, 1780, on Lord Shelburne's motion for an
+inquiry into the public expenditure.--_Parliamentary History_, xx.,
+1346.]
+
+[Footnote 68: 101 to 55.]
+
+[Footnote 69: "Constitutional History," iii., 43.]
+
+[Footnote 70: His language is said to have been that "there was at all
+events one Magistrate in the kingdom who would do his duty."--Lord
+Stanhope, _History of England_, vii., 48.]
+
+[Footnote 71: "Lives of the Lord Chancellors," c. clxvii.]
+
+[Footnote 72: Lord Stanhope's "History of England," vii, 56.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+
+Changes of Administration.--The Coalition Ministry.--The Establishment
+of the Prince of Wales.--Fox's India Bill.--The King Defeats it by the
+Agency of Lord Temple.--The Ministry is Dismissed, and Succeeded by Mr.
+Pitt's Administration.--Opposition to the New Ministry in the House of
+Commons.--Merits of the Contest between the Old and the New
+Ministry.--Power of Pitt.--Pitt's India Bill.--Bill for the Government
+of Canada.--The Marriage of the Prince of Wales to Mrs.
+Fitzherbert.--The King becomes Deranged.--Proposal of a
+Regency.--Opinions of Various Writers on the Course adopted.--Spread of
+Revolutionary Societies and Opinions.--Bills for the Repression of
+Sedition and Treason.--The Alien Act.--The Traitorous Correspondence
+Act.--Treason and Sedition Bills.--Failure of some Prosecutions under
+them.
+
+
+The occurrences of the next year brought the question of the influence
+of the crown into greater prominence. Lord Rockingham's administration,
+unfortunately, came to a premature termination by his death at the
+beginning of July. With a strange arrogance, Fox claimed the right of
+dictating the choice of his successor to the King, making his
+pretensions the more unwarrantable by the character of the person whom
+he desired to nominate, the Duke of Portland, who, though a man of vast
+property and considerable borough influence, was destitute of ability of
+any kind, and had not even any of that official experience which in some
+situations may at times compensate or conceal the want of talent.[73]
+The King preferred Lord Shelburne, a statesman whose capacity was
+confessedly of a very high order, who had more than once been Secretary
+of State,[74] and who had been recognized as the leader of what was
+sometimes called the Chatham section of the Whigs, ever since the death
+of the great Earl. Indeed, if George III. had been guided by his own
+wishes and judgment alone, he would have placed him at the Treasury, in
+preference to Lord Rockingham, three months before. But, during the last
+three months, jealousies had arisen between him and Fox, his colleague
+in office, who charged him with concealing from him the knowledge of
+various circumstances, the communication of which he had a right to
+require. It was more certain that on one or two points connected with
+the negotiations with the United States there had been divisions between
+them, and that the majority of the cabinet had agreed with Lord
+Shelburne. Lord Shelburne, therefore, became Prime-minister,[75] and
+Fox, with some of his friends, resigned; Fox indemnifying himself by a
+violent philippic against "those men who were now to direct the counsels
+of the country," and whom he proceeded to describe as "men whom neither
+promises could bind nor principles of honor could secure; who would
+abandon fifty principles for the sake of power, and forget fifty
+promises when they were no longer necessary to their ends; who, he had
+no doubt, to secure themselves in the power which they had by the labor
+of others obtained, would strive to strengthen it by any means which
+corruption could procure."[76]
+
+Fox at once went into what even those most disposed to cherish his
+memory admit to have been a factious opposition. He caballed with the
+very men to whom he had hitherto been most vehemently opposed for the
+sole object of expelling Lord Shelburne from office. And when, at the
+beginning of the session of 1783, the merits of the preliminary articles
+of peace which had been provisionally concluded with the United States
+came under discussion, though the peers approved of them, in the House
+of Commons he defeated the ministers in two separate divisions,[77] and
+thus rendered their retention of office impossible. He had gained this
+victory by uniting with Lord North and a portion of the Tory party whom,
+ever since his dismissal from office in 1774, he had been unwearied in
+denouncing, threatening Lord North himself with impeachment. And he now
+used it to compel the King to intrust the chief office in the government
+to the very man whom his Majesty had refused to employ in such an office
+six months before.
+
+The transactions of the next twelve months exhibit in a striking light
+more than one part of the practical working of our monarchical and
+parliamentary constitution, not only in its correspondence with, but,
+what is more important to notice, in its occasional partial deviations
+from, strict theory. The theory has sometimes been expressed in the
+formula, "The King reigns, but does not govern." But, like many another
+terse apophthegm, it conveys an idea which requires some modification
+before it can be regarded as an entirely correct representation of the
+fact; and the King himself, especially if endowed with fair capacity and
+force of character, imbued with earnest convictions, and animated by a
+genuine zeal for the honor and welfare of his kingdom, will be likely to
+dwell more on the possible modifications than on the rigid theory. Even
+those who insist most on the letter of the theory will not deny that, if
+the King has not actual power, he has at least great influence; and the
+line between authority and influence is hard to draw. One of George the
+Third's earliest ministers had explained to his Majesty that the
+principle of the constitution was, "that the crown had an undoubted
+right to choose its ministers, and that it was the duty of subjects to
+support them, unless there were some very strong and urgent reasons to
+the contrary."[78] And such a doctrine was too much in harmony with the
+feelings of George III. himself not to be cordially accepted. For George
+III. was by no means inclined to be a _Roi fainéant_. No sovereign was
+ever penetrated with a more conscientious desire to do his duty to his
+people. Conscious, perhaps, that his capacity was rather solid than
+brilliant, he gave unremitting attention to the affairs of the nation in
+every department of the government; and, perhaps not very unnaturally,
+conceived that his doing so justified him, as far as he might be able,
+in putting a constraint on his ministers to carry out his views. Thus,
+he had notoriously induced Lord North to persevere in the late civil war
+in America long after that minister had seen the hopelessness of the
+contest; and it was, probably, only the knowledge of the strength of his
+feelings on that subject, and of his warm attachment to that minister,
+that caused the Parliament so long to withstand all the eloquence of the
+advocates of peace, and the still stronger arguments of circumstances.
+He might fairly think that he had now greater reason to adhere to his
+own judgment; for Fox's recommendation of the Duke of Portland in
+preference to Lord Shelburne was an act not only of unwarrantable
+presumption, but of inconceivable folly, since there was no comparison
+between the qualifications of the two men; and the coalition by which,
+six months afterward, he had, as it were, revenged himself for the
+rebuff, and had driven Lord Shelburne from office, was, as the King well
+knew, and as even Fox's own friends did not conceal from themselves,
+almost universally condemned out-of-doors.[79] To this combination,
+therefore, his Majesty tried every expedient to escape from yielding.
+And when Pitt's well-considered and judicious refusal of the government
+left him no alternative but that of submission to Fox's dictation, it
+would hardly have been very unnatural if his disposition and attitude
+toward a ministry which had thus forced itself upon him had been those
+attributed to him by Lord John Russell, of "an enemy constantly on the
+watch against it."[80] But for some time that was not the impression of
+the ministers themselves. In July, when they had been in office more
+than three months, Fox admitted that he had never behaved toward them as
+if he were displeased with them, and that he had no project of
+substituting any other administration for the present one.[81] And his
+temperate treatment of them was the more remarkable, because a flagrant
+blunder of Burke (who filled the post of Paymaster), in reinstating some
+clerks who had been dismissed by his predecessor for dishonesty, had
+manifestly weakened the ministry in the House of Commons;[82] while in
+another case, in which the King had clearly in no slight degree a
+personal right to have his opinion consulted and his wishes accepted by
+them as the guide for their conduct, the establishment to be arranged
+for the Prince of Wales, whose twenty-first birthday was approaching,
+Fox persuaded the Parliament to settle on the young Prince an allowance
+of so large an amount that some even of his own colleagues disliked it
+as extravagant;[83] while the King himself reasonably disapproved both
+of the amount and of the mode of giving it, the amount being large
+beyond all precedent, and the fact of its being given by Parliament
+rendering the Prince entirely independent of his parental control, of
+which his conduct had given abundant proof that he stood greatly in
+need.
+
+That he presently changed his line of behavior toward them was caused by
+their introduction of a bill which he regarded as aimed in no small
+degree at his own prerogative and independence--the celebrated India
+Bill, by which, in the November session, Fox proposed to abrogate all
+the charters which different sovereigns had granted to the East India
+Company, to abolish all vested rights of either the Company or
+individuals, and to confer on a board of seven persons, to be named by
+Parliament, the entire administration of all the territories in any way
+occupied by the Company. It was at once objected to by the Opposition in
+the House of Commons, now led by Mr. Pitt, as a measure thoroughly
+unconstitutional, on the twofold ground that such an abrogation of
+formally granted charters, and such an extinction of vested rights, was
+absolutely without precedent; and also that one real, if concealed,
+object of the bill was to confer on the ministers who had framed and
+introduced it so vast an amount of patronage as would render them
+absolute masters of the House of Commons, and indirectly, therefore, of
+the King himself, who would be practically disabled from ever dismissing
+them. That such a revocation of ancient charters, and such an immovable
+establishment of an administration, were inconsistent with the
+principles of the constitution, was not a position taken up by Pitt in
+the heat of debate, but was his deliberate opinion, as may be fairly
+inferred from his assertion of it in a private letter[84] to his friend
+the Duke of Rutland. It may, however, be doubted whether the epithet
+"unconstitutional" could be properly applied to the bill on either
+ground. There is, indeed, a certain vagueness in the meaning, or at all
+events in the frequent use of this adjective. Sometimes it is used to
+imply a violation of the provisions of the Great Charter, or of its
+later development, the Bill of Rights; sometimes to impute some imagined
+departure from the principles which guided the framers of those
+enactments. But in neither sense does it seem applicable to this bill.
+To designate the infringement or revocation of a charter by such a
+description would be to affirm the existence of a right in the sovereign
+to invest a charter, from whatever motive it may originally have been
+granted, with such a character of inviolability or perpetuity that no
+Parliament should, on ever such strong grounds of public good, have the
+power of interfering with it. And to attribute such a power to the crown
+appears less consistent with the limitations affixed to the royal
+prerogative by the constitution, than to regard all trusts created by
+the crown as subject to parliamentary revision in the interests of the
+entire nation. On the second ground the description seems even less
+applicable. An arrangement of patronage is a mere matter of detail, not
+of principle. For the minister to propose such an arrangement as should
+secure for himself and his party a perpetual monopoly of power and
+office might be grasping and arrogant; for Parliament (and Parliament
+consists of the sovereign and the peers, as well as of the House of
+Commons) to assent to such an arrangement might be short-sighted and
+impolitic; but it is not clear that either the minister in proposing
+such an enactment, or the Parliament in adopting it, would be violating
+either the letter or the spirit of the constitution. Every member of the
+Governing Board was to be appointed by the Parliament itself; and,
+though unquestionably Fox would have the nomination, and though he could
+reckon on the support of the majority in the House of Commons for those
+whom he might select, still it was a strictly constitutional machinery
+that he was putting in motion.
+
+A measure, however, may be very objectionable without being
+unconstitutional, and such a view of the India Bill the progress of the
+debates in the House of Commons disposed the King to take of it. In the
+House of Peers Lord Thurlow described the bill as one to take the crown
+off his head and place it on that of Mr. Fox; and, even without adopting
+that description to its full extent, the King might easily regard the
+bill as a very unscrupulous attempt to curtail his legitimate authority
+and influence. He became most anxious to prevent the bill from being
+presented to him for his royal assent. And it was presently represented
+to him that the knowledge of his desire would probably induce the Lords
+to reject it. Among the peers who had attacked the bill on its first
+introduction into their House was Earl Temple, whose father had taken so
+prominent a part in the negotiations for the formation of a new ministry
+in 1765, and who had himself been Lord-lieutenant of Ireland under Lord
+Shelburne's administration. But he had not thought it prudent to divide
+the House against its first reading, and felt great doubts as to his
+success in a division on the second, unless he could fortify his
+opposition by some arguments as yet untried. He had no difficulty in
+finding a willing and effective coadjutor. Since the retirement of Lord
+Bute from court, no peer had made himself so personally acceptable to
+the King as Lord Thurlow, who had been Lord Chancellor during the last
+four years of Lord North's administration, and, in consequence, as it
+was generally understood, of the earnest request of George III., had
+been allowed to retain the seals by Lord Rockingham, and afterward by
+Lord Shelburne. What special attraction drew the King toward him, unless
+it were some idea of his honesty and attachment to the King himself--on
+both of which points subsequent events proved his Majesty to be wholly
+mistaken--it is not very easy to divine; but his interest with the King
+at this time was notorious, and equally notorious was the deep
+resentment which he cherished against Fox and Lord North, of whom, as he
+alleged, the former had proscribed and the latter had betrayed him. To
+him, therefore, Lord Temple now applied for advice as to the best mode
+of working on the King's mind, and, with his assistance, drew up a
+memorial on the character of the India Bill, on its inevitable fruits if
+it should pass (which it described as an extinction of "more than half
+of the royal power, and a consequent disabling of his Majesty for the
+rest of his reign"), and on the most effectual plan for defeating it;
+for which end it was suggested that his Majesty should authorize some
+one to make some of the Lords "acquainted with his wishes" that the bill
+should be rejected.[85]
+
+George III. eagerly adopted the suggestion, and drew up a brief note,
+which he intrusted to Lord Temple himself, and which stated that "his
+Majesty allowed Earl Temple to say that whoever voted for the India Bill
+was not only not his friend, but would be considered by him as his
+enemy. And, if these words were not strong enough, Earl Temple might
+whatever words he might deem stronger and more to the purpose."[86]
+
+Lord Temple lost no time in availing himself of the permission thus
+granted him; and, as it was by no means his object to keep the
+transaction secret, his conduct was made the subject of severe comment
+by the Prime-minister himself the next time that the bill was mentioned
+in the Upper House. The Duke of Portland, indeed, professed to have
+learned it only from common report, and to hope that the report was
+unfounded, since, were it true, "he should be wanting in the duty he
+owed to the public as a minister if he did not take the opportunity of
+proposing a measure upon it to their lordships that would prove that
+they felt the same jealousy, the same detestation, the same desire to
+mark and stigmatize every attempt to violate the constitution as he
+did." Lord Temple, in reply, abstained from introducing any mention of
+the King's opinions or wishes, but avowed plainly that he had used his
+privilege as a peer to solicit an interview with his Majesty, and that
+at that interview "he had given his advice. What that advice had been he
+would not then say; it was lodged in the breast of his Majesty, nor
+would he declare the purport of it without the royal consent, or till he
+saw a proper occasion. But, though he would not declare affirmatively
+what his advice to his sovereign was, he would tell their lordships
+negatively what it was not. It was not friendly to the principle and
+objects of the bill."[87] The debate lasted till near midnight. Of the
+speakers, a great majority declared against the bill; and, on the
+division, it was rejected by a majority of nineteen.[88] This took place
+on the 15th of December. On the 18th, as the ministers had not
+resigned--not regarding a single defeat in the Upper House as a
+necessary cause for such a step--the King sent messengers to them to
+demand their resignation, and the next day it was publicly announced in
+the House of Commons that Pitt had accepted the office of
+Prime-minister.
+
+But Fox, who had anticipated the dismissal of himself and his
+colleagues, was by no means inclined to acquiesce in it, or to yield
+without a struggle; and on the 17th one of his partisans in the House of
+Commons, Mr. Baker, one of the members for Hertfordshire, brought
+forward some resolutions on the subject of the late division in the
+House of Lords. He professed to rest them solely on rumors, but he urged
+that "it was the duty of that House to express its abhorrence even of
+that rumor," since by such an action as was alleged "that responsibility
+of ministers which was the life of the constitution would be taken away,
+and with it the principal check that the public had upon the crown." And
+he urged "the members of that House, as the guardians of the
+constitution, to stand forward and preserve it from ruin, to maintain
+that equilibrium between the three branches of the Legislature, and that
+independence without which the constitution could no longer exist," and
+with this view to resolve "that to report any opinion, or pretended
+opinion, of his Majesty upon any bill or other proceeding depending in
+either House of Parliament, with a view to influence the votes of the
+members, is a high crime and misdemeanor, derogatory to the honor of the
+crown, a breach of the fundamental privileges of Parliament, and
+subversive of the constitution of the country." It was opposed by Pitt,
+chiefly on the ground that Mr. Baker only based the necessity for such a
+resolution on common report, which he, fairly enough, denied to be a
+sufficient justification of it; and partly on the undoubted and
+"inalienable right of peers, either individually or collectively, to
+advise his Majesty, whenever they thought the situation of public
+affairs made such a step an essential part of their duty." But it was
+supported by Lord North as "necessary on constitutional principles,"
+since the acts so generally reported and believed "affected the freedom
+of debate;" and by Fox, who declared that the action which was reported,
+if true, "struck at the great bulwark of our liberties, and went to the
+absolute annihilation, not of our chartered rights only, but of those
+radical and fundamental ones which are paramount to all charters, which
+were consigned to our care by the sovereign disposition of Nature, which
+we cannot relinquish without violating the most sacred of all
+obligations, to which we are entitled, not as members of society, but as
+individuals and as men; the right of adhering steadily and uniformly to
+the great and supreme laws of conscience and duty; of preferring, at all
+hazards and without equivocation, those general and substantial
+interests which members have sworn to prefer; of acquitting themselves
+honorably to their constituents, to their friends, to their own minds,
+and to that public whose trustees they were, and for whom they acted."
+He avowed his conviction that rumor in this instance spoke truth, and,
+affirming that "the responsibility of ministers is the only pledge and
+security the people of England possesses against the infinite abuses so
+natural to the exercise of royal powers," argued that, if "this great
+bulwark of the constitution were once removed, the people would become
+in every respect the slaves and property of despotism. This must be the
+necessary consequence of secret influence." He argued that the sole
+distinction between an absolute and a limited monarchy was that the
+sovereign in one is a despot, and may do as he pleases, but that in the
+other he is himself subjected to the laws, and consequently is not at
+liberty to advise with any one in public affairs who is not responsible
+for that advice, and that the constitution has clearly directed his
+negative to operate under the same wise restrictions. Mr. Baker's
+resolution was carried by a large majority; but, as we have seen, did
+not deter the King from dismissing the ministry.
+
+The conduct of George III. in this transaction has been discussed by
+writers of both parties with such candor that the Tory historian, Lord
+Stanhope, while evidently desirous to defend it by implication, passes a
+slight censure on it in the phrase that "the course pursued by the King
+was most unusual, and most extreme, and most undesirable to establish as
+a precedent;"[89] while, on the other hand, so rigid a Whig as Lord
+Campbell urges in his favor "that if it be ever excusable in a King of
+England to cabal against his ministers, George III. may well be defended
+for the course he now took, for they had been forced upon him by a
+factious intrigue, and public opinion was decidedly in his favor."[90]
+But to those who regard not the excuse which previous provocation may be
+conceived in some degree to furnish to human infirmity, but only the
+strict theory and principle of the constitution on which the doctrine of
+the responsibility of the ministers and the consequent irresponsibility
+of the sovereign rests, Lord Campbell's conditional justification for
+the communication made through Lord Temple will hardly appear
+admissible. We cannot be sure how far Mr. Grenville's "Diary" is to be
+trusted for transactions in which he was not personally concerned, or
+for conversations at which he was not present; but in giving an
+account[91] of some of the occurrences of the spring of 1766, while Lord
+Rockingham was Prime-minister, we find him relating a conversation
+between the King and Lord Mansfield on the ministerial measure for
+conciliating the American Colonies by the repeal of the Stamp Act,
+combined, however, with an assertion of the _right_ to tax. "He (Lord
+Mansfield) took notice of the King's name having been bandied about in a
+very improper manner; to which the King assented, saying he had been
+very much displeased at it, as thinking it unconstitutional to have his
+name mentioned as a means to sway any man's opinion in any business
+which was before Parliament; and that all those who approached him knew
+that to be his sentiment. Lord Mansfield said he differed from his
+Majesty in that opinion, for that, though it would be unconstitutional
+to endeavor by his Majesty's name to carry questions in Parliament, yet
+where the lawful rights of the King and Parliament were to be asserted
+and maintained, he thought the making his Majesty's opinion in support
+of those rights to be known was very fit and becoming." The line here
+alleged to have been drawn by the great Chief-justice, between
+proclaiming the King's opinion in support of rights, but withholding it
+in the case of measures, is, perhaps, too fine to be perceptible by
+ordinary intellects. But however the King may have understood the judge,
+it is clear that the doctrine thus asserted does not justify, but
+condemns, such an act as the communication of the King's opinion and
+wishes in the case under consideration. If it "would be unconstitutional
+to endeavor by his Majesty's name to carry questions in Parliament," it
+must be at least equally so to use his name to defeat them. And the case
+is infinitely stronger, if the measure to be defeated be one which has
+been introduced by his ministers. For there can be no doubt whatever
+that, so long as they are his ministers, they are entitled to his full
+and complete support on every question; alike in their general policy
+and on each separate measure. When he can no longer give them that
+support, which the very act of conferring their offices on them promised
+them, his only legitimate and becoming course is to dismiss them from
+their offices, and to abide the judgment of Parliament and the nation on
+that act. Thus William IV. acted in the autumn of 1834; and thus George
+III. himself acted at the end of the month of which we are speaking. But
+to retain them in their offices, and to employ an unofficial declaration
+of his dissent from them to defeat their policy, is neither consistent
+with the straightforward conduct due from one gentleman to another, nor
+with the principle on which the system of administration, such as
+prevails in this country, is founded.
+
+As has been already mentioned, the King at once dismissed the Coalition
+Ministry. Mr. Pitt accepted the conduct of affairs, and by so doing
+accepted the responsibility for all the acts of the King which had
+conduced to his appointment. Lord John Russell, who in his "Memorials
+and Correspondence of Fox" has related and examined the whole
+transaction at considerable though not superfluous length, while blaming
+the prudence, and in some points the propriety, of Fox's conduct, at the
+same time severely censures Pitt as "committing a great fault in
+accepting office as the price of an unworthy intrigue," and affirms that
+"he and his colleagues who accepted office upon the success of this
+intrigue placed themselves in an unconstitutional position."[92] This
+seems to be a charge which can hardly be borne out. In dismissing his
+former ministry, the King was clearly acting within his right; and, if
+so, Pitt was equally within his in undertaking the government. The truer
+doctrine would seem to be, that, in so undertaking it, he assumed the
+entire responsibility for the dismissal of his predecessors,[93] and
+left it to the people at large, by the votes of their representatives,
+to decide whether that dismissal were justified, and whether, as its
+inevitable consequence, his acceptance of office were also justified or
+not. The entire series of transactions, from the meeting of Parliament
+in November, 1783, to its dissolution in the following March, may be
+constitutionally regarded as an appeal by the King from the existing
+House of Commons to the entire nation, as represented by the
+constituencies; and their verdict, as is well known, ratified in the
+most emphatic manner all that had been done. And we may assert this
+without implying that, if the single act of empowering Lord Temple to
+influence the peers by the declaration of the King's private feeling had
+been submitted by itself to the electors, they would have justified
+that. The stirring excitement of the three months' contest between the
+great rivals led them to pronounce upon the transaction as a whole, and
+to leave unnoticed what seemed for the moment to be the minor
+issues--the moves, if we may borrow a metaphor from the chess-table,
+which opened the game; and it may be observed that, though, on the 17th
+of December, Pitt resisted Mr. Baker's resolution with his utmost
+energy, in the numerous debates which ensued he carefully avoided all
+allusion to Lord Temple's conduct, or to the measure which had led to
+the dismissal of his predecessors, farther than was necessary for the
+explanation of the principles of his own India Bill. It may even be
+surmised that, if he had been inclined to recognize Lord Temple's
+interference as warrantable, the breach between that peer and himself,
+which occurred before the end of the week, would not have taken place,
+since it seems nearly certain that the cause of that breach was a
+refusal on the part of Pitt to recommend his cousin for promotion in the
+peerage, a step which, at such a moment, would have had the appearance
+of an approval of his most recent deed,[94] but which he could hardly
+have refused, if it had been done with his privity. The battle, as need
+hardly be told, was first fought among the representatives of the people
+in the House of Commons; for there was only one occasion on which the
+opinion of the Lords was invited, when they declared in favor of Pitt by
+a decisive majority.[95] But in the Lower House the contest was carried
+on for more than two months with extraordinary activity and ability, by
+a series of resolutions and motions brought forward by the partisans of
+the coalition, and contested by the youthful minister. In one respect
+the war was waged on very unequal terms, Pitt, who had been but three
+years in Parliament, and whose official experience could as yet only be
+counted by months, having to contend almost single-handed against the
+combined experience and eloquence of Lord North, Fox, and Burke.
+Fortunately, however, for him, their own mismanagement soon turned the
+advantage to his side. They were too angry and too confident to be
+skilful, or even ordinarily cautious. The leaders on both sides made
+professions in one respect similar; they both alike denied that a desire
+of office influenced either their conduct or their language (a denial
+for which Pitt's refusal of the Treasury, a year before, gained him more
+credit than could be expected by Fox after his coalition with Lord
+North), and both alike professed to be struggling for the constitution
+alone, for some fundamental principle which each charged his antagonist
+with violating; Fox on one occasion even going so far as, in some
+degree, to involve the King himself in his censures, declaring not only
+that "the struggle was, in fact, one between Pitt himself and the
+constitution," but that it was also one "between liberty and the
+influence of the crown," and "between prerogative and the constitution;"
+and that "Pitt had been brought into power by means absolutely
+subversive of the constitution."[96] But no act of which he thus accused
+the minister or the King showed such a disregard of the fundamental
+principle of the constitution of Parliament as was exhibited by Fox
+himself when, in the very first debate after the Christmas recess, he
+called in question that most undoubted prerogative of the crown to
+dissolve the Parliament, and, drawing a distinction which had certainly
+never been heard of before, declared that, though the King had an
+incontestable right to dissolve the Parliament after the close of a
+session, "many great lawyers" doubted whether he had such a right in the
+middle of a session, a dissolution at such a period being "a penal" one.
+Professing to believe that an immediate dissolution was intended, he
+even threatened to propose to the House of Commons "measures to guard
+against a step so inimical to the true interests of the country," and
+made a more direct attack than ever on the King himself, by the
+assertion of a probability that, even if Pitt did not contemplate a
+dissolution, his royal master might employ "secret influence" to
+overrule him, and might dissolve in spite of him,[97] an imputation
+which Lord North, with a strange departure from his customary
+good-humor, condescended to endorse.[98] There could be no doubt that
+both the doubt and the menace were of themselves distinct attacks on the
+constitution; and they were, moreover, singularly impolitic and
+inconsistent with others of the speaker's arguments, since, if the
+nation at large approved of his views and conduct, a dissolution--which
+would have placed the decision in its hands--would have been the very
+thing he should most have desired. On another evening, though he
+admitted as a principle that the sovereign had the prerogative of
+choosing his ministers, he not only sought to narrow the effect of that
+admission by the assertion that "to exercise that prerogative in
+opposition to the House of Commons would be a measure as unsafe as
+unjustifiable,"[99] but to confine the right of deciding the title of
+the ministers to confidence to the existing House of Commons. He accused
+Pitt of "courting the affection of the people, and on this foundation
+wishing to support himself in opposition to the repeated resolutions of
+the House passed in the last three weeks." Had he confined himself to
+urging the necessity of the ministers and the House of Commons being in
+harmony, even though such a mention of the House of Commons by itself
+were to a certain extent an ignoring of the weight of the other branches
+of the Legislature, he would have only been advancing a doctrine which
+is practically established at the present day, since there has been
+certainly more than one instance in which a ministry has retired which
+enjoyed the confidence of both the sovereign and the House of Lords,
+because it was not supported by a majority in the House of Commons. But
+when he proceeded to make it a charge against the minister that he
+trusted to the good-will of the people to enable him to disregard the
+verdict of the House of Commons, he forgot that it was only as
+representing the people that the House had any right to pronounce a
+verdict; and that, if it were true that the judgment of the people was
+more favorable to the minister than that of the House of Commons, the
+difference which thus existed was a condemnation of the existing House,
+and an irresistible reason for calling on the constituencies to elect
+another.
+
+Pitt, therefore, had no slight advantage in defending himself against so
+rash an assailant. "He did not shrink," he said, "from avowing himself
+the friend of the King's just prerogative," and in doing so he
+maintained that he had a title to be regarded as the champion of the
+people not less than of the crown. "Prerogative had been justly called a
+part of the rights of the people, and he was sure it was a part of their
+rights which they were never more inclined to defend, of which they were
+never more jealous, than at that hour."[100] And he contended that Fox's
+objections to a dissolution betrayed a consciousness that he had not the
+confidence of the nation. At last, when the contest had lasted nearly
+two months, Fox took the matter into his own hands, and, no longer
+putting his partisans in the front of the battle, on the 1st of March he
+himself moved for an address to the King, the most essential clause of
+which "submitted to his Majesty's royal consideration that the
+continuance of an administration which did not possess the confidence of
+the representatives of the people must be injurious to the public
+service." ... And, therefore, that "his Majesty's faithful Commons did
+find themselves obliged again to beseech his Majesty that he would be
+graciously pleased to lay the foundation of a strong and stable
+government by the previous removal of his present ministers." In the
+speech with which he introduced this address he put himself forward as
+especially the champion of the House of Commons. He charged the
+Prime-minister with an express design "to reduce the House to
+insignificance, to render it a mere appendage to the court, an
+appurtenance to the administration." He asserted the existence of a
+systematic "design to degrade the House, after which there was not
+another step necessary to complete the catastrophe of the constitution."
+And on this occasion he distinguished the feelings of the King from
+those which influenced the minister, affirming his confidence "that the
+King's heart had no share in the present business."[101]
+
+Pitt, on the other hand, in reply, affirmed that he was called on by
+duty "to defend the rights of the other branches of the Legislature; the
+just and constitutional prerogative of the sovereign," upon which the
+Opposition was seeking to encroach, without even having shown a single
+reason to justify such invasion. He freely admitted that, if the House
+of Commons or either of the other branches of the Legislature
+"disapproved of an administration on proper grounds, it would not be
+well for that administration to retain office." But in the present
+instance he contended that "no ground for disapprobation had been
+shown." The existing administration "had, in fact, by an unaccountable
+obstinacy and untowardness of circumstances, been deprived of all
+opportunity" of showing its capacity or its intentions. "If any
+accusations should be made and proved against it, if any charges should
+be substantiated, it would, indeed be proper for the ministers to
+resign; and if, in such a case he were afterward to continue in office,
+he would suffer himself to be stigmatized as the champion of
+prerogative, and the unconstitutional supporter of the usurpation of the
+crown. But till this period arrived, he should reckon it his duty to
+adhere to the principles of the constitution, as delivered to us by our
+ancestors; to defend them against innovation and encroachment, and to
+maintain them with firmness." "The constitution of this country," he
+presently added, "is its glory; but in what a nice adjustment does its
+excellence consist! Equally free from the distractions of democracy and
+the tyranny of monarchy, its happiness is to be found in its mixture of
+parts. It was this mixed government which the prudence of our ancestors
+devised, and which it will be our wisdom to support. They experienced
+all the vicissitudes and distractions of a republic; they felt all the
+vassalage and despotism of a simple monarchy. They abandoned both; and,
+by blending each together, extracted a system which has been the envy
+and admiration of the world. This system it is the object of the present
+address to defeat and destroy. It is the intention of this address to
+arrogate a power which does not belong to the House of Commons; to place
+a negative on the exercise of the prerogative, and to destroy the
+balance of power in the government as it was settled at the Revolution."
+
+Fox had urged that our history afforded no example of a ministry
+retaining office after the House of Commons had passed a resolution
+condemning it. Pitt, in reply, urged that our history equally failed to
+furnish any instance of a ministry having been called on to retire
+without any misconduct being alleged against them. And the result of the
+division showed that his arguments and his firmness were producing an
+impression on the House, for, though he was again defeated, the majority
+against him (only twelve) was far smaller than on any previous
+division.[102] A week later, this feeling in his favor was shown still
+more decidedly, when Fox, on moving for a fresh address, or, as he
+termed it, a representation to the King that the House had received his
+Majesty's reply to their address "with surprise and affliction," he
+could only carry it by a single vote.[103] And this division closed the
+struggle. Fox made no farther effort. Before the end of the month the
+Parliament was dissolved, and the general election which ensued sent to
+the House a majority to support the ministers which Pitt was fairly
+warranted in claiming as the full justification of the course which he
+had pursued.
+
+On a review of the whole of this extraordinary transaction, or series of
+transactions, it is impossible to avoid regarding the issue of the
+struggle as an all-important element in the case, and a test almost
+decisive of the correctness of conduct of the rival leaders. We may
+leave out of the question the action of the King in his communication to
+Lord Temple, which, although sanctioned by the great legal authority of
+Lord Thurlow, we are, for reasons already given, compelled to regard as
+unconstitutional, but for which Mr. Pitt was only technically
+responsible; having, indeed, made himself so by his subsequent
+acceptance of office, but having had no previous suspicion of the royal
+intentions. Similarly, we may dismiss from our consideration the merits
+or demerits of Fox's India Bill, the designs which were imputed to its
+framers, or the consequences which, whether intended or not by them,
+were predicted as certain to flow from it. And we may confine ourselves
+to the question whether, in the great Parliamentary struggle which
+ensued, and which lasted for more than three months,[104] the doctrines
+advanced by Mr. Fox, and the conduct pursued by him, were more or less
+in accordance with the admitted rules and principles of the
+constitution.
+
+These doctrines may be reduced to two: the first a declaration that no
+minister is justified in retaining office any longer than he is
+sustained in it by the favorable judgment of the representatives of the
+people. Taken by itself, this, but for one consideration, might be
+pronounced the superfluous assertion of a truism; superfluous, because
+it is obvious that a House of Commons hostile to a minister can compel
+his resignation by obstructing all his measures. And Pitt himself
+recognized this as fully as Fox, though we may hardly agree with him
+that the Opposition was bound to allow him time to develop his policy,
+and to bring forward his various measures, before it pronounced an
+opinion adverse to them. In 1835, when Sir R. Peel first met Parliament
+after his acceptance of office, consequent on the King's dismissal of
+Lord Melbourne's ministry, the Opposition encountered and defeated him
+twice in the first week of the session--on the choice of a Speaker, and
+on the address, though the latter had been framed with the most skilful
+care to avoid any necessity for objection; but no attempt was made by
+him to call in question the perfect right of Lord J. Russell and his
+followers in the House to choose their own time and field of battle. But
+there is one farther consideration, that the authority belonging to the
+judgment of the House of Commons depends on that judgment being not
+solely its own, but the judgment also of the constituencies which have
+returned it, and whose mouth-piece it is; and also that the House is not
+immortal, but is liable to be sent back to those constituencies, to see
+whether they will ratify the judgment which their representatives have
+expressed; whether, in other words, their judgment be the judgment of
+the nation also. This farther consideration was, in fact, Pitt's plea
+for resisting the majorities which, through January and February, so
+repeatedly pronounced against him. And in determining to appeal to the
+constituencies, as the court of ultimate resort, he was clearly within
+the lines of the constitution.
+
+It follows that Fox, in protesting against a dissolution, in threatening
+even to take steps to prevent it, was acting in self-evident violation
+of all constitutional principle and precedent. He was denying one of the
+most universally acknowledged of the royal prerogatives. The distinction
+which he endeavored to draw between a dissolution at the close of a
+session and one in the middle of it, had manifestly no validity in law
+or in common-sense. The minister had a clear right to appeal from the
+House of Commons to the people, and one equally clear to choose his own
+time for making that appeal. The appeal was made, the judgment of the
+nation was pronounced, and its pronouncement may be, and indeed must be,
+accepted as a sufficient justification, in a constitutional point of
+view, of Pitt's conduct both in accepting and retaining office. If he
+retained it for three months, in opposition to the voice of the existing
+House of Commons, he could certainly allege that he was retaining it in
+accordance with the deliberate judgment of the nation.
+
+And this is the verdict of a modern statesman, a very careful student of
+the theory of our Parliamentary constitution, and one whom party
+connection would notoriously have inclined to defend the line taken by
+Mr. Fox, had it been possible to do so. Indeed, he may be said to show
+his bias in that statesman's favor when he affirms that he would have
+been right in moving a resolution of censure on Pitt for "his acceptance
+of office," which he presently calls the result of "the success of a
+court intrigue,"[105] and, without a particle of evidence to justify the
+imputation, affirms to "have been prepared beforehand with much art and
+combination." But _amicus Fox, sed magis arnica veritas_; and though he
+thus passes censure on Pitt, where the facts on which he bases it are at
+least unproved, on those points as to which the facts are clear and
+certain he condemns Fox altogether, affirming that his "attempt to show
+that the crown had not the prerogative of dissolving Parliament in the
+middle of a session had neither law nor precedent in its support."[106]
+And he proceeds to lay down, with great clearness and accuracy, "the
+practice as well as the theory of our mixed government," which is, that
+"when two of the powers of the state cannot" agree, and the business of
+the state is stopped, the only appeal is to the people at large. Thus,
+when in the reign of Queen Anne the House of Lords and the House of
+Commons fulminated resolutions at each other, a dissolution cleared the
+air and restored serenity. If no case had occurred since the Revolution
+of a quarrel between the crown and the House of Commons, the cause is to
+be sought in the prudence with which every sovereign who had reigned
+since that event had wielded his constitutional authority. If George
+III. had been wanting in that prudence, it did not follow that he was
+debarred from the right of appealing to the people. Any other doctrine
+would invest the House of Commons, elected for the ordinary business of
+the state, with a supreme power over every branch of it. This supreme
+power must rest somewhere; according to our constitution it rests in the
+common assent of the realm, signified by the persons duly qualified to
+elect the members of the House of Commons; and Lord Russell, in thus
+expounding his ideas on this subject, was undoubtedly expressing the
+view that ever since the transactions of which we have been speaking has
+been taken of the point chiefly in dispute. Since that day there has
+been more than one instance of Parliament being dissolved in the middle
+of a session; but, though the prudence of the different ministers who
+advised such dissolutions may, perhaps, have been questioned--nay,
+though in one memorable instance it was undoubtedly a penal dissolution
+in the fullest sense of the word[107]--no one has ever accused the
+sovereign's advisers of seducing him into an unconstitutional exercise
+of his prerogative.
+
+Pitt was now Prime-minister, with a degree of power in Parliament and of
+popularity out-of-doors that no former minister, not even his own
+father, had ever enjoyed. As such, by the confession of one who was
+certainly no friendly critic,[108] "he became the greatest master of
+Parliamentary government that has ever existed." His administration may
+be regarded as a fresh starting-point in the history of the country, as
+the inauguration of the principle of steady amendment, improvement, and
+progress, in place of the maxims which had guided all his predecessors
+since the Revolution, of regarding every thing as permanently settled by
+the arrangements made at that time, and their own duty, consequently, as
+binding them to keep everything in its existing condition. But, of all
+the ministers recorded in our annals, there is not one so greatly in
+advance of his time as Pitt; and from the very outset of his ministerial
+career he applied himself, not only to the removal or correction of
+admitted abuses or defects, but, in cases where the fault, being in our
+general system of policy, had been less conspicuous, to the
+establishment of new principles of action which have been the rules of
+all succeeding statesmen. He was not, indeed, the first raiser of the
+question of Parliamentary Reform, but he was the first to produce an
+elaborate scheme with that object, parts of which, such as the
+suppression of the smaller boroughs and the enfranchisement of places
+which had gradually become more important, have been leading features of
+every subsequent bill on the subject. He was the first to propose the
+removal of those political disabilities under which the Roman Catholics
+labored, which no one before him had regarded as consistent with the
+safety of the state, and to which he sacrificed office. He was the first
+to conceive the idea of developing our national industries and resources
+by commercial treaties with other nations, even choosing for his
+essay-piece a treaty with a country with which our relations for nearly
+five hundred years had been almost uninterruptedly hostile, and which
+Fox, in the heat of his opposition, objected even to consider in any
+other light than that of an enemy. He laid the foundation for all
+subsequent legislation connected with our colonies in his Bill for the
+Government of Canada; and he established a system for the government of
+our Indian dependencies on so statesman-like a principle, that all
+subsequent administrations concurred in upholding it, till subsequent
+events compelled the abolition of all the share in the government of the
+country previously possessed by the Company.
+
+A great writer of the past generation,[109] who in some respects has
+done full justice to his genius and political virtue, has, however
+(partly, it can hardly be doubted, from regarding himself as a follower
+of his great rival, Fox), contrasted his capacity as a War-minister with
+that of his father, drawing a comparison on this point very
+disadvantageous to the son. We need not stop to examine how far the
+praises which he bestows on Lord Chatham's talents as a planner of
+military operations are deserved; but it may very fairly be contended
+that the disparaging views of Pitt's military policy which he has
+advanced are founded solely on what is in this as well as in many other
+instances a most delusive criterion, success. It is true,
+unquestionably, that in the campaigns of 1793-4-5 against the French
+revolutionists, while he took upon this country the entire burden of the
+naval war, on land he contented himself with playing a secondary part,
+and employing a comparatively small force (which, however, doubled that
+which his father had sent to Minden),[110] for the success of the
+military operations trusting chiefly to the far stronger Austrian and
+Prussian divisions, under the command of Prince Coburg and the Duke of
+Brunswick, to which the British regiments were but auxiliaries. It is
+true, also, that the result of their operations was unfortunate, and
+that the German generals proved wholly unable to contend with the fiery
+and more skilful impetuosity of Jourdan and Pichégru. But the question
+is not whether Pitt's confidence in the prowess of his allies was
+misplaced, but whether he had not abundant reason to justify him in
+entertaining it. And, to judge fairly on this point, we must recollect
+the reputation which for the last forty years the Austrian and Prussian
+armies had enjoyed. The result of the seven years' war had established
+the renown of the Prussians, and the Duke of Brunswick was understood to
+be a favorite pupil of the Great Frederic. The same war had shown that
+the Austrians were not very unequal to the Prussians; while the
+reputation of the French troops had fallen to the lowest ebb, the most
+memorable event in their annals during the same war being the rout of
+Rosbach, when 60,000 of them fled before Frederic and 22,000. At the
+breaking out of the Revolution, it might be said that De Bouille was the
+only French general of the slightest reputation, and since the sad
+journey to Varennes he had been an exile from his country. And, though
+again in 1803 Pitt once more trusted for success on land to Continental
+alliances, not only does he deserve admiration for the diplomatic talent
+with which he united Austria, Prussia, and Russia against France, but it
+can hardly be doubted that confederacy would have been triumphant, had
+not the incompetent vanity of Alexander ruined all its prospects by his
+rash disregard at Austerlitz of the experienced warnings of his own
+staff.[111]
+
+The new form of government which he established for India, and to which
+allusion has been made, has lost the greater part of its importance in
+the eyes of the present generation, from the more-recent abolition of
+the political authority of the East India Company, though of some of the
+principles which he avowed he had taken for his guides it is worth while
+to preserve the record; with such clearness, as well as statesman-like
+wisdom, do they affirm the objects which every one should keep in view
+who applies himself to legislation for distant dependencies where the
+privileges and interests of foreign fellow-subjects are to be regarded
+with as jealous a solicitude as those of our own countrymen. These
+objects may be briefly described as being the reconciling the vested and
+chartered interests of the Company with the legitimate authority of the
+King's government; for, though Pitt admitted that "state necessity"
+might occasionally be allowed as a valid reason for the abrogation of a
+charter, he affirmed that nothing short of such absolute necessity could
+excuse such a measure, and he relied on the previous history of the
+Company to prove the fallacy of an observation that had sometimes been
+made, that commercial companies could not govern empires. There were
+three interests to be considered: that of the native Indians, that of
+the Company, and that of this country; and the problem to be solved was,
+"how to do the most good to India and to the East India Company with the
+least injury to our constitution." Some of his remarks contained
+unavoidable allusions to Fox's bill of the previous year, since some of
+the provisions of his bill were entirely opposite to those which Fox had
+framed, the most material point of difference being the character of the
+Board of Control which he proposed to establish. Fox, as has been seen,
+had proposed to make the commissioners to be appointed under his bill
+irremovable for several years, whatever changes might take place in the
+home government; an arrangement which the opposers of the bill suspected
+of being designed to prevent any change in the home government from
+taking place. Pitt, on the other hand, laid down as one of his leading
+principles that "the board could not be permanent, that it must be
+subordinate to the administration of the day, and that permanency would
+be in itself a deviation from the principles of the constitution, and
+would involve the board in contradictions to the executive government
+that could not fail to be attended with great public inconvenience. An
+institution to control the government of India must be either totally
+independent of the government of this country or subordinate to it."
+"The board was to consist of none but privy councillors," and instead of
+the vast amount of patronage which was to have been created by the bill
+of 1783, this board was "to create no increase of officers nor to impose
+any new burdens." ... "The first and leading ideas would be, to limit
+the subsisting patronage;" ... and so little was Pitt covetous to
+engross that which did and must continue to subsist, that he left even
+"the officers of the government of Bengal to the nomination of the Court
+of Directors, subject only to the negative of the crown; and the Court
+of Directors was also to have the nomination of the officers of all the
+subordinate governments, except only of the commander-in-chief, who, for
+various reasons, must remain to be appointed by the crown." Another very
+important part of the arrangement was, that "gradation and succession
+were to be the general rule of promotion," a regulation which of itself
+would be "a forcible check upon patronage, and tend greatly to its
+reduction." The governor of Bengal was to be the governor-general of the
+whole country, the governors of Madras and Bombay being subordinate to
+him; and each governor was to be assisted by a council of three members,
+of whom the commander of the forces was to be one.
+
+The spirit in which a law or a government is administered is commonly of
+greater practical importance than the words in which the regulation or
+the system is framed or defined; and Pitt, therefore, concluded his
+speech by laying down a few "clear and simple principles as those from
+which alone a good government could arise. The first and principal
+object would be to take care to prevent the government from being
+ambitious and bent on conquest. Commerce was our object, and, with a
+view to its extension, a pacific system should prevail, and a system of
+defence and conciliation. The government there ought, therefore, in an
+especial manner, to avoid wars, or entering into alliances likely to
+create wars." It was not to forget "to pay a due regard to self-defence,
+or to guard against sudden hostilities from neighboring powers, and,
+whenever there was reason to apprehend attack, to be in a state of
+preparation. This was indispensably necessary; but whenever such
+circumstances occurred, the executive government in India was not to
+content itself with acting there as the circumstances of the case might
+require; it was also to send immediate advice home of what had happened,
+of what measures had been taken in consequence, and what farther
+measures were intended to be pursued; and a tribunal was to be
+established to take cognizance of such matters." The system of taking
+presents from the natives was to be absolutely prohibited, a regulation
+which he hoped would "tend effectually to check private corruption;"
+and, lastly, it was proposed to establish a court of criminal judicature
+for the trial in England of certain classes of delinquents after their
+return from India. The Judges of the court were to be men of the highest
+character; they were to be chosen by ballot, some being taken from the
+bench of judges, some from each House of Parliament. And they were "not
+to be tied down to strict rules of evidence, but to be upon their oaths
+to give their judgments conscientiously, and to pronounce such judgment
+as the common law would warrant." Such a tribunal he admitted to be an
+innovation; but, "unless some new process were instituted, offences
+shocking to humanity, opposite to justice, and contrary to every
+principle of religion and morality, must continue to prevail, unchecked,
+uncontrolled, and unrestrained, and the necessity of the case outweighed
+the risk and the hazard of the innovation."
+
+These were the general outlines of the constitution which in 1784 the
+Parliament established for India, and the skill with which it was
+adapted to the very peculiar character of the settlements to be governed
+is sufficiently proved by the fact that it was maintained with very
+little alteration equally by Whig and Tory administrations for
+three-quarters of a century, till the great convulsion of the Mutiny
+compelled an entire alteration in the system, and the abolition of the
+governing powers of the Company, as we shall have occasion to relate in
+a subsequent chapter. The principles which Pitt had laid down as the
+guiding maxims for the governors; the avoidance of ambitious views of
+conquest, the preservation of peace, and the limitation of the aims of
+the government to the encouragement and extension of commerce, were not
+equally adhered to. Undoubtedly, in some instances, the wars in which,
+even during Pitt's too short lifetime, the Indian government was
+engaged, came under his description of wars which were justifiable on
+the ground of self-defence--wars undertaken for the preservation of what
+had been previously won or purchased, rather than for the acquisition of
+new territories at the expense of chiefs who had given us no
+provocation. But for others, though professedly undertaken with a view
+only of anticipating hostile intentions, the development of which might
+possibly be reserved for a distant future, it is not easy to find a
+similar justification; and it may be feared that in more than one case
+governors-general, conscious of great abilities, have been too much
+inclined to adopt the pernicious maxim of Louis XIV., that the
+aggrandizement and extension of his dominions is the noblest object
+which a ruler of nations can have in view. Yet, though unable on
+strictly moral grounds to justify all the warlike enterprises which make
+up so large a part of our subsequent Indian history, it is impossible,
+probably, for even the most rigid moralist to avoid some feelings of
+national pride in the genius of our countrymen, who in the short space
+of a single century have built up an empire of a magnitude unequalled
+even by the Caesars, and have governed and still are governing it in so
+wise and beneficent a spirit, and with such a display of administrative
+capacity, that our rule is recognized as a blessing by the great
+majority of the nations themselves, as a protection from ceaseless
+intestine war, from rapine, and that worst of tyrannies, anarchy, which
+was their normal condition before Clive established our supremacy at
+Plassy, and into which they would surely and speedily fall back, if our
+controlling authority were to be withdrawn.
+
+India was not the only British settlement for which the growth of our
+empire compelled Pitt to devise a constitution. The year which saw his
+birth had also seen the conquest of Canada from the French; and in 1774
+a system of government for the new province had been established which
+it is sufficient here to describe as one, which differed but little from
+a pure despotism, the administration being vested in a governor and
+Legislative Council, every member of which was to be nominated by the
+crown. But the working of this act had from the first proved very
+unsatisfactory, and had become more so as the population increased by
+the influx of fresh settlers from Great Britain, and also from the
+United States, here many of those who in the recent civil war had
+adhered the connection with the mother country had been exposed to
+constant malice and ill-treatment, and had preferred crossing the border
+and obtaining lands in Canada to returning to England. Pitt recognized
+the evil, and undertook to remedy it and in 1791 he introduced a bill to
+establish a constitution for Canada, which a recent historian describes
+as "remarkable, as recognizing for the first time the wise and generous
+principle of independent colonial institutions, which has since been
+fully developed in every dependency of the British crown capable of
+local self-government."[112] One peculiar difficulty in framing such a
+constitution arose from the circumstance of the old French colonists,
+who greatly outnumbered the settlers of British blood, being attached to
+the Roman Catholic religion; while the British settlers were nearly, or
+perhaps all, Protestant, though of different denominations. The
+difficulty was, indeed, lessened by the circumstance that the French
+dwelt in Quebec and the district between that city and the mouth of the
+St. Lawrence, and that the English had for the most part betaken
+themselves to the more inland region. And this local separation of the
+two races the minister now took for his guide in the arrangement which
+he devised. The most important feature in it was the division of the
+province into two parts, as Upper and Lower Canada, and the
+establishment of a distinct local Legislature for each division, a House
+of Assembly being created in each, and a Council, so as, in Pitt's
+words, "to give both divisions the full advantages of the British
+constitution." The Assemblies were to have the power of taxation (so
+that there was no room left for such perverse legislation by a British
+Parliament as had lately cost its sovereign the United States). The act
+of _habeas corpus_ was extended to the province (a privilege which no
+one of French blood had ever enjoyed before); the tenure of land was to
+be the socage[113] tenure so long and happily established in England.
+Complete religious toleration was established, and a certain proportion
+of land was allotted in Upper Canada, as a provision for a Protestant
+clergy, and the foundation of an ecclesiastical establishment. So great
+was Pitt's desire to complete the resemblance between the colony and
+Great Britain, that he even contemplated the creation of an aristocracy,
+by the introduction of a provision enabling the King to grant hereditary
+colonial titles, the possession of which should include hereditary seats
+in the provincial Council. The two latter clauses were opposed by Fox,
+and the latter of them, though sanctioned by Parliament, was never
+carried out in practice. But Fox, bitter as he was at this time in his
+general opposition to the government, agreed cordially in the general
+principles of the bill, avowing his conviction that "the only method of
+retaining distant colonies with advantage is to enable them to govern
+themselves," so that each party in the British Parliament is entitled to
+a share of the credit for this pattern of all subsequent colonial
+constitutions--Pitt for the original genius for organization which his
+contrivance of all the complicated details of the measure displayed, and
+Fox for his frank adoption of the general principle inculcated by his
+rival, even while differing as to some of the minor details of the
+measure. During these years the country was increasing in prosperity,
+and the minister was daily rising in credit; more powerful and more
+popular than the most successful or the most brilliant of his
+predecessors. But during these same years two great constitutional
+difficulties had arisen, one of which, indeed, the deep sense which both
+parties felt of the danger of investigating it shelved almost as soon as
+it was seen; but the other of which, besides the importance which it
+derived from the degree in which it involved the principle of the
+supreme authority of Parliament, and brought under discussion even that
+which regulates the succession to the crown, imperilled the existence of
+the ministry, and threatened a total change in both the domestic and
+foreign policy of the nation.
+
+The Prince of Wales, who had come of age in the summer of 1783, had at
+once begun to make himself notorious for the violence of his opposition
+to his father's ministers, carrying the openness of his hostility so far
+as, during the Westminster election to drive about the streets with a
+carriage and all his servants profusely decorated with Fox's colors;
+and, still more discreditably, by most unmeasured profligacy of all
+kinds. The consequence was that he soon became deeply involved in debt,
+so deeply that, in 1787, a member of Fox's party gave notice of his
+intention to move that the Parliament should pay his debts and increase
+his income. Pitt, without specifying his reasons, avowed that he should
+feel it his duty to oppose any grant of such a character; but another
+member of Parliament, Mr. Rolle, one of the members for Devonshire,
+being trammelled by no such feeling of responsibility, expressed a
+similar resolution in language which contained an allusion perfectly
+understood on both sides of the House. He said that "the question thus
+proposed to be brought forward went immediately to affect our
+constitution in Church and State." And every one knew that he was
+referring to a report which had recently become general, that the Prince
+was married to a Roman Catholic lady of the name of Fitzherbert. No
+direct notice was taken of this allusion at the moment, Fox himself, who
+had the chief share of the Prince's confidence, being accidentally
+absent; but a day or two afterward he referred to Rolle's speech with
+great indignation, declaring that it referred to a "low, malicious
+calumny" which had no foundation whatever, and "was only fit to impose
+on the lowest order of persons." Being pressed as to the precise force
+of his assertion, and being asked whether it meant more than that under
+the existing laws, such as the Royal Marriage Act, there had been no
+marriage, because there could have been no _legal_ marriage, he declared
+that he meant no such evasion, but that no marriage ceremony, legal or
+illegal, had ever taken place; and farther, that in saying this he was
+speaking on the direct authority of the Prince himself. No more
+degrading act stains the annals of British royalty. For the fact was
+true--the very next evening Fox learned the deceit which the Prince had
+practised on him from a gentleman who had been one of the witnesses to
+the marriage, which had been solemnized by a Protestant clergyman
+fifteen months before.[114] And his indignation was such that for some
+time afterward he abstained from all interference in the Prince's
+affairs; while the language held by the Prince's other confidant, Mr.
+Sheridan, was so evasive as to betray a consciousness that whatever had
+occurred would not bear the light of day; so that there were very few to
+whom the truth or falsehood of the report was a subject of interest who
+felt any uncertainty on the subject.
+
+It may, probably, be regarded as fortunate for the peace of the kingdom
+that the Prince, who eventually became King George IV., left behind him
+no issue from his marriage with the Princess, the failure of heirs of
+his body thus removing any temptation to raise the question whether he
+had not himself forfeited all right to succeed to the throne by his
+previous marriage to a Roman Catholic. A clause of the Bill of Rights
+provides that any member of the royal family who should marry a Roman
+Catholic (with the exception of the issue of princesses who may be the
+wives of foreign princes) shall by that marriage be rendered incapable
+of inheriting the crown of England. And though the Royal Marriage Act
+(which, as we have seen, had been recently passed) had enacted that no
+marriage of any member of the royal family contracted without the
+consent of the reigning sovereign should be valid, it by no means
+follows that an invalidity so created would exempt the contractor of a
+marriage with a Roman Catholic, which as an honorable man he must be
+supposed to have intended to make valid, from the penalties enacted by
+the Bill of Rights. It is a point on which the most eminent lawyers of
+the present day are by no means agreed. The spirit of the clause in that
+bill undoubtedly was, that no apparent or presumptive heirs to the crown
+should form a matrimonial connection with any one who should own
+allegiance to a foreign power, and that spirit was manifestly
+disregarded if a prince married a Roman Catholic lady, even though a
+subsequent law had enacted a conditional invalidity of such a marriage.
+We may find an analogy to such a case in instances where a man has
+abducted a minor, and induced her to contract a marriage with himself.
+The lady may not have been reluctant; but the marriage has been
+annulled, and the husband has been criminally prosecuted, the nullity of
+the marriage not availing to save him from conviction and punishment. A
+bigamous marriage is invalid, but the bigamist is punished. And, apart
+from any purely legal consideration, it may be thought that public
+policy forbids such a construction of law as would make the illegality
+or invalidity of an act (and all illegal acts must be more or less
+invalid) such a protection to the wrong-doer as would screen him from
+punishment.
+
+Whatever may be the judgment formed on the legal aspect and merits of
+the case, the conduct of the Prince could not fail to give the great
+body of the people, justly jealous at all times of their national
+adherence to truthfulness and honesty, a most unfavorable impression of
+his character. As has been already mentioned, Fox was so indignant at
+having been made the instrument to assure the Parliament and the nation
+of a falsehood, that he for a time broke off all communication with
+him.[115] Yet a singular caprice of fortune, or, it would be more proper
+to say, a melancholy visitation of Providence, before the end of the
+following year led Fox to carry his championship of the same Prince who
+had so abused his confidence to the length of pronouncing the most
+extravagant eulogies on his principles, and on his right to the
+confidence and respect of the nation at large. In the autumn of 1788 the
+King fell into a state of bad health, which in no long time affected his
+mind, and, by the middle of November, had so deranged his faculties as
+to render him incapable of attending to his royal duties, or, in fact,
+transacting any business whatever. Parliament was not sitting, but its
+re-assembling had been fixed for the 4th of December, and before that
+day arrived the King's illness had assumed so alarming a character, and
+it appeared so unsafe to calculate on his immediate recovery, that the
+minister summoned a Privy Council, the summons being addressed to the
+members of the Opposition as well as to his own followers, to receive
+the opinions of the physicians in attendance on his Majesty, as a
+necessary foundation for the measures which he conceived it to be his
+duty to propose to Parliament. Those opinions were, that it was almost
+certain that the disease would not be permanent, though no one could
+undertake to fix its duration with the least appearance of probability.
+And, as the royal authority could not be left in abeyance, as it were,
+for an uncertain period, it was indispensable to appoint a Regent to
+conduct the affairs of the kingdom till the King should, happily, be
+once more in a condition to resume his functions.
+
+In considering the line of conduct adopted in this emergency by Pitt and
+his great rival Fox, Pitt has one manifest advantage on his side, that
+it is impossible to attribute the course which he took to any personal
+motive, or any desire for the retention of official power; while it is
+equally impossible to doubt that Fox was in no slight degree,[116] and
+that Lord Loughborough, the prince's chief adviser on points of law, was
+wholly influenced by the hope of supplanting the ministry. Pitt had
+never the least doubt that on the establishment of the Regency he should
+be dismissed, and was prepared to return to the Bar. But his knowledge
+of the preference which the Prince entertained for his rival did not
+lead him to hesitate for a single moment as to the propriety of placing
+him in a situation to exercise that preference. On the reassembling of
+Parliament, he at once took what he conceived to be the proper
+parliamentary course of proceeding; at his suggestion committees in both
+Houses were appointed to take a formal examination of the royal
+physicians; and, when those committees had reported that the King was
+for the present incapable of discharging his royal functions, though
+likely at some future period to be able to resume them, he moved the
+House of Commons to appoint another committee, to search for "precedents
+of such proceedings as might have been taken in the case of the personal
+exercise of the royal authority being prevented or interrupted by
+infancy, sickness, or infirmity, with a view to provide for the same."
+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. He
+instantly replied that to assert an inherent indefeasible right in the
+Prince of Wales, or any one else, independently of the decision of the
+two Houses, fell little short of treason to the constitution; but, at
+the same time, to prevent any one pretending to misconceive his
+intentions, he allowed it to be seen with sufficient plainness that,
+when once the right of Parliament to appoint the Regent had been
+established, he should agree in the propriety of conferring that office
+on the Prince of Wales. The committee was appointed; but, even before it
+could report the result of its investigations, the doctrine advanced by
+Fox had been the subject of discussion in the House of Lords, where Lord
+Camden, who had presided over the meeting of the Privy Council a few
+days before, on moving for the appointment of a similar committee of
+peers, had taken occasion to declare that, if Fox had made such an
+assertion as rumor imputed to him, it was one which had no foundation in
+"the common law of the kingdom." He had never read nor heard of such a
+doctrine. Its assertors might raise expectations not easily laid, and
+might involve the country in confusion. And he contended, as Pitt had
+done in the Commons, that its assertion was a strong argument in favor
+of the appointment of a committee, that it might be at once seen whether
+it were warranted by any precedent whatever. The reports of the two
+committees bore out Fox's statement, that no precedent entirely
+applicable to the case before them had ever occurred. But by this time
+Fox had learned that the argument which he had founded on it was in the
+highest degree unpalatable both to Parliament and to the nation; and for
+a moment he sought to modify it by an explanation that, though he had
+claimed for the Prince "the naked right, he had not by that expression
+intended to maintain that that right could be reduced into possession
+without the consent of Parliament;" an explanation not very reconcilable
+to common sense, since, if a right were inherent and indefeasible,
+Parliament could not, without absolute tyranny, refuse to sanction its
+exercise; and, in fact, his coadjutor, Sheridan, on the very same
+evening, re-asserted his original doctrine in, if possible, still more
+explicit terms, warning the minister "of the danger of provoking the
+Prince to assert his right," while a still greater man (Burke) declared
+that "the minister had taken up an attitude on the question tantamount
+to that of setting himself up as a competitor to the Prince." Such
+inconsiderate violence gave a great advantage to Pitt, one of whose most
+useful characteristics as a debater was a readiness and presence of mind
+that nothing could discompose. He repelled such menaces and imputations
+with an equally lofty scorn, and, after a few necessary preliminaries,
+brought forward a series of resolutions, one of which declared the fact
+of the sovereign's illness, and consequent incapacity; a second affirmed
+it to be the right and duty of the two Houses of Parliament to provide
+the means for supplying the defect in the royal authority; and a third
+imposed on the Houses the task of deciding on the mode in which the
+royal assent necessary to give their resolutions the authority of law
+should be signified. It was impossible to object to the first; but the
+second was stubbornly contested by the Opposition, the chiefs of the
+Coalition Ministry once more fighting side by side; though Lord North
+contented himself with arguing that the affirmation of the right and
+duty of Parliament was a needless raising of a disputable point, and
+moving, therefore, that the committee should report progress, as the
+recognized mode of shelving it. Fox, however, carried away by the heat
+of debate, returned to the assertion of the doctrine of absolute right,
+overlooking his subsequent modification of it, and again gave Pitt the
+advantage, by condescending to impugn his motives for proposing the
+resolution, as being inspired, not by a zeal for the constitution, but
+by a consciousness that he did not deserve the confidence of the Prince,
+and, therefore, anticipated his instant dismissal by the Regent. The
+re-affirmation of the Prince's inherent right was, indeed, necessary to
+Fox as the foundation for the objections which he took to other parts of
+Pitt's scheme. For the minister, while admitting to its full extent the
+irresistible claim which the Prince of Wales possessed to the preference
+of Parliament for the Regency, proposed at the same time to impose
+certain limitations on his exercise of the authority, so long as there
+was a reasonable hope of his royal father's recovery. He was not to have
+the power to create peerages, nor to alienate the property of the crown,
+nor to grant offices in reversion; and, as the Queen was to have the
+care of his Majesty's person, she also was to have the appointment of
+all the offices in the royal household. Fox, on the other hand, objected
+with extreme earnestness to the impropriety of imposing any limitations
+whatever on the power of the Regent; and then the question whether the
+Prince was to derive his right to the Regency from the authority of
+Parliament, or from his natural position and inalienable preceding right
+as his father's heir, became one of practical importance. If the
+Parliament had the right to confer authority, it had clearly the right
+to limit the authority it conferred. If the Prince had an indefeasible
+right to the Regency, independently of the will of Parliament, then
+Parliament could have no pretence to limit or restrain the exercise of
+an authority which in no degree flowed from itself. Fox, indeed, took
+another objection to the imposing of limitations to the authority to be
+intrusted to the Regent, contending that this would be to create a power
+unknown to the constitution--a person in the situation of King without
+regal power. But, not to mention precedents drawn from the reigns of
+Edward III., Richard II., and Henry VI., in the twenty-fourth year of
+the very last reign, George II., on the death of his son, the father of
+the present King, had enjoined the Parliament to provide for the
+government, in the case of his own death, while the heir was still a
+minor, recommending to them the appointment of the Princess Dowager of
+Wales as Regent, "with such powers and limitations as might appear
+expedient." And, in conformity with his desire, the Parliament had
+appointed the Princess Regent, with a Council of Regency to assist her;
+and had enacted that "several portions of the regal power" should be
+withheld from the Regent, if she could not obtain the consent of the
+Council thus appointed.[118]
+
+This part of the case was so plain, that when, after the different
+resolutions proposed by Pitt had been adopted in both Houses, Fox
+insisted that, instead of proceeding by a bill to create a Regency, and
+to appoint the Prince of Wales Regent, the only course which could be
+adopted with propriety would be to present an address to the Prince, to
+entreat him to assume the government, he failed to induce the House to
+agree with him; and finally, as if he were determined to find a
+battle-field in every clause, he made a vigorous resistance to the
+expedient by which Pitt proposed that the formal royal assent which was
+necessary to make the bill law should be given. Fox, on one occasion,
+had gone the length of denying that the two Houses had any right to be
+regarded as a Parliament while the King, an essential part of
+Parliament, was incapacitated. But such an objection could have had no
+force, even in the mind of him who raised it, since the proceedings of
+the two Convention Parliaments of 1660 and 1689 labored under a similar
+defect; and yet their acts had been recognized as valid, and ratified by
+subsequent Parliaments. And now, in reference to the expedient proposed
+by the minister, that the two Houses should empower and authorize the
+Lord Chancellor to affix the Great Seal to the bill, Burke, with great,
+but for him not unusual, violence, denounced both the proposal and the
+Chancellor, declaring that such a step would be the setting up of a
+phantom of sovereignty, a puppet, an idol, an idiot, to which he
+disclaimed all allegiance. A more perilous amendment was one proposed to
+another clause by Mr. Rolle, enacting that if the Regent should marry a
+Roman Catholic his authority should cease. Since the Bill of Rights, as
+we have seen, forbade a sovereign to marry a Roman Catholic without
+incurring the forfeiture of his crown, it was evidently reasonable that
+the same restriction should be imposed on every Regent; but it was hard
+at the moment altogether to dissociate such a clause from the
+discussions of the preceding year; and Mr. Rolle endeavored to give the
+clause a more pointed meaning by an amendment to enact that the
+forfeiture should be incurred by the mere celebration of any marriage
+ceremony, whether the marriage thus performed were legal and valid or
+not. His amendment, however, was unanimously rejected. The bill was
+passed without alteration by the House of Commons; the Prince, while
+protesting in an elaborate and most able letter, drawn up for him by
+Burke, against the restrictions imposed by the bill, nevertheless
+consented to sacrifice his own judgment to the general good of the
+kingdom, and to accept the authority, limited as it was. And by the
+middle of February the bill was sent up to the House of Lords. There
+Lord Camden had charge of it, and his position as a former Chancellor
+gave irresistible weight to his opinion that the mode proposed to give
+the final sanction to the bill was strictly in accordance with the
+spirit and practice of the constitution. The point with which he dealt
+was the previous one, how Parliament, which was to pass the bill, was to
+be opened, for, "circumstanced as it was, Parliament could not at
+present take a single step." The law, as he put it, declared that the
+King must be present, either in person or by a representative. When he
+could not attend personally, the legal and constitutional process was to
+issue letters-patent under the Great Seal. In the present dilemma,
+therefore, he recommended that the two Houses should direct
+letters-patent to be issued under the Great Seal, authorizing
+commissioners to open Parliament in the name of his Majesty. He "must
+use the liberty to say that those who treated this proposal with
+ridicule were ignorant of the laws of their country. A fiction it might
+be termed, but it was a fiction admirably calculated to preserve the
+constitution, and, by adopting its forms, to preserve its substance."
+The authority of the Great Seal he explained to be such that, "even if
+the Lord Chancellor, by caprice, put it to any commission, it could not
+afterward be questioned;" and he adduced a precedent of a very similar
+character to the course now proposed, which occurred "at the
+commencement of the reign of Henry VI., when, the sovereign being an
+infant of nine months old, the Great Seal was placed in his hand, and it
+was supposed to be given to him by the Master of the Rolls, whereupon
+many commissions were sealed by it, and the government was carried on
+under its authority." That precedent, he reminded the peers, had been
+followed as recently as the year 1754, when, during an illness of George
+II., Lord Chancellor Hardwicke affixed the Great Seal to a commission
+for opening a session of Parliament. And, finally, he concluded by
+moving, "That it is expedient and necessary that letters-patent for
+opening the Parliament should pass under the Great Seal."[119] The
+motion was carried, and Parliament was opened in accordance with it;
+and, if it had been necessary, the same expedient would have sufficed to
+give the requisite assent to the Regency Bill, a necessity which was
+escaped by the fortunate recovery of the royal patient, which was
+announced by his medical advisers a day or two before that fixed for the
+third reading of the bill in the House of Lords.
+
+Though the question was thus left undetermined for the moment, it was
+revived twenty-two years afterward, when the same sovereign was attacked
+by a recurrence of the same disease, and the existing ministry, then
+presided over by Mr. Perceval, brought forward a Regency Bill almost
+identical with that which on this occasion had been framed by Mr. Pitt;
+and the Opposition, led by Lord Grey and Sir Samuel Romilly, raised as
+nearly as possible the same objections to it which were now urged by Fox
+and his adherents. The ministerial measure was, however, again supported
+by considerable majorities; so that the course proposed by Mr. Pitt on
+this occasion may be said to have received the sanction of two
+Parliaments assembled and sitting under widely different circumstances;
+and may, therefore, be taken as having established the rule which will
+be adopted if such an emergency should, unfortunately, arise hereafter.
+And indeed, though the propriety of Pitt's proposals has, as was
+natural, been discussed by every historical and political writer who has
+dealt with the history of that time, there has been a general
+concurrence of opinion in favor of that statesman's measure. Lord John
+Russell, while giving a document, entitled "Materials for a Pamphlet,"
+in which he recognizes the handwriting of Lord Loughborough, and which
+"contains the grounds of the opinion advanced by him, and adopted by Mr.
+Fox, that, from the moment the two Houses of Parliament declared the
+King unable to exercise his royal authority, a right to exercise that
+authority attached to the Prince of Wales," does not suppress his own
+opinion of the "erroneousness of this or any other doctrine that
+attributes to any individual or any constituted authority existing in
+the state a strict or legal right to claim or to dispose of the royal
+authority while the King is alive, but incapable of exercising it."[120]
+
+The only writer, as far as I am aware, who advocates the opposite view
+is Lord Campbell, who, after quoting the speech of Lord Camden, from
+which extracts have been made, comments on it, and on the whole
+transaction, in the following terms: "From the course then adopted and
+carried through, I presume it is now to be considered part of our
+constitution that if ever, during the natural life of the sovereign, he
+is unable by mental disease personally to exercise the royal functions,
+the deficiency is to be supplied by the two Houses of Parliament, who,
+in their _discretion_, will probably elect the heir-apparent Regent,
+under such restrictions as they may please to propose, but who may
+prefer the head of the ruling faction, and at once vest in him all the
+prerogatives of the crown. On the two occasions referred to in the reign
+of George III., the next heir being at enmity with the King and his
+ministers, this was considered the loyal and courtly doctrine; and, from
+its apparent advancement of the rights of Parliament, there was no
+difficulty in casting odium on those who opposed it. But I must avow
+that my deliberate opinion coincides with that of Burke, Fox, and
+Erskine, who pronounced it to be unsupported by any precedent, and to be
+in accordance with the principles of the Polish, not the English,
+monarchy. The two Houses of Parliament would be the proper tribunal to
+pronounce that the sovereign is unable to act; but then, as if he were
+naturally as well as civilly dead, the next heir ought of right to
+assume the government as Regent, ever ready to lay it down on the
+sovereign's restoration to reason, in the same way as our Lady Victoria
+would have returned to a private station if, after her accession, there
+had appeared posthumous issue of William IV. by his queen. It is easy to
+point out possible abuses by the next heir as Regent, to the prejudice
+of the living sovereign; but there may be greater abuses of the power of
+election imputed to the two Houses, whereby a change of dynasty might be
+effected. I conceive, therefore, that the Irish Parliament[121] in 1789
+acted more constitutionally in acknowledging the _right_ of the next
+heir, in scouting the fiction of a commission or royal assent from the
+insane sovereign, and in addressing the Prince of Wales to take on
+himself the government as Regent."
+
+Though the sneers at the possibility of Parliament preferring "the head
+of the ruling faction" to the heir-apparent be hardly consistent with
+the impartial candor which is one of the most imperative duties of an
+historical critic, and though the allusion to the principles of the
+Polish monarchy be not very intelligible, yet no one will refuse to
+attach due weight to the deliberate opinion of one who won for himself
+so high a professional reputation as Lord Campbell. But, with all
+respect to his legal rank, we may venture to doubt whether he has not
+laid down as law, speaking as a literary man and an historian, a
+doctrine which he would not have entertained as a judge. For, if we
+consider the common law of the kingdom, it is certain that, in the case
+of subjects, if a man becomes deranged, his next heir does not at once
+enter on his property "as if he were naturally as well as civilly dead."
+And if, as in such cases is notoriously the practice, the Court of
+Chancery appoints a guardian of the lunatic's property, analogy would
+seem to require that the Houses of Parliament, as the only body which
+can possibly claim authority in such a matter, should exercise a similar
+power in providing for the proper management of the government to that
+which the law court would exercise in providing for the proper
+management of an estate; and that, therefore, the principles of
+constitutional[122] statesmanship, which is deeply interested in
+upholding the predominant authority of Parliament, must justify the
+assertion of the ministers that the two Houses had the entire and sole
+right to make regulations for the government of the kingdom during the
+incapacity of the sovereign; and that the next heir, even when a son of
+full age, can have no more right to succeed to his father's royal
+authority in his lifetime than, if that father were a subject, he would
+have to succeed to his estate.
+
+The opposite doctrine would seem to impugn the legality of the whole
+series of transactions which placed William and Mary on the throne. The
+admission of an indefeasible right of the heir-apparent would have borne
+a perilous resemblance to a recognition of that divine right, every
+pretension to which the Revolution of 1688 had extinguished. If, again,
+as Fox and his followers at one time endeavored to argue, the Houses in
+1789 had no right to the name or power of a Parliament, because the King
+had no part in their meetings, the convention that sat a century before
+(as, indeed, was admitted) was certainly far less entitled to that name
+or power, for it had not only never been called into existence by a
+King, but was assembled in direct defiance of the King. Similarly, it is
+admitted that the body which invited Charles II. to return and resume
+his authority was equally destitute of the validity which could only be
+given by a royal summons. Yet both these bodies had performed actions of
+greater importance than that which was looked for from this Parliament.
+The one had abolished the existing and usurping government, and restored
+to his kingdom a King who had been long an exile. The other had, as it
+were, passed sentence on the existing sovereign, on grounds which
+confessedly will not bear a strict examination, and had conferred the
+crown on a prince who had no hereditary claim to the title. The
+justification of both acts was necessity. _Salus regni suprema Lex_. And
+the necessity was clearly more urgent in the present case than in either
+of the preceding instances. For, unless the Parliament interfered to
+create an authority, there was absolutely none in existence which was
+capable of acting. It should also be remembered that this Parliament of
+1789, though not opened for the session by the King, had been originally
+elected in obedience to his order, and had been prorogued by his
+proclamation to the day of meeting;[123] and, though the opening of a
+session by a speech from the throne is the usual form for the
+commencement of its proceedings, it may be doubted whether it be so
+indispensable a part of them that none of their acts are valid without
+it.
+
+The breaking out of the French Revolution, and the degree in which, in
+spite of all its atrocities and horrors, the revolutionary spirit for a
+time infected a large party in England, prevented Pitt from reviving the
+plan of Reform which he had framed with such care and genius for
+organization, and in which, though defeated in Parliament, both before
+and after he became minister, he had hitherto continued to cherish the
+hope of eventually succeeding. But when clubs and societies, where the
+most revolutionary and seditious doctrines were openly broached, were
+springing up in London and other large towns, and unscrupulous
+demagogues by speeches and pamphlets were busily disseminating theories
+which tended to the subversion of all legitimate authority, he not
+unnaturally thought it no longer seasonable to invite a discussion of
+schemes which would be supported in many quarters only, to quote his own
+words, "as a stepping-stone to ulterior objects, which they dared not
+avow till their power of carrying them into effect should be by this
+first acquisition secured." But the alarm which the spread of
+revolutionary ideas excited in his mind was displayed, not only
+passively in this abstention from the advocacy of measures the
+expediency of which must at all times in some degree depend on the tone
+of their introduction, but also in active measures of repression, some
+of which were not, indeed, unwarranted by precedent, but others of which
+can hardly be denied to have been serious inroads on the constitution,
+infringements of the freedom of opinion and discussion to which all
+Englishmen are entitled, and one of which was, to say the least, a very
+perilous extension of a law already sufficiently severe, the statute of
+treason. If the French had been content with the overthrow of their own
+government and institutions, much as we should have lamented the
+indiscriminate rashness and abhorred the atrocities with which their
+design was carried out, we should still have adhered to the
+unquestionable maxim, that no nation is justified in interfering in the
+internal affairs of another. But the Jacobin and Girondin demagogues,
+who had now the undisputed sway in Paris, did not limit their views to
+their own country, but openly declared themselves the enemies of all
+established governments in every country; and the Convention passed a
+formal resolution in which they proffered "fraternity and assistance" to
+every people which might be inclined to rise against their governments.
+Their resolutions were officially communicated to the sympathizing
+societies in England, and emissaries were secretly encouraged to cross
+the Channel in the hope of gaining converts. Nor were their exertions
+barren. Two men were convicted in Scotland of a plot to seize Edinburgh
+Castle, to massacre the garrison, to imprison the judges, and to rise in
+arms to compel the government to a change of policy. In London the King
+was fired at on his way to open Parliament, and on his return his
+carriage was attacked by a furious mob, and was only protected from
+serious injury by a troop of the Life Guards. Such outrages proved the
+existence of a new danger, against which no previous government had ever
+been called on to provide, and such as, in the opinion of the cabinet,
+could only be met by novel measures of precaution.
+
+The first was directed against the foreign propagators of revolution.
+The resolutions of the Convention had been promulgated in November,
+1792; and at the meeting of Parliament in December, Lord Grenville, as
+Foreign Secretary of State, introduced in the House of Lords an alien
+bill, to enable the government to deal in a summary manner with any
+foreign visitors whose conduct or character might seem to call for its
+interference. It provided that all foreigners who had arrived in the
+kingdom since the preceding January should give in a statement of their
+names and residences; that any one who should arrive in future should
+furnish an account of his name, his station in life, and his object in
+visiting England; that the King, by proclamation, order in Council, or
+sign-manual, might direct all foreigners to reside in such districts as
+might be thought suitable; that no one might quit the residence in which
+he first settled without a passport; and that the Secretary of State
+might order any suspected foreigner to quit the kingdom instantly.
+
+The act was to be in operation for twelve months, and Lord Grenville, in
+introducing it, though he admitted it to be a measure of "rather a novel
+nature," explained at the same time that it was so far from being new in
+the powers which it gave, that Magna Charta distinctly recognized "the
+power and right of the crown to prevent foreigners from entering or
+residing within the realm." All that was really new was the defining of
+the manner in which that power should be exercised, since it had been so
+rarely needed that doubts might exist as to the proper mode of putting
+it in action. The bill, which was adopted in both Houses by large
+majorities, is remarkable, among other circumstances, from the fact that
+its discussion furnished the first instance of a public display of the
+difference between the two sections of the Opposition, subsequently
+described by Burke in one of his most celebrated pamphlets as the Old
+and New Whigs; those whom he called the Old Whigs (the Duke of Portland,
+Sir Gilbert Elliott, Mr. Windham, not to mention Burke himself)
+earnestly supporting it, while Lord Lansdowne, Mr. Fox, Mr. Sheridan,
+and Mr. Grey resisted it with equal zeal. Lord Lansdowne took the ground
+that it was a suspension of the _Habeas Corpus_ Act; while Fox and Grey
+denounced it, in more general terms, as a measure "utterly
+irreconcilable with the principles of the constitution," Mr. Grey
+apparently referring chiefly to the power given by the bill to the
+Secretary of State to send any foreigners from the country, which he
+described as "making the bill a measure of oppression, giving power for
+the exercise of which no man was responsible." Sir Gilbert Elliott's
+answer was singularly ingenious. He did not deny that the bill conferred
+additional power on the crown, though not more than was justified by
+existing circumstances; but he maintained that the right of giving
+extraordinary powers to the crown on occasions was so far from being
+inconsistent with the principles of the constitution, that to grant
+extraordinary powers in extraordinary emergencies was a part of it
+essential to the character of a free government. If such powers were at
+all times possessed by the crown, its authority would be too great for a
+free government to co-exist with it; but if such could not be at times
+conferred on the crown, its authority would be too small for its own
+safety or that of the people.
+
+The arguments of the ministers were, no doubt, greatly recommended, both
+to the Parliament and the people in general, by the notoriety of the
+fact that foreign agents were in many of our large towns busily, and not
+unsuccessfully, engaged in propagating what were known as Jacobin
+doctrines. But, even without that aid, it was clear that every
+government must, for the common good of all, be at times of
+extraordinary emergency invested with the power of suspending laws made
+for ordinary circumstances. And what would be an intolerable evil, if
+the supreme magistrate took upon himself to exercise it, ceases to be
+one when the right to exercise it is conferred by the nation itself in
+Parliament. If the bill did, as was argued, suspend the _Habeas Corpus_
+Act, that statute had been enacted by Parliament, and therefore for
+Parliament, in a case of necessity, to suspend its operation was clearly
+within the spirit of the constitution.
+
+The bills affecting our own fellow-subjects were still more warmly
+contested. One was known as the Traitorous Correspondence Bill, which,
+according to Lord Campbell, was suggested by Lord Loughborough, who had
+lately become Lord Chancellor. The old law of high-treason, enacted in
+the reign of Edward III., had been in effect greatly mitigated by later
+statutes, which had made acts to which that character was imputed more
+difficult of proof, by a stricter definition of what was admissible
+evidence, and other safeguards; and the practice of the courts had by
+degrees practically reduced the list of treasons enumerated in the old
+law, indictments for many of the offences contained in it forbearing to
+assert that the persons accused had incurred the penalty of
+high-treason. But this new bill greatly enlarged the catalogue. It made
+it high-treason to hold any correspondence with the French, or to enter
+into any agreement to supply them with commodities of any kind, even
+such as were not munitions of war, but articles of ordinary merchandise,
+or to invest any money in the French Funds; and it enacted farther that
+any person who, by "any writing, preaching, or malicious and advised
+speaking," should encourage such designs as the old statute of Edward
+made treasonable, should be liable to the penalties of high-treason.
+
+Another bill was designed to check the growing custom of holding public
+meetings, by providing that no meeting, the object of which was to
+consider any petition to the King or Parliament, or to deliberate on any
+alleged grievance, should be held without those who convened it, and who
+must be householders, giving previous notice of it by public
+advertisement; and empowering any two justices of the peace, at their
+own discretion, to declare any such meeting an unlawful assembly, and to
+disperse it by force, if, from the subjects discussed, the language
+held, or any special circumstances, they should regard it as dangerous.
+
+Fox, and those who still adhered to him, resisted almost every clause of
+these different bills. They maintained that one of the most fundamental
+maxims of law "in every country calling itself free was, that property
+was in the highest degree entitled to the protection of the law; and, if
+so, that the right of disposing of it or investing it in any manner must
+be considered under the same protection;" that any interference "with
+ordinary commercial transactions was equally repugnant to the spirit of
+the constitution;" and, taking a practical view of the question, they
+warned the minister that such rigorous enactments imposing such extreme
+penalties would defeat their own end; for "it was a general and true
+maxim, that excess of punishment for a crime brings impunity along with
+it; and that no jury would ever find a verdict which would doom a
+fellow-creature to death for selling a yard of cloth and sending it to
+France." They protested, too, against inflicting on words, whether
+written or spoken, penalties which had hitherto been confined to overt
+acts. And the clauses conferring power on magistrates to prevent or
+disperse public meetings encountered still more vehement opposition; Fox
+insisting, with great eloquence, that "public meetings for the
+discussion of public subjects were not only lawful, but agreeable to the
+very essence of the constitution; that, indeed, to them, under that
+constitution, most of the liberties which Englishmen now enjoyed were
+particularly owing." The people, he maintained, had a right to discuss
+their grievances. "They had an inalienable right to complain by
+petition, and to remonstrate to either House of Parliament, or to the
+King; and to make two magistrates, who might be strong partisans,
+irresponsible judges whether anything said or done at a meeting had a
+tendency to encourage sedition, was to say that a free constitution was
+no longer suitable to us." Pitt justified these measures, partly on the
+ground of the special and unprecedented danger of the times, as proved
+by the late attempt on the King's life, and partly by the open avowal of
+republican doctrines made at the meetings of different societies;
+partly, also, on the temporary character of the measures, since in each
+bill a period was fixed after which its operation should expire. And he
+argued, farther, that, as many of the actions specified in these bills
+as seditious or treasonable were by many lawyers considered capable of
+being reached by statutes already existing, though not universally
+understood, it was "humane, not cruel, to remove doubts, and to prevent
+men from being ensnared by the ambiguity of old laws."
+
+And in May, 1794, he brought in another bill, founded on the report of a
+secret committee which, in compliance with a royal message, the House of
+Commons had appointed to investigate the proceedings and objects of
+certain societies which were known to exist in different parts of the
+kingdom. In obedience to a Secretary of State's warrant, founded on
+sworn informations, their books and papers had been seized, and, having
+been sealed up, were now laid before the House, with the report of the
+committee that they proved that several of the societies which they
+named had, ever since the end of the year 1791, been uniformly pursuing
+a settled design for the subversion of the constitution; one society, in
+particular, having approved a plan for assembling a Convention, in
+imitation of the French Assembly sitting under that title, in order to
+overturn the established government, and to wrest from the Parliament
+the power which the constitution placed in its hands.
+
+To prevent the dissemination of such principles, and to defeat such
+schemes, Pitt now asked leave to bring in a bill to empower his
+Majesty--acting, of course, through the Secretary of State--to secure
+and detain such persons as he should suspect of conspiring against the
+King's person and government. He admitted that the power which he thus
+proposed to confer amounted to a suspension of the _Habeas Corpus_ Act
+in every part of the United Kingdom; nor did he deny that it was an
+unusually strong measure, but he contended that it was one justified by
+absolute necessity, by the manifest danger of such a conspiracy as the
+committee had affirmed to exist to the tranquillity of the nation and
+the safety of the government.
+
+Fox, it may almost be said as a matter of course, opposed the
+introduction of any such measure; but his opposition was hardly marked
+by his usual force of argument. He was hampered by the impossibility of
+denying either the existence of the societies which the committee and
+the minister had mentioned, or the dangerous character of some of their
+designs; but he objected to the measures of repression which were
+proposed, partly on the absence of all attempts at concealment on the
+part of the promoters of these societies, partly on the contemptible
+character of the Convention which it was designed to summon, and the
+impossibility that such an assembly should have the slightest influence.
+He even made their avowed hostility to the constitution a plea for a
+panegyric on that constitution, and on the loyal attachment to it
+evinced by the vast majority of the people; and from that he proceeded
+to found a fresh argument against the proposed measure, contending that
+it made a fatal inroad on that very constitution which was so highly
+valued by the whole nation. He described it as a measure "of infinitely
+greater mischief than that which it proposed to remedy, since it would
+give the executive authority absolute power over the personal liberty of
+every individual in the kingdom." He did not deny that a similar measure
+had been enacted under William III., again in 1715, and again in 1745;
+but he contended that "the present peril bore no resemblance to the
+dangers of those times. This measure went to overturn the very
+corner-stone of the constitution, and if it passed, there was an end of
+the constitution of England." The bill was passed in both Houses by very
+large majorities.[124] It was originally enacted for six months only,
+but was from time to time renewed till the end of the century.
+
+If we take a general survey of all these measures together, as parts of
+one great defensive scheme for the preservation of the public
+tranquillity and the general safety of the empire, it may, probably, be
+thought that, though undoubtedly suspensions of the constitution, they
+are not open to the charge of being unconstitutional, since they were
+enacted, not only for the welfare of the people, but with their consent
+and concurrence, legitimately signified by their representatives in
+Parliament. It is scarcely consistent with sound reason to contend that
+the _habeas corpus_, which had been enacted by Parliament, could not be
+suspended by the authority which had enacted it; that the constitution,
+which exists for the benefit of the people, could not be suspended by
+the people; or to deny, if it was in appearance transgressed by these
+enactments, that it was yet transgressed by strictly constitutional
+acts, by the decision of the Parliament, to whose power the constitution
+prescribes no limits.
+
+But it is not sufficient that in this point of view these measures may
+have been defensible. In judging of their statesmanship, it is almost
+equally to be considered whether they were expedient and politic,
+whether the emergency or necessity were such as to justify such rigorous
+methods of repression. It was fairly open to doubt whether some of them,
+and especially the Traitorous Correspondence and the Seditious Meetings
+Bills, did not treat as treasonable acts which did not go beyond
+sedition, and whether so to treat them were not to invest them with an
+importance which did not belong to them. And on this part of the
+question the general judgment has, we think, been unfavorable to the
+government; and it has been commonly allowed that the Chancellor, whose
+advice on legal subjects the Prime-minister naturally took for his
+guide, gave him impolitic counsel. In fact, it is well known that these
+two acts, to a great extent, failed in their object through their
+excessive severity, several juries having refused to convict persons who
+were prosecuted for treason, who would certainly not have escaped had
+they only been indicted for sedition; and it is deserving of remark that
+these two bills were not regarded with favor by the King himself, if the
+anecdote--which seems to rest on undeniable authority--be true, that he
+expressed satisfaction at the acquittal of some prisoners, on the ground
+that almost any evil would be more tolerable than that of putting men to
+death "for constructive treason." It must therefore, probably, be
+affirmed that these two acts, the Treason Act and the Seditious Meetings
+Act, went beyond the necessity of the case; that they were not only
+violations of the constitution--which, when the measures are temporary,
+as these were, are not always indefensible--but that they were
+superfluous, unjust, and impolitic; superfluous, when they proposed to
+deal with acts already visitable with punishment by the ancient laws of
+the kingdom; unjust, when they created new classes of offences; and
+impolitic, as exciting that kind of disapproval of the acts of
+government which in many minds has a tendency to excite a spirit of
+discontent with and resistance to legitimate authority. And, indeed, it
+must be inferred that such was the light in which these measures were
+regarded by a statesman who in his general policy was proud to
+acknowledge himself Mr. Pitt's pupil, as he was also the most skilful
+and successful of his more immediate successors. Twenty-five years
+afterward the distress caused by the reaction inevitably consequent on
+the termination of twenty years of war produced a political excitement
+scarcely inferior to that with which Pitt had now to deal, and seditious
+societies and meetings scarcely less formidable; but, as we shall see,
+Lord Liverpool, taking warning, perhaps, from the mistake into which Mr.
+Pitt was led on this occasion, though compelled to bring forward new and
+stern measures of repression, and even to suspend the _Habeas Corpus_
+Act for a time, kept strictly within the lines of constitutional
+precedent, and was careful to avoid confounding sedition with treason.
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 73: He had been Lord-chamberlain in Lord Rockingham's
+administration of 1765. He was now Lord-lieutenant of Ireland.]
+
+[Footnote 74: In Lord Chatham's or the Duke of Grafton's ministry of
+1766, and in the later administration of Lord Rockingham.]
+
+[Footnote 75: It may be convenient to take this opportunity of pointing
+out that, in this administration, Lord Shelburne altered the old, most
+unreasonable, and inconvenient arrangement by which the departments of
+the two Secretaries of State were distinguished by the latitude, and
+called Northern and Southern. By a new division, one took charge of the
+home affairs, the other of the foreign affairs. And in 1794 a third
+Secretary was added for War, who, by a very singular arrangement, which
+continued till very recently, had charge also of the colonies. But, in
+the year 1855, the Colonial-office was intrusted to a separate minister;
+and in 1858 a fifth Secretary of State, that for India, was added, on
+the transfer of the government of that country from the East India
+Company to the Crown. When there were only two Secretaries of State, the
+rule was that one should sit in each House. At present it is not
+_necessary_ that more than one should be a peer, though it is more usual
+for two to be members of the Upper House. And it is usual also for the
+Under-secretaries to be members of the House to which the
+Chief-secretaries do not belong, though this rule is not invariably
+observed.]
+
+[Footnote 76: "Parliamentary History," xxiii., 163.]
+
+[Footnote 77: The divisions were: 224 to 208, and 207 to 190.]
+
+[Footnote 78: Lord Stanhope, quoting from an unpublished "Life of Lord
+Barrington," compiled by the Bishop of Durham (meaning, I suppose,
+Bishop Shute Barrington).--_History of England_, v., 174.]
+
+[Footnote 79: Even with the first flush of triumph, the night after the
+second defeat of Lord Shelburne in the House of Commons, Fox's great
+friend, Mr. Fitzpatrick, writes to his brother, Lord Ossory: "To the
+administration it is _cila mors_, but not _victoria loeta_ to us. The
+apparent juncture with Lord North is universally cried out
+against."--Lord J. Russell's _Memorials and Correspondence of C.J. Fox_,
+ii., 18.]
+
+[Footnote 80: Lord J. Russell's "Memorials and Correspondence of C.J.
+Fox," ii., 90.]
+
+[Footnote 81: _Ibid_., p. 118.]
+
+[Footnote 82: In one division (161 to 137) they had only a majority of
+twenty-four.]
+
+[Footnote 83: In a letter to Lord Northington (Lord-lieutenant of
+Ireland), dated July 17, Fox himself mentions that not one of his
+colleagues, except the Duke of Portland and Lord Keppel (First Lord of
+the Admiralty), approved of it.--_Memoirs of Fox_, ii., 116.]
+
+[Footnote 84: November 22 he writes to the Duke of Rutland: "The bill
+... is, I really think, the boldest and most unconstitutional measure
+ever attempted, transferring at one stroke, in spite of all charters and
+compacts, the immense patronage and influence of the East to Charles
+Fox, in or out of office."--Stanhope's _Life of Pitt_, i., 140.]
+
+[Footnote 85: The whole paper is given by the Duke of Buckingham,
+"Courts and Cabinets of George III," i., 288, and quoted by Lord Russell
+in his "Memorials and Correspondence of C. J. Fox," ii., 251. It is
+endorsed, "Delivered by Lord Thurlow, December 1, 1783. Nugent Temple."]
+
+[Footnote 86: "Life of Pitt," i., 148. Lord Stanhope does not pledge
+himself to these being "the exact words of this commission, but as to
+its purport and meaning there is no doubt." They are, however, the exact
+words quoted by Fox in his speech in support of Mr. Baker's resolutions
+on the 17th.--_Parliamentary History_, xxiv., 207.]
+
+[Footnote 87: "Parliamentary History," xxiv., 151-154.]
+
+[Footnote 88: 95 to 76. "Strange to say, one of the cabinet ministers,
+Lord Stormont, president of the council, formed part of the final
+majority against the bill."--_Life of Pitt_, ii., 154.]
+
+[Footnote 89: "Life of Pitt," i., 155.]
+
+[Footnote 90: "Lives of the Chancellors," c. clix. Lord Thurlow.]
+
+[Footnote 91: "The Grenville Papers," iii., 374. It may, however, be
+remarked, as tending to throw some doubt on Mr. Grenville's statement,
+that Lord Campbell asserts that "Lord Mansfield, without entering into
+systematic opposition, had been much alienated from the court during
+Lord Rockingham's first administration."--_Lives of the Chief-justices_,
+ii., 468.]
+
+[Footnote 92: Vol. ii., pp. 229-232.]
+
+[Footnote 93: It will be seen hereafter that this doctrine was admitted
+in the fullest degree by Sir Robert Peel in the winter of 1884, when he
+admitted that his acceptance of office made him alone responsible for
+the dismissal of Lord Melbourne, though, in fact, he was taken entirely
+by surprise by the King's act, being in Italy at the time.]
+
+[Footnote 94: Lord John Russell, in his "Memorials of Fox" (ii., 253),
+affirms that "Lord Temple's act was probably known to Pitt;" but Lord
+Macaulay, in his "Essay on Pitt" (p. 326), fully acquits Pitt of such
+knowledge, saying that "he could declare, with perfect truth, that, if
+unconstitutional machinations had been employed, he was no party to
+them."]
+
+[Footnote 95: On Lord Effingham's motion, in condemnation of some of the
+proceedings of the Commons, which was carried February 4, 1784, by 100
+to 53.]
+
+[Footnote 96: "Parliamentary History," xxiv., 383-385--debate of January
+20, 1784.]
+
+[Footnote 97: _Ibid_, p. 283--January 12.]
+
+[Footnote 98: _Ibid_., pp. 251-257.]
+
+[Footnote 99: "Parliamentary History," xxiv., 478--February 2.]
+
+[Footnote 100: _Ibid_., p. 663.]
+
+[Footnote 101: "Parliamentary History," xxiv., 687, 695, 699.]
+
+[Footnote 102: The numbers were 201 to 189. The week before, on Mr.
+Powys's motion for a united and efficient administration, the majority
+had been 20--197 to 177. On a motion made by Mr. Coke, February 3, the
+majority had been 24--211 to 187. At the beginning of the struggle the
+majorities had been far larger--232 to 143 on Fox's motion for a
+committee on the state of the nation, January 12.]
+
+[Footnote 103: 191 to 190.]
+
+[Footnote 104: From December 19, when Pitt accepted office, to March 24,
+when the Parliament was dissolved.]
+
+[Footnote 105: "Memorials and Correspondence of C.J. Fox," by Earl
+Russell, ii., 229, 248.]
+
+[Footnote 106: _Ibid_., p. 280.]
+
+[Footnote 107: That of April, 1831, after the defeat of the Government
+on General Gascoyne's amendment]
+
+[Footnote 108: Lord Macaulay, "Miscellaneous Essays," ii., 330.]
+
+[Footnote 109: Lord Macaulay, essay on William Pitt.]
+
+[Footnote 110: Alison ("History of Europe," xiii., 971) states the
+English force in the Netherlands in 1794 at 85,000 men. Lord Stanhope
+calls the English at Minden 10,000 or 12,000.]
+
+[Footnote 111: An eminent living writer (Mr. Leeky, "History of
+England," ii., 474) quotes with apparent approval another comparison
+between the father and son, made by Grattan, in the following words:
+"The father was not, perhaps, so good a debater as his son, but was a
+much better orator, a greater scholar, and a far greater man." The first
+two phrases in this eulogy may, perhaps, balance one another; though,
+when Mr. Lecky admits that "Lord Chatham's taste was far from pure, and
+that there was much in his speeches that was florid and meretricious,
+and not a little that would have appeared absurd bombast but for the
+amazing power of his delivery," he makes a serious deduction from his
+claim to the best style of eloquence which no one ever made from the
+speeches of his son. But Grattan's assertion that the man who, as his
+sister said of him, knew but two books, the "Æneid" and the "Faerie
+Queene," was superior in scholarship to one who, with the exception of
+his rival, Fox, had probably no equal for knowledge of the great authors
+of antiquity in either House of Parliament, is little short of a
+palpable absurdity. We may, however, suspect that Grattan's estimate of
+the two men was in some degree colored by his personal feelings. With
+Lord Chatham he had never been in antagonism. On one great subject, the
+dispute with America, he had been his follower and ally, advocating in
+the Irish House of Commons the same course which Chatham upheld in the
+English House of Peers. But to Pitt he had been almost constantly
+opposed. By Pitt he and his party, whether in the English, or, so long
+as it lasted, in the Irish Parliament, had been repeatedly defeated. The
+Union, of which he had been the indefatigable opponent, and to which he
+was never entirely reconciled, had been carried in his despite; and it
+was hardly unnatural that the recollection of his long and unsuccessful
+warfare should in some degree bias his judgment, and prompt him to an
+undeserved disparagement of the minister by whose wisdom and firmness he
+had been so often overborne.]
+
+[Footnote 112: Massey's "History of England," iii., 447; _confer_ also
+Green's "History of the English People," vol. iv.]
+
+[Footnote 113: Hallam ("Middle Ages," ii., 386, 481), extolling the
+condition of "the free socage tenants, or English yeomanry, as the class
+whose independence has stamped with peculiar features both our
+constitution and our national character," gives two derivations for the
+name; one "the Saxon _soe_, which signifies a franchise, especially one
+of jurisdiction;" and the other, that adopted by Bracton, and which he
+himself prefers, "the French word _soc_, a ploughshare."]
+
+[Footnote 114: Lord Colchester's "Diary," i., 68, mentions that the
+officiating clergyman was Mr. Burt, of Twickenham, who received £500 for
+his services. Lord John Russell ("Memorials and Correspondence of Fox,"
+ii., 284-389) agrees in stating that the marriage was performed in the
+manner prescribed by the Common Prayer-book. Mr. Jesse, in his "Life of
+George III.," ii., 506, gathering, as the present writer can say from
+personal knowledge, his information from some papers left behind him by
+the late J.W. Croker, says: "The ceremony was performed by a Protestant
+clergyman, though in part, apparently, according to the rites of the
+Roman Catholic Church." Lord John Russell avoids discussing the question
+whether the marriage involved the forfeiture of the inheritance of the
+crown, an avoidance which many will interpret as a proof that in his
+opinion it did. Mr. Massey's language ("History of England," iii., 327)
+clearly intimates that he holds the same opinion.]
+
+[Footnote 115: Russell's "Life of Fox," ii., 187.]
+
+[Footnote 116: Fox's private correspondence is full of anticipations
+that the Regent's first act will be to dismiss Pitt, and to make him
+minister. In a letter of December 15 he even fixes a fortnight as the
+time by which he expects to be installed; while Lord Loughborough, who
+was eager to possess himself of the Great Seal--an expectation in which,
+though well-founded, he would, as it proved, have found himself
+disappointed--was led by his hopes to give the Prince counsel of so
+extraordinary a nature that it is said that the ministers, to whose
+knowledge it had come, were prepared, if any attempt had been made to
+act upon it, or even openly to avow it, to send the learned lord to the
+Tower. ("Diary of Lord Colchester," i., 28.) In an elaborate paper which
+he drew up and read to the Prince at Windsor, he assured his Royal
+Highness, speaking as a lawyer, that "the administration of government
+devolved to him of right. He was bound by every duty to assume it, and
+his character would be lessened in the public estimation, if he took it
+on any other ground but right, or on any sort of compromise. The
+authority of Parliament, as the great council of the nation, would be
+interposed, not to confer but to declare the right. The mode of
+proceeding should be that in a short time his Royal Highness should
+signify his intention to act by directing a meeting of the Privy
+Council, when he should declare his intention to take upon himself the
+care of the state, and should at the same time signify his desire to
+have the advice of Parliament, and order it by proclamation to meet
+early for the despatch of business.... It is of vast importance in the
+outset that he should appear to act entirely of himself, and, in the
+conferences he must necessarily have, not to consult, but to listen and
+direct." The entire paper is given by Lord Campbell ("Lives of the
+Chancellors," c. clxx.).]
+
+[Footnote 117: Hume's account of this transaction is, that the Duke
+"desired that it might be recorded in Parliament that this authority was
+conferred on him from their own free motion, without any application on
+his part; ... and he required that all the powers of his office should
+be specified and defined by Parliament."]
+
+[Footnote 118: "Parliamentary History," xxvii., 803--speech of Mr.
+Hardinge, one of the Welsh judges, and M.P. for Old Sarum.]
+
+[Footnote 119: I take this report, or abstract, of Lord Camden's speech
+from the "Lives of the Chancellors," c. cxlvii.]
+
+[Footnote 120: "Memorials of Fox," ii., 292.]
+
+[Footnote 121: The proceedings of the Irish Parliament on this occasion
+will be mentioned in the next chapter.]
+
+[Footnote 122: Mr. Hallam (iii., 144, ed. 1832) gives a definition of
+the term "unconstitutional" which seems rather singular: "By
+unconstitutional, as distinguished from 'illegal,' I mean a novelty of
+much importance, tending to endanger the established laws." May not the
+term rather be regarded as referring to a distinct class of acts--to
+those at variance with the recognized _spirit_ of the constitution or
+principles of government, with the preservation of the liberties of the
+people, as expressed or implied in the various charters, etc., but not
+forbidden by the express terms of any statute?]
+
+[Footnote 123: The entry in the "Parliamentary History," November 20,
+1788, is: "Both Houses met pursuant to the last prorogation. Later
+meetings were in consequence of successive adjournments."]
+
+[Footnote 124: In the Commons by 183 to 33; in the Lords by 119 to 11.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+
+The Affairs of Ireland.--Condition of the Irish Parliament.--The
+Octennial Bill.--The Penal Laws.--Non-residence of the Lord-
+lieutenant.--Influence of the American War on Ireland.--Enrolment of the
+Volunteers.--Concession of all the Demands of Ireland.--Violence of the
+Volunteers.--Their Convention.--Violence of the Opposition in
+Parliament: Mr. Brownlow, Mr. Grattan, Mr. Flood.--Pitt's Propositions
+Fail.--Fitzgibbon's Conspiracy Bill.--Regency Question.--Recovery of the
+King.--Question of a Legislative Union.--Establishment of Maynooth
+College.--Lord Edward Fitzgerald.--Arguments for and against the
+Union.--It passes the Irish Parliament.--Details of the Measure.--
+General Character of the Union.--Circumstances which Prevented
+its Completeness.
+
+
+In describing the condition of Ireland and the feelings of its people,
+in the latter years of the reign of George II., Mr. Hallam has fixed on
+the year 1753 as that in which the Irish Parliament first began to give
+vent to aspirations for equality with the English Parliament in audible
+complaints; and the Irish House of Commons, finding the kingdom in the
+almost unprecedented condition of having "a surplus revenue after the
+payment of all charges," took steps to vindicate that equality by a sort
+of appropriation bill.
+
+There were, however, three fundamental differences between the
+Parliaments of the two countries, which, above all others, stood in the
+way of such equality as the Irish patriots desired: the first, that by a
+law as old as the time of Henry VII., and called sometimes the Statute
+of Drogheda, from the name of the town in which it was first
+promulgated, and sometimes Poynings' Act, from the name of Sir Henry
+Poynings, the Lord-deputy at the time, no bill could be introduced into
+the Irish Parliament till it had received the sanction of the King and
+Privy Council in England; the second, that the Parliament lasted for the
+entire life of the King who had summoned it--a regulation which caused a
+seat in the House of Commons to be regarded almost as a possession for
+life, and consequently enormously increased the influence of the patrons
+of boroughs, some of whom could return a number of members such as the
+mightiest borough monger in England could never aspire to equal.[125]
+The third difference, of scarcely inferior importance, was, that the
+Parliament only sat in alternate years. But, though these arrangements
+suited the patrons and the members of the House of Commons, it was not
+strange that the constituencies, whose power over their representatives
+was almost extinguished by them, regarded them with less complacency,
+and, at the general election which was the consequence of the accession
+of George III., pledges were very generally exacted from the candidates
+that, if elected, they would endeavor to procure the passing of a
+septennial act like that which had been the law in England ever since
+the early years of George I. A bill with that object was introduced in
+1761, and reported on not unfavorably as to its principle by the English
+law advisers to whom the Privy Council referred it. But, as if it had
+been designed to exemplify in the strongest possible manner the national
+propensity for making blunders, it contained one clause which rendered
+it not only impracticable but ridiculous. The clause provided that no
+member should take his seat or vote till his qualification had been
+proved before the Speaker in a full house. But the Speaker could not be
+chosen till the members had established their right of voting, so that
+the whole was brought to a dead-lock, and the bill, if passed, could
+never have been carried out.
+
+In the ministry of 1767, however--that of the Duke of Grafton and Lord
+Chatham--Lord Halifax was replaced at Dublin Castle by Lord Townsend,
+who, among his other good qualities, deserves specially honorable
+mention as the first Lord-lieutenant who made residence in Dublin his
+rule on principle; for till very lately non-residence had been the rule
+and residence the exception, a fact which is of itself a melancholy but
+all-sufficient proof of the absolute indifference to Irish interests
+shown by all classes of English statesmen. And under his government a
+bill for shortening Parliaments was passed, though it fixed the possible
+duration of each Parliament at eight years instead of seven, the
+variation being made to prevent a general election from being held at
+the same time in both countries, but, according to common belief, solely
+in order to keep up a mark of difference between the Irish and English
+Parliaments. And those who entertained this suspicion fancied they saw a
+confirmation of it in the retention of the regulation that the Irish
+Parliament should only sit in alternate years, a practice wholly
+inconsistent with any proper idea of the duties and privileges of a
+Parliament such as prevailed on this side of the Channel; since a
+Parliament whose sessions were thus intermittent could not possibly
+exercise that degree of supervision over the revenue, either in its
+collection or its expenditure, which is among its most important duties.
+And the continued maintenance of this practice must be regarded farther
+as a proof that the English legislators had not yet learned to consider
+Ireland as an integral part of the kingdom, entitled in every particular
+to equal rights with England and Scotland. Indeed, it is impossible for
+any Englishman to contemplate the history of the treatment of Ireland by
+the English legislators, whether Kings, ministers, or Parliaments, for
+more than a century and a half, without equal feelings of shame at the
+injustice and wonder at the folly of their conduct. Not only was Ireland
+denied freedom of trade with England (a denial as inconsistent not only
+with equity but also with common-sense as if Windsor had been refused
+free trade with London),[126] but Irish manufactures were deliberately
+checked and suppressed to gratify the jealous selfishness of the English
+manufacturers. Macaulay, in his zeal for the memory of William III., has
+not scrupled to apologize for, if not to justify, the measures
+deliberately sanctioned by that sovereign for the extinction of the
+Irish woollen manufactures, on the ground that Ireland was not a sister
+kingdom, but a colony; that "the general rule is, that the English
+Parliament is competent to legislate for all colonies planted by English
+subjects, and that no reason existed for considering the case of the
+colony in Ireland as an exception."[127] There is, perhaps, no passage
+in his whole work less to his credit. But, if such was the spirit in
+which an English historian could write of Ireland in the latter half of
+this present century, it may, perhaps, diminish our wonder at the
+conduct of our legislators in an earlier generation.
+
+The penal laws on the subject of religion were also conceived and
+carried out in a spirit of extraordinary rigor and injustice. By far the
+larger portion of the Irish population still adhered to the Roman
+Catholic faith; but, as far as the negative punishment of restrictions
+and disabilities could go, its profession was visited as one of the most
+unpardonable of offences. No Roman Catholic could hold a commission in
+the army, nor be called to the Bar, nor practise as an attorney; and
+when it was found that a desire to devote themselves to the study of the
+law had led many gentlemen to acknowledge a conversion to Protestantism,
+a statute was actually passed to require them to prove their sincerity
+by five years' adherence to their new form of religion before they could
+be regarded as having washed off the defilement of their old heresy
+sufficiently to be thought worthy to wear a gown in the Four Courts. No
+Roman Catholic might keep a school; while a strange refinement of
+intolerance had added a statute prohibiting parents from sending their
+children to Roman Catholic Schools in a foreign country.
+
+And the manner in which the government was carried on was, if possible,
+worse even than the principle. The almost continual absence of the
+Lord-lieutenant inevitably left the chief management of the details in
+the hands of underlings, and the favor of the Castle was only to be
+acquired by the lowest time-serving, of which those who could influence
+elections, wealthy and high-born as they for the most part were, were
+not more innocent than the representatives. No support to government
+could be looked for from either peer or commoner unless it were
+purchased by bribes more or less open, which it was equally
+discreditable to ask and to grant; for one of the worst fruits of the
+system which had so long reigned throughout the island was the general
+demoralization of all classes. Mr. Fronde gives George III. himself the
+credit of being the first person who resolutely desired to see a change
+of the system, and to "try the experiment whether Ireland might not be
+managed by open rectitude and real integrity."[128] But his first
+efforts were baffled by the carelessness or incompetency of the
+Viceroys, since it was difficult to find any man of ability who would
+undertake the office. And for some years things went on with very little
+change, great lords of different ranks having equally no object but that
+of controlling the Castle and engrossing the patronage of the
+government, and in not a few instances of also procuring large grants or
+pensions for themselves, each seeking to build up an individual
+influence which no Viceroy could ever have withstood, had they been
+united instead of being separated by mutual jealousies, which enabled
+him from time to time to play off one against the other.
+
+But the war with the North American Colonies, which broke out in 1774,
+by some of its indirect consequences brought about a great change in the
+affairs of Ireland. The demand for re-enforcements to the armies engaged
+in America could only be met by denuding the British islands themselves
+of their necessary garrisons. No part of them was left so undefended as
+the Irish coast; and, after a time, the captains of some of the American
+privateers, learning how little resistance they had to fear, ventured
+into St. George's Channel, penetrated even into the inland waters, and
+threatened Carrickfergus and Belfast. In matters of domestic policy it
+was possible to procrastinate, to defer deciding on relaxations of the
+penal laws or the removal of trade restrictions, but to delay putting
+the country into a state of defence against an armed enemy for a single
+moment was not to be thought of; yet the government was powerless. Of
+the regular army almost every available man was in, or on his way to,
+America, and the most absolute necessity, therefore, compelled the Irish
+to consider themselves as left to their own resources for defence. It
+was as impossible to levy a force of militia as one of regular troops,
+for the militia could not be embodied without great expense; and the
+finances of the whole kingdom had been so mismanaged that money was as
+hard to procure as men. In this emergency several gentlemen proposed to
+the Lord-lieutenant to raise bodies of volunteers. The government,
+though reluctant to sanction the movement, could see no alternative,
+since the presence of an armed force of some kind was indispensable for
+the safety of the island. The movement grew rapidly; by the summer of
+1779 several thousand men were not only under arms, but were being
+rapidly drilled into a state of efficiency, and had even established
+such a reputation for strength, that, when in the autumn the same
+privateers that had been so bold in Belfast Lough the year before
+reached the Irish coast, in the hope of plundering Limerick or Galway,
+they found the inhabitants of the district well prepared to receive
+them, and did not venture to attempt a descent on any part of the
+island. And, when the Parliament met in October, some of the members,
+who saw in the success that could not be denied to have attended their
+exertions an irresistible means of strengthening the rising pretensions
+of Ireland to an equality of laws and freedom with England, moved votes
+of thanks in both Houses to the whole body of Volunteers. They were
+carried by acclamation, and the Volunteers of the metropolis lined the
+streets between the Parliament House and the Castle when, according to
+custom, the members of the two Houses marched in procession to present
+their addresses to the Lord-lieutenant. Such a recognition of the power
+of this new force stimulated those members who claimed in a special
+degree the title of Friends of Ireland to greater exertion. A wiser
+government than that of Lord North would have avoided giving occasion
+for the existence of a force which the utter absence of any other had
+made masters of the situation. The Volunteers even boasted that they had
+been called into existence by English misgovernment. In the words of one
+of their most eloquent advocates, "England had sown her laws like
+dragons' teeth, and they had sprung up as armed men."
+
+Ireland began to feel that she was strong, and, not unnaturally desired
+to avail herself of that strength, which England now could not question,
+to put forward demands for concessions which in common fairness could
+not well be denied. In 1778, when Lord North, in the hope of recovering
+the allegiance of the North American Colonies, brought forward what he
+termed his conciliatory propositions, the Irish members began to press
+their demand that the advantages thus offered to the Americans should be
+extended to their own countrymen also; that the fact of the Irish not
+having rebelled should not be made a plea for treating them worse than
+those who had; and in the front of all their requests was one for the
+abolition of those unjust and vexatious duties which shackled their
+trade and manufactures. But the jealousy of the English and Scotch
+manufacturers was still as bitter, and, unhappily, still as influential,
+as it had proved in the time of William III. And, to humor the grasping
+selfishness of Manchester and Glasgow, Lord North met the demands of the
+Irish with a refusal of which every word of his speech on the
+propositions to America was the severest condemnation, and which he
+sought to mitigate by some new regulations in favor of the linen trade,
+to which the English and Scotch manufacturers made no objection, since
+they had no linen factories. The Irish, in despair, had recourse to
+non-importation agreements, of which the Americans had set the example,
+binding themselves not to import nor to use any articles of English or
+Scotch manufacture with which they could possibly dispense. And the
+result was, that Lord North yielded to fear what he had refused to
+justice, and the next year brought in bills to grant the Irish the
+commercial equality which they demanded. Some of the most oppressive and
+vexatious of the penal laws were also relaxed; and some restrictions
+which the Navigation Act imposed on commerce with the West Indies were
+repealed. But, strange to say, the English ministers still clung to one
+grievance of monstrous injustice, and steadily refused to allow judicial
+appointments to be placed on the same footing as in England, and to make
+the seat of a judge on the bench depend on his own good conduct, instead
+of on the caprice of a king or a minister.
+
+But the manifest reluctance with which the English government had
+granted this partial relief encouraged the demand for farther
+concessions. The Irish members, rarely deficient in eloquence or
+fertility of resource, had been lately re-enforced by a recruit of
+pre-eminent powers, whom Lord Charlemont had returned for his borough of
+Moy, Henry Grattan; and, led by him, began to insist that the remaining
+grievances, to the removal of which the nation had a right, would never
+be extinguished so long as the supreme power of legislation for the
+country rested with the English and Scotch Parliament; and that the true
+remedy was only to be found in the restoration to the Irish Parliament
+of that independence of which it had been deprived ever since the time
+of Henry VII. They were encouraged by the visibly increasing weakness of
+Lord North's administration. Throughout the year 1781 it was evidently
+tottering to its fall. And on the 22d of February, 1782, Grattan brought
+forward in the Irish House of Commons a resolution, intended, if
+carried, to lay the foundation of a bill, "that a claim of any body of
+men other than the King, Lords, and Commons of Ireland to bind this
+kingdom is unconstitutional, illegal, and a grievance." This resolution
+aimed at the abolition of Poynings' Act. Other resolutions demanded the
+abolition of the "powers exercised by the Privy Council under color of
+Poynings' Act," and a farther relaxation of the penal laws. So helpless
+did the government by this time feel itself, that the Attorney-general,
+who was its spokesman on this occasion, could not venture to resist the
+principle of these resolutions, but was contented to elude them for the
+time by objections taken to some of the details; and Grattan gave notice
+of another motion to bring the question to a more definite decision,
+which he fixed for the 16th of April.
+
+Before that day came Lord North's government had ceased to exist, and
+had been replaced by Lord Rockingham's, one most influential member of
+which was the most distinguished of living Irishmen, Mr. Burke, who,
+while in opposition, had always shown himself a warm supporter of the
+claims of his countrymen, and was not likely to have his ardor in the
+cause damped by being placed in a situation where he could procure a
+friendly hearing to his counsels. Once more they had increased their
+demands, requiring, besides the removal of the purely political
+grievances, a surrender of the right of appeal from the Irish to the
+English courts of law. But their new masters were inclined to grant
+everything which seemed requisite to the establishment of complete
+equality between the two kingdoms; and though the new ministry was
+dissolved in a few months by the premature death of its chief, he lived
+long enough to carry the repeal of Poynings' Act, the retention of which
+was now admitted to be not only senseless but mischievous, since the
+existence of a body invested with nominal dignity, but practically
+powerless, was calculated not only to provoke discontent, but to furnish
+a lever for agitation.
+
+The repeal was, however, nothing less than the establishment of an
+entirely new constitution in Ireland. The Irish Parliament, the meetings
+of which had hitherto been a mere form and farce, was installed in a
+position of absolute independence, to grant money or to make laws,
+subject to no other condition than that their legislation should be of a
+character to entitle it to the royal assent, a condition to which every
+act of the British Parliament was likewise and equally liable.
+"Unhappily, as an Irish patriotic writer exclaims on this occasion, it
+was written in the book of fate that the felicity of Ireland should be
+short-lived."[129] And a similar shortness of existence was to be the
+lot of the separate independence of her Parliament. Even while framing
+instructions for the Lord-lieutenant, in his honest desire to inaugurate
+a system of just government for Ireland, George III. had warned him on
+no account to "summon a Parliament without his special command."[130]
+And, regarded by the light of subsequent events, it can hardly be denied
+that the prohibition displayed an accurate insight into the real
+difficulties of the country, and also into the character of the people
+themselves as the source of at least some of those difficulties. We
+ought not to judge its leaders too severely. A nation which has been
+long kept in bondage, and is suddenly presented with liberty, is hardly
+more able to bear the change than a man immured for years in a dark
+dungeon can at once endure the unveiled light of the sun; and
+independence had been granted to the Irish too suddenly for it to be
+probable that they would at once and in every instance exercise it
+wisely.
+
+All parties were to blame in different degrees. The first danger came
+from the Volunteers, who, flushed with self-importance, from the belief
+that it was the imposing show of their strength which had enabled the
+Parliament to extort Lord Rockingham's concession from the English
+Houses, now claimed to be masters of the Parliament itself. With the
+termination of the American war, and the consequent return of the
+English army to Europe, the reason for their existence had passed away.
+But they refused to be disbanded, and established a convention of armed
+delegates, to sit in Dublin during the session of Parliament, and to
+overawe the Houses into passing a series of measures which they
+prescribed, and which included a Parliamentary Reform Bill of a most
+sweeping character. On this occasion, however, the House of Commons
+acted with laudable firmness. Led by Mr. Fitzgibbon, a man of great
+powers, and above all suspicion of corruptibility, it spurned the
+dictation of an unauthorized body, and rejected the Reform Bill,
+avowedly on the ground of its being presented to it "under the mandate
+of a military congress;" and the Convention, finding itself powerless to
+enforce its mandates, dissolved.
+
+But the difficulties of the government were not over with the
+suppression of the Volunteer Convention. The Lord-lieutenant had a
+harder, because a more enduring, contest to encounter with the
+Parliament and the patrons of the boroughs. A single act of Parliament
+may substitute a new law for an old one; but no one resolution or bill
+has a magical power to extinguish long habits of jobbery and corruption.
+Members and patrons alike seemed to regard the late concessions as
+chiefly valuable on account of the increased value which it enabled them
+to place on their services to the government; and one cannot read
+without a feeling of shame that one or two of the bishops who were wont
+to be regarded as the proprietors of the seats for their diocesan
+cities, were not behind the most nameless lay boroughmongers in the
+resolution they evinced make a market of their support of the
+government. The consequence was that the government was unable to feel
+confident of its power to carry any measure except at a price that it
+was degrading to pay; while of those few members who were above all
+suspicion of personal corruption, many were so utterly wrong-headed, and
+had their minds so filled with unreasonable jealousy for what they
+called the honor and dignity of Ireland, and with a consequent distrust
+of England and of all Englishmen, that their honest folly was even a
+greater obstacle to wise and good government than the mean cunning of
+the others. There can hardly be a more striking proof of the
+difficulties to be overcome by a minister than is furnished by a speech
+made by a gentleman of the highest character, and of deservedly wide
+influence in the Northern counties, Mr. Brownlow, of Lurgan, one of the
+members for Armagh, which is quoted by Mr. Froude.[131]
+
+Pitt was painfully conscious of the commercial injustice with which
+hitherto Ireland had always been treated, and in the very first year of
+his administration he applied himself to the removal of the most
+mischievous of the grievances of which the Irish merchants complained,
+adopting to a great extent a scheme which had been put before him by one
+of the most considerable gentlemen of that body, which was based on the
+principle of equalization of duties in both countries. It is unnecessary
+here to enter into the details of the measure which he introduced into
+the House of Commons. He avowed it to be the commencement of a new
+system of government for Ireland, "a system of a participation and
+community of benefits, a system of equality and fairness, which, without
+tending to aggrandize one portion of the empire or to depress the other,
+should seek the aggregate interest of the whole; it was a substitute for
+the system which had hitherto been adopted of making the smaller country
+completely subordinate to and subservient to the greater, of making the
+smaller and poorer country a mere instrument for the advantage of the
+greater and wealthier one. He, therefore, proposed now to create a
+situation of perfect commercial equality, in which there was to be a
+community of benefits, and also to some extent a community of burdens."
+And he urged the House to "adopt that system of trade with Ireland that
+would tend to enrich one part of the empire without impoverishing the
+other, while it would give strength to both; that, like mercy, the
+favorite attribute of Heaven,
+
+  "'Is twice blessed--
+  It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.'"
+
+It might, he said, be regarded as "a treaty with Ireland by which that
+country would be put on a fair, equal, and impartial footing with Great
+Britain, in point of commerce, with respect to foreign countries and our
+colonies." The community of burdens which his measure would impose on
+Ireland was this: that whenever the gross hereditary revenue of Ireland
+should exceed £650,000 (an amount considerably in excess of anything it
+had ever yet reached), the excess should be applied to the support of
+the fleet of the United Kingdom. It was, in fact, a burden that could
+have no existence at all until the Irish trade had become far more
+flourishing and productive than as yet it had ever been. Yet a measure
+conceived in such a spirit of liberality, and framed with such careful
+attention to the minutest interests of Irish trade, Mr. Brownlow did not
+hesitate to denounce as one "tending to make Ireland a tributary nation
+to Great Britain. The same terms," he declared, "had been held out to
+America, and Ireland had equal spirit with America to reject them." He
+even declared that "it was happy for Mr. Orde" (the Chief Secretary, who
+had introduced the measure into the Irish House of Commons) "that he was
+in a country remarkable for humanity. Had he proposed such a measure in
+a Polish Diet, he would not have lived to carry back an answer to his
+master. If," he concluded, "the gifts of Britain are to be accompanied
+with the slavery of Ireland, I will never be a slave to pay tribute; I
+will hurl back her gifts with scorn." Baffled by such frantic and
+senseless opposition, Pitt condescended to remodel his measure. In its
+new form it was not so greatly for the advantage of Ireland. He had been
+constrained to admit some limitation of his original liberality by the
+opposition which, it had met with in England also where Fox, at all
+times an avowed enemy of freedom of trade, had made himself the
+mouth-piece of the London and Liverpool merchants, who could not see,
+without the most narrow-minded apprehension, the monopoly of the trade
+with India and the West Indies, which they had hitherto enjoyed,
+threatened by the admission of Ireland to its benefits. And now a clause
+in the second bill, binding the Irish Parliament to reenact the
+Navigation Laws existing in England, called up an opposition from
+Grattan[132] as furious as that with which Mr. Brownlow had denounced
+the original measure. To demand the enactment of the English Navigation
+Law, he declared, was "a revocation of the constitution;" and his rival,
+Flood, in his zeal to emulate his popularity with the mob, surpassing
+him in vehemence, inveighed against the clause, as one intended to make
+the Irish Parliament a mere register of the English Parliament, "which
+it should never become". All the arguments brought forward in favor of
+the measure by the supporters of the government--arguments which,
+probably, no one would now be found to deny to have been
+unanswerable--failed to make the slightest impression on a House in
+which the chief object of each opponent of the ministry seemed to be to
+outrun his fellows in violence; and eventually the measure fell to the
+ground, and for fifteen years more Ireland was deprived of the
+advantages which had been intended for her.
+
+And even yet the danger from the Volunteers was not wholly extinguished.
+Though their Convention had been suppressed, its leaders had only
+changed their tactics. Under the guidance of a Dublin ironmonger, named
+Napper Tandy, they now proposed to convene a Congress, to consist, not,
+as before, of delegates from the Volunteer body, but of persons who
+should be representatives of the entire nation; and Tandy had even the
+audacity to issue circulars to the sheriffs of the different counties,
+to require them, in their official capacity, to summon the people to
+return representatives to this Congress. The Sheriff of Dublin, a man of
+the name of O'Reilly, obeyed the requisition; but Fitzgibbon, who,
+luckily, was now Attorney-general, instantly prosecuted him for abuse of
+his office. He was convicted, fined, and imprisoned, and his punishment
+deterred others from following his example. And a rigorous example had
+become indispensable, since it was known to the government that Tandy
+and some of his followers were acting in connection with French
+emissaries, and that their object was the separation of Ireland from
+England, and, in the minds of some of them, certainly the annexation of
+the country to France; indeed, on one occasion Fitzgibbon asserted in
+the House of Commons that he had seen resolutions inviting the French
+into the country. The government would gladly have established a militia
+to supersede the Volunteers, but the temper of the Irish Parliament, in
+its newly-acquired independence, rendered any such attempt hopeless; and
+Mr. Grattan, with a perversity of judgment which his warmest admirers
+must find it difficult to reconcile with statesmanship, if not with
+patriotism, even opposed with extreme bitterness a bill for the
+establishment of a police for Dublin, though he could not deny that
+there existed in the city an organized body of ruffians, who made not
+only the streets but even the dwelling-houses of the more orderly
+citizens unsafe, by outrages of the worst kind, committed on the largest
+scale--assaults, plunderings, ravishments, and murders. In the rural
+districts of the South the disturbances were so criminally violent, and
+so incessant, that the Lord-lieutenant was compelled to request the
+presence of some additional regiments from England, as the sole means of
+preserving any kind of respect for the law; and more than once the mobs
+of rioters showed themselves so bold and formidable, that the soldiers
+were compelled to fire in self-defence, and order was not restored but
+at the cost of many lives.
+
+Presently a Conspiracy Bill was passed, and gradually the firmness of
+the government re-established a certain amount of internal tranquillity.
+But shortly afterward a crisis arose which, more than the debates on the
+commercial propositions, or on the Volunteers, or on the police, showed
+how over-liberal had been the confidence of the English minister who had
+repealed Poynings' Act, and had bestowed independent authority on the
+Irish Parliament before the members had learned how to use it. We have
+seen how keen a contest was excited in the English Parliament by the
+deranged condition of the King's health in 1788, and the necessity which
+consequently arose for the appointment of a Regency. Grattan was in
+London at the time, where he had contracted a personal intimacy with
+Fox, and had been presented by him to the Prince of Wales, whose
+graciousness of manner, and profession of adherence to the Whig system
+of politics, secured his attachment to that party. Grattan was easily
+indoctrinated by Fox with his theory of the indefeasible claim of the
+Prince to the Regency as his birthright, and is understood to have
+promised that the Irish Parliament should adopt that view. The case was
+one which seemed unprovided for. There was no question but that the law
+enacted that the sovereign of England should also be the sovereign of
+Ireland. But no express law of either country contained any such
+stipulation respecting a Regent; and Grattan conceived that, in the
+absence of any pre-existing ordinance, it would be easy to contend that
+the Irish Parliament was the sole judge who the Regent should be, and on
+what terms he should exercise the royal authority.
+
+The Irish Parliament had been prorogued in 1787 to the 5th of February,
+1789, the same day on which, after numerous examinations of the
+physicians in attendance on the royal patient, and after the passing of
+a series of resolutions enunciating the principles on which the
+government was proceeding, Pitt introduced the Regency Bill into the
+English House of Commons, being prepared to conduct it through both
+Houses with all the despatch that might be consistent with a due
+observance of all the forms of deliberation. Grattan's object was to
+anticipate the decision of the English Parliament, so as to avoid every
+appearance that the Irish Parliament was only following it; and he
+therefore proposed that the House of Commons should instantly vote an
+address to the Prince, requesting him to take upon himself the Regency
+of the kingdom of Ireland, by his own natural right as the heir of the
+crown; making sure not only that his advice would be taken by those whom
+he was addressing, but that the House of Lords would not venture to
+dissent from it.
+
+Fitzgibbon, as Attorney-general and spokesman of the government in the
+Commons, as a matter of course opposed such precipitate action, not only
+warning his hearers of the folly and danger of taking a step "which
+might dissolve the single tie which now connected Ireland with Great
+Britain," but explaining also the whole principle of the constitution of
+the two kingdoms, so far as it was a joint constitution, in terms which
+give his speech a permanent value as a summary of its principle and its
+character. He recalled to the recollection of the House the act of
+William and Mary, which declares "the kingdom of Ireland to be annexed
+to the imperial crown of England, and the sovereign of England to be by
+undoubted right sovereign of Ireland also;" and argued from this that
+Mr. Grattan's proposal was contrary to the laws of the realm and
+criminal in the extreme. "The crown of Ireland," as he told his hearers,
+"and the crown of England are inseparably united, and the Irish
+Parliament is totally independent of the British Parliament. The first
+of these positions is your security, the second your freedom, and any
+other language tends to the separation of the crowns or the subjection
+of your Parliament. The only security of your liberty is the connection
+with Great Britain; and gentlemen who risk breaking the connection must
+make up their minds to a union. God forbid I should ever see that day;
+but, if the day comes on which a separation shall be attempted, I shall
+not hesitate to embrace a union rather than a separation."
+
+He proceeded to show that, as the Irish Parliament had itself enacted
+that all bills which passed their two Houses should require the sanction
+of the Great Seal of England, they actually had no legal power to confer
+on the Prince of Wales such authority as Grattan advised his being
+invested with, whatever might be the form of words in which their
+resolution was couched. He pointed out, also, that if the Irish
+Parliament should insist on appointing the Prince of Wales Regent before
+it was known whether he would accept the Regency of England, it was
+manifestly not impossible "that they might be appointing a Regent for
+Ireland being a different person from the Regent of England; and in that
+case the moment a Regent was appointed in Great Britain, he might send a
+commission under the Great Seal appointing a Lord-lieutenant of Ireland,
+and to that commission the Regent of Ireland would be bound to pay
+obedience. Another objection of great force to his mind was, that the
+course recommended by Grattan would be a formal appeal from the
+Parliament of England to that of Ireland. It would sow the seeds of
+dissension between the Parliaments of the two countries. And, indeed,
+those who were professing themselves advocates for the independence of
+the Irish crown were advocates for its separation from England."
+
+But the House was too entirely under the influence of Grattan's
+impassioned eloquence for Fitzgibbon's more sober arguments to be
+listened to. The address proposed by Grattan was carried by acclamation;
+and the peers were scarcely less unanimous in its favor, one of the
+archbishops even dilating on "the duty of availing themselves of the
+opportunity of asserting the total independence of Ireland." Even when,
+on a second discussion as to the mode in which the address was to be
+presented to the Prince, Fitzgibbon reported that he had consulted the
+Chancellor and all the judges, and that they were unanimously of opinion
+that, till the Regency Bill should be passed in England, the address was
+not only improper but treasonable, he found his warning equally
+disregarded. And when the Lord-lieutenant refused to transmit the
+address to England, on the avowed ground of its illegality, Grattan
+proposed and carried three resolutions: the first, that the address was
+not illegal, but that, in addressing the Prince to take on himself the
+Regency, the Parliament of Ireland had exercised an undoubted right; the
+second, that the Lord-lieutenant's refusal to transmit the address to
+his Royal Highness was ill-advised and unconstitutional; the third, that
+a deputation from the two Houses should go to London, to present the
+address to the Prince. Mr. Fronde affirms that the deputation, even when
+preparing to sail for England, was very irresolute and undecided whether
+to present the address or not, from a reasonable fear of incurring the
+penalties of treason, to which the lawyers pronounced those who should
+present it liable. But their courage was not put to the test. As has
+been already seen, before the end of the month the King's recovery was
+announced, and the question of a Regency did not occur again till the
+Irish Parliament had been united to the English.
+
+Since Lord Rockingham's concessions, in 1782, the project of a
+legislative union between the two countries, resembling that which
+united Scotland to England, had more than once been broached. We have
+seen it alluded to by Fitzgibbon in the course of these discussions, and
+it was no new idea. It had been discussed even before the union with
+Scotland was completed, and had then been regarded in Ireland with
+feelings very different from those which prevailed at a later period.
+Ten years after the time of which we are speaking, Grattan denounced the
+scheme with almost frantic violence. Fitzgibbon (though after the
+Rebellion he recommended it as indispensable) as yet regarded it only as
+an alternative which, though he might eventually embrace it, he should
+not accept without extreme reluctance. But at the beginning of the
+century all parties among the Protestant Irish had been eager for it,
+and even the leading Roman Catholics had been not unwilling to acquiesce
+in it. Unluckily, the English ministers were unable to shake off the
+influence of the English manufacturers; and they, in another development
+of the selfish and wicked jealousy which had led them in William's reign
+to require the suppression of the Irish woollen manufacture, now, in
+Anne's, rose against the proposal of a legislative union.[133] In
+blindness which was not only fatal but suicidal also, "they persuaded
+themselves that the union would make Ireland rich, and that England's
+interest was to keep her poor;" as if it had been possible for one
+portion of the kingdom to increase in prosperity without every other
+portion benefiting also by the improvement.
+
+However, in the reign of Anne the union was a question only of
+expediency or of wisdom. The wide divergence of the two Parliaments on
+this question of the Regency transformed it into a question of
+necessity. The King might have a relapse; the Irish Parliament, on a
+recurrence of the crisis, might re-affirm its late resolutions; might
+frame another address to the Prince of Wales; and there might be no
+alternative between seeing two different persons Regents of England and
+Ireland, or, what would be nearly the same thing, seeing the same person
+Regent of the two countries on different grounds, and exercising a
+different authority.
+
+And if these proceedings of the Irish Parliament had wrought in the mind
+of the great English minister a conviction of the absolute necessity of
+preventing a recurrence of such dangers by the only practicable means
+open to him--the fusion of it into one body with the English Parliament
+by a legislative union--the occurrences of the ensuing ten years
+enforced that conviction with a weight still more irresistible. It has
+been seen how stirring an influence the revolutionary fever engendered
+by the overthrow of the French monarchy for a time exerted even over the
+calmer temper of Englishmen. In Ireland, where, ever since Sarsfield and
+his brave garrison enlisted under the banner of Louis XIV., a connection
+more or less intimate with France had been constantly kept up, the
+events in Paris had produced a far deeper and wider effect. More than
+one demagogue among the Volunteers had avowed a desire to see the whole
+country transfer its allegiance from the English to the French
+sovereign; and this preference was more pronounced after the triumph of
+democracy in the French capital. For the leaders of the movement,
+themselves nearly all men of the lowest degree, denounced the Irish
+nobles with almost as much vehemence as the English connection.
+
+Yet Pitt's policy, dictated partly by a spirit of conciliation, and
+still more by feelings of justice, was gradually removing many of the
+grievances of which the Irish had real reason to complain. Next to the
+restrictions on trade, nothing had made such an impression on his mind
+as the iniquity of the penal laws; and those he proceeded to repeal,
+encouraging the introduction of bills to throw open the profession of
+the law to Roman Catholics, to allow them seats on the magistrates'
+bench and commissions in the army, and to grant them the electoral
+franchise, a concession which he himself would willingly have extended
+by admitting them to Parliament itself. But these relaxations of the old
+Penal Code, important as they were, only conciliated the higher classes
+of the Roman Catholics. Most of the Roman Catholic prelates, and most of
+the Roman Catholic lay nobles, proclaimed their satisfaction at what had
+been done, and their good-will toward the minister who had done it; but
+the professional agitators were exasperated rather than conciliated at
+finding so much of the ground on which they had rested cut from beneath
+their feet. So desirous was Pitt to carry conciliation to the greatest
+length that could be consistent with safety, that he held more than one
+conference with Grattan himself; but he found that great orator not very
+manageable, partly, as it may seem from some of Mr. Windham's letters,
+through jealousy of Fitzgibbon, who was now the Irish Chancellor,[134]
+and still more from a desire to propitiate the Roman Catholics, for whom
+he demanded complete and immediate Emancipation; while Pitt, who was,
+probably, already resolved on accomplishing a legislative Union,
+thought, as far as we can judge, that Emancipation should follow, not
+precede, the Union, lest, if it should precede it, it might prove rather
+a stumbling-block in the way than a stepping-stone to the still more
+important measure.
+
+It is not very easy to determine what influence the "Emancipation," as
+it was rather absurdly called,[135] if it had been granted at that time,
+might have had in quieting the prevailing discontent. With one large
+party it would probably have increased it, for there was quite as great
+an inclination to insurrection in Ulster as in Leinster or Munster; and
+with the Northern Presbyterians animosity to Popery was at least as
+powerful a feeling as sympathy with the French Republicans. A subsequent
+chapter, however, will afford a more fitting opportunity for discussing
+the arguments in favor of or against Emancipation. What seems certain
+is, that a large party among the Roman Catholics of the lower class
+valued Emancipation itself principally as a measure to another end--a
+separation from England. Pitt, meanwhile, hopeless of reconciling the
+leaders of the different parties--the impulsive enthusiasm of Grattan
+with the sober, practical wisdom of Fitzgibbon--pursued his own policy
+of conciliation united with vigor; and one of the measures which he now
+carried subsists, unaltered in its principle, to the present day.
+
+There was no part of the penal laws of which the folly and iniquity were
+more intolerable than the restrictions which they imposed on education.
+To a certain extent, they defeated themselves. The clause which
+subjected to severe penalties a Roman Catholic parent who sent his child
+abroad to enjoy the benefits of an education which he was not allowed to
+receive at home, was manifestly almost incapable of enforcement, and the
+youths designed for orders in the Romish Church had been invariably sent
+to foreign colleges--some to Douai or St. Omer, in France; some to the
+renowned Spanish University of Salamanca. But the French colleges had
+been swept away by the Revolution, which also made a passage to Spain
+(the greater expense of which had at all times confined that resource to
+a small number of students) more difficult; and the consequence was,
+that in 1794 the Roman Catholic Primate, Dr. Troy, petitioned the
+government to grant a royal license for the endowment of a college in
+Ireland. Justice and policy were equally in favor of the grant of such a
+request. For the sake of the whole kingdom, and even for that of
+Protestantism itself, it was better that the Roman Catholic priesthood
+should be an educated rather than an ignorant body of men; and, in the
+temper which at that time prevailed over the western countries of the
+Continent, it was at least equally desirable that the rising generation
+should be preserved from the contagion of the revolutionary principles
+which the present rulers of France were so industrious to propagate.
+Pitt at once embraced the idea, and in the spring of the next year a
+bill was introduced into the Irish Parliament by the Chief Secretary,
+authorizing the foundation and endowment of a college at Maynooth, in
+the neighborhood of Dublin, for the education of Roman Catholics
+generally, whether destined for the Church or for lay professions. It is
+a singular circumstance that the only opposition to the measure came
+from Grattan and his party, who urged that, as the Roman Catholics had
+recently been allowed to matriculate and take degrees at Trinity
+College, though not to share in the endowments of that wealthy
+institution, the endowment of another college, to be exclusively
+confined to Roman Catholics, would be a retrograde step, undoing the
+benefits of the recent concession of the authorities of Trinity; would
+be "a revival and re-enactment of the principles of separation and
+exclusion," and an injury to the whole community. For, as he wisely
+contended, nothing was so important to the well-doing of the entire
+people as the extinction of the religious animosities which had hitherto
+embittered the feelings of each Church toward the other, and nothing
+could so surely tend to that extinction as the uniting the members of
+both from their earliest youth, in the pursuit both of knowledge and
+amusement, as school-fellows and playmates. If Mr. Froude's
+interpretation of the motives of those who influenced Grattan on this
+occasion be correct, he was unconsciously made a tool of by those whose
+real object was a separation from England, of the attainment of which
+they despaired, unless they could unite Protestants and Roman Catholics
+in its prosecution. The bill, however, was passed by a very large
+majority, and £9000 a year was appropriated to the endowment of the
+college. Half a century afterward, as will be seen, that endowment was
+enlarged, and placed on a more solid and permanent footing, by one of
+the ablest of Pitt's successors. It was a wise and just measure; and if
+its success has not entirely answered the expectations of the minister
+who granted it, its comparative failure has been owing to circumstances
+which the acutest judgment could not have foreseen.
+
+But it seems certain that neither the concession nor the refusal of any
+demands put forward by any party in Ireland could have prevented the
+insurrection which broke out shortly afterward. There were two parties
+among the disaffected Irish--or it should, perhaps, rather be said that
+two different objects were kept in view by them--one of which, the
+establishment of a republic, was dearer to one section of the
+malcontents; separation from England, with the contingency of annexation
+to France, was the more immediate aim of the other, though the present
+existence of a republican form of government in France to a great extent
+united the two. As has been mentioned before, the original movers in the
+conspiracy were of low extraction, Dublin tradesmen in a small way of
+business. Napper Tandy was an ironmonger, Wolfe Tone was the son of a
+coach-maker. But they had obtained a recruit of a very different class,
+a younger son of the Duke of Leinster, Lord Edward Fitzgerald, a man of
+very slender capacity, who, at his first entrance into Parliament, when
+scarcely more than of age, had made himself remarkable by a furious
+denunciation of Pitt's Irish propositions; had married a natural
+daughter of the Duke of Orleans, a prince, in spite of his royal birth,
+one of the most profligate and ferocious of the French Jacobins; and had
+caught the revolutionary mania to such a degree that he abjured his
+nobility, and substituted for the appellation which marked his rank the
+title of "Citizen Fitzgerald." He had enrolled himself in a society
+known as the United Irishmen, and had gone to France, as its
+plenipotentiary, to arrange with Hoche, one of the most brilliant and
+popular of the French generals, a scheme for the invasion of Ireland, in
+which he promised him that, on his landing, he should be joined by tens
+of thousands of armed Irishmen. Hoche entered warmly into the plan, was
+furnished with a splendid army by the Directors, and in December, 1796,
+set sail for Ireland; but the fleet which carried him was dispersed in a
+storm; many of the ships were wrecked, others were captured by the
+British cruisers, and the remnant of the fleet, sadly crippled, was glad
+to regain its harbors. Two years afterward another invading expedition
+had still worse fortune. General Humbert, who in 1796 had been one of
+Hoche's officers, did succeed in effecting a landing at Killala Bay, in
+Mayo; but he and the whole of his force was speedily surrounded, and
+compelled to surrender; and a month afterward a large squadron, with a
+more powerful division of troops, under General Hardy, on board, found
+itself unable to effect a landing, but fell in with a squadron under Sir
+John Warren, who captured every ship but two; Wolfe Tone, who was on
+board one of them, being taken prisoner, and only escaping the gallows
+by suicide.
+
+This happened in October, 1798. But it is difficult to conceive with
+what object these last expeditions had been despatched from France at
+all; for in the preceding summer the rebellion of the Irish had broken
+out, and had been totally crushed in a few weeks;[136] not without
+terrible loss of life on both sides, nor without the insurgent
+leaders--though many of them were gentlemen of good birth, fortune, and
+education, and still more were clergy--showing a ferocity and ingenuity
+in cruelty which the worst of the French Jacobins had scarcely exceeded;
+one of the saddest circumstances of the whole rebellion being, that the
+insurgents, who had burnt men, women, and children alive, who had
+deliberately hacked others to pieces against whom they did not profess
+to have a single ground of complaint beyond the fact that they were
+English and Protestant, found advocates in both Houses of the English
+Parliament, who declared that the rebellion was owing to the severity of
+the Irish Viceroy and his chief councillors, who denied that the rebels
+had solicited French aid, and who even voted against granting to the
+government the re-enforcements necessary to prevent a revival of the
+treason.
+
+The rebellion was crushed with such celerity as might have convinced the
+most disaffected of the insanity of defying the power of Great Britain;
+but it was certain that the spirit which prompted the rebellion was not
+extinguished, and that, as it had been fed before, so it would continue
+to be fed by the factious spirit of members of the Irish House of
+Commons, and of those who could return members,[137] so long as Ireland
+had a separate Parliament. Not, indeed, that Pitt required the argument
+in favor of a Union which was thus furnished. The course adopted by the
+Irish Parliament on the Regency question was quite sufficient to show
+how great a mistake had been made by the repeal of Poynings' Act. But
+what the rebellion proved was, that the Union would not admit of an
+instant's delay; and Pitt at once applied himself to the task of framing
+a measure which, while it should strengthen England, by the removal of
+the necessity for a constant watchfulness over every transaction and
+movement in Ireland, should at the same time confer on and secure to
+Ireland substantial advantages, such as, without a Union, the English
+Parliament could scarcely be induced to contemplate.
+
+Mr. Hallam, in one of the last chapters of his work,[138] while showing
+by unanswerable arguments the advantages which Scotland has derived from
+her Union with England, has also enumerated some of the causes which
+impeded the minister of the day in his endeavors to render it acceptable
+to the Scotch members to whom it was proposed. The most apparently
+substantial of these was the unprecedented character of the measure. No
+past "experience of history was favorable to the absorption of a lesser
+state, at least where the government partook so much of the republican
+form, in one of superior power and ancient rivalry." But, in the case of
+the present measure, what had thus been a difficulty in the Scotch Union
+might have been expected to be regarded as an argument in its favor,
+since the keenest patriots among the Scotch had long been convinced that
+the Union had brought a vast increase of prosperity and importance to
+their country, and what was now confessed to have proved advantageous to
+Scotland might naturally be expected to be equally beneficial to
+Ireland. Another obstacle had been the fear of the danger to which the
+Presbyterian Church might be "exposed, when brought thus within the
+power of a Legislature so frequently influenced by one which held her,
+not as a sister, but rather a bastard usurper to a sister's
+inheritance." But here again experience might give her testimony in
+favor of an Irish Union, since it was incontestable that those
+apprehensions--which, no doubt, many earnest Scotchmen had sincerely
+entertained--had not been realized, but that since the Union the
+Presbyterian Church had enjoyed as great security, as complete
+independence, and as absolute an authority over its members as in the
+preceding century; that the Parliament had never attempted the slightest
+interference with its exercise of its privileges, and that the Church of
+England had been equally free from the exhibition of any desire to
+stimulate the Parliament to such action; while the Roman Catholic
+Church, which had many more adherents in England than the Presbyterian
+Church had ever had, was quite powerful enough to exact for itself the
+maintenance of its rights, and the minister was quite willing to grant
+equal securities to those which, at the beginning of the century, had
+been thought sufficient for the Church of Scotland. A third reason which
+our great historical critic puts forward for the disfavor with which the
+Union was at the time regarded by many high-minded Scotchmen, he finds
+in "the gross prostitution with which a majority sold themselves to the
+surrender of their own legislative existence." That similar means were
+to some extent employed to win over opponents of the government in
+Ireland cannot, it must be confessed, be denied, though the temptations
+held out to converts oftener took the shape of titles, promotions,
+appointments, and court favors than of actual money. The most recent
+historian of this period--who, to say the least, is not biassed in favor
+of either the English or Irish government of the period--pronounces as
+his opinion, formed after the most careful research, that the bribery
+was on the other side. "Cornwallis and Castlereagh" (the Lord-lieutenant
+and the Chief Secretary) "both declared it to be within their knowledge
+that the Opposition offered four thousand pounds, ready money, for a
+vote. But they name only one man who was purchased, and his vote was
+obtained for four thousand pounds. From the language of Lord Cornwallis,
+it is certain that if money was spent by the government in this way it
+was without his knowledge; but many things may have been done by the
+inferior agents of the government, and possibly by Castlereagh himself,
+which they would not venture to lay before the Lord-lieutenant. It
+appears, however, from the papers which have recently come to light,
+that the prevalent belief of the Union having been mainly effected by a
+lavish expenditure of money is not well-founded; still it is certain
+that some money was expended in this way." Besides actual payment for
+votes, he adds that a very large sum--a hundred thousand pounds--is said
+to have been expended in the purchase of seats, the holders of which
+were, of course, to vote against the measure; and names Lord Downshire
+as subscribing £5000, Lord Lismore and Mr. White £3000 each, while the
+government funds were chiefly expended "in engaging[139] young
+barristers of the Four Courts to write for the Union." But, even if it
+were true that corruption was employed to the very utmost extent that
+was ever alleged by the most vehement opponent of the measure and of the
+government, it may be feared that very few of the last century Irishmen
+would have been so shocked at it as to consider that fact an objection
+to the Union, especially, it is sad and shameful to say, among the upper
+classes. The poorer classes, those who could render no political service
+to a minister, as being consequently beneath official notice, were
+unassailed by his temptations; but the demoralization of the men of rank
+and property was almost universal, and few seats were disposed of, few
+votes were given, except in return for favors granted, or out of
+discontent at favors refused. And it cannot be denied that the tendency
+to political jobbery had not been diminished by the concessions of 1782,
+if, indeed, it may not be said that the increased importance which those
+concessions had given to the Irish Parliament had led the members of
+both Houses to place an increased value on their services. Certainly no
+previous Lord-lieutenant had given such descriptions of the universality
+of the demands made on him as were forwarded to the English government
+by those who held that office in the sixteen years preceding the
+outbreak of the Rebellion.
+
+It is remarkable that the transaction which, as has been said before,
+may be conceived to have first forced on Pitt's mind the conviction of
+the absolute necessity of the Union--namely, the course pursued by the
+Irish Parliament on the Regency Bill--bore a close resemblance to that
+which, above all other considerations, had made the Scotch Union
+indispensable, namely, the Act of Security passed by the Scottish
+Estates in 1703, which actually provided that, on the decease of Queen
+Anne without issue, the Estates "should name her successor, but should
+be debarred from choosing the admitted successor to the crown of
+England, unless such forms of government were settled as should fully
+secure the religion, freedom, and trade of the Scottish nation."[140]
+The Scotch Estates, therefore, had absolutely regarded the possible
+separation of the two kingdoms as a contingency which might become not
+undesirable; and, though it was too ticklish an argument to bring
+forward, it may very possibly have occurred to Pitt that a similar vote
+of the Irish Parliament was not impossible. The claim which Grattan,
+following Fox, had set up on behalf of the Prince of Wales, was one of
+an indefeasible right to the Regency; and, as far as right by
+inheritance went, his claim to the crown, if, or whenever, a vacancy
+should occur, was far less disputable. But, as has been mentioned in the
+last chapter, a question had already been raised whether his Royal
+Highness had not forfeited his right to the succession, and it was quite
+possible that that question might be renewed. The fact of the Prince's
+marriage to a Roman Catholic was by this time generally accepted as
+certain; the birth of the Princess Charlotte gave greater importance to
+the circumstance than it seemed to have while the Prince remained
+childless; and, if the performance of the marriage ceremony should be
+legally proved, and the English law courts should pronounce that the
+legal invalidity of the marriage did not protect the Prince from the
+penalty of forfeiture, it was highly probable that the Irish Parliament
+would take a different view--would refuse, in spite of the Bill of
+Rights, to regard marriage with a Roman Catholic as a disqualification,
+but would recognize the Prince of Wales as King of Ireland.
+
+Several minor considerations, such as the desirableness of uniformity in
+the proceedings of the two countries with respect to Money Bills, the
+Mutiny Act, and other arrangements of parliamentary detail, all pointed
+the same way; and, on the whole, it may be said that scarcely any of the
+opponents of the government measure were found to deny its expediency,
+especially as regarded the interests of Great Britain. The objections
+which were made were urged on different grounds. In the Irish House of
+Commons, a member who, though a young man, had already established a
+very high reputation for professional skill as a barrister, for
+eloquence equally suited to the Bar and to the Senate, and for sincere
+and incorruptible patriotism, Mr. Plunkett, took upon himself to deny
+the competency of the Irish Parliament to pass a bill not only to
+extinguish its own existence, but to prevent the birth of any future
+Parliament, and to declare that the act, if it "should be passed," would
+be a mere nullity, and that no man in "Ireland would be bound to obey
+it." And, in the English House of Commons, Mr. Grey may be thought to
+have adopted something of the same view, when he proposed an amendment
+"to suspend all proceedings on the subject till the sentiments of the
+people of Ireland respecting that measure could be ascertained." He did
+not, of course, deny (he was speaking on the 21st of April, 1800) that
+the bill had been passed by both Houses of the Irish Parliament by
+considerable majorities.[141] But he contended that that Parliament did
+not speak the sentiments of the people; and, that being the case, that
+its voice was of no authority. It is evident that all arguments founded
+on a denial of the omnipotence of a Parliament, whether English or
+Irish, are invalid. The question of that omnipotence, as has been seen
+in a former chapter, had been fully discussed when Mr. Pitt's father
+denied the power of Parliament to tax the American Colonies; and that
+question may fairly be regarded as having been settled at that time. It
+is equally clear that the denial that, on any question whatever, the
+House of Commons must be taken to speak the sentiments of the
+constituencies, whether the proposal of such question had been
+contemplated at the time of their election or not, is the advancement of
+a doctrine wholly inconsistent with our parliamentary constitution, and
+one which would practically be the parent of endless agitation and
+mischief. To expect that the members could pronounce on no new question
+without a fresh reference to their constituents, would be to reduce them
+from the position of representatives to that of delegates; such as that
+of the members of the old States-general, in France, whose early decay
+is attributed by the ablest political writers in no small degree to the
+dependence of the members on their constituents for precise
+instructions. Another argument on which Mr. Grey insisted with great
+earnestness is worth preserving, though subsequent inventions have
+destroyed its force; he contended that the example of the Scotch Union
+did not, when properly considered, afford any argument in favor of an
+Irish Union, from the difference of situation of the two countries.
+Scotland was a part of the same island as England; "there was no
+physical impediment to rapid and constant communication; the relative
+situation of the two countries was such that the King himself could
+administer the executive government in both, and there was no occasion
+for a separate establishment being kept up in each." But the sea lay
+between England and Ireland, and the delays and sometimes difficulties
+which were thus interposed rendered it "necessary that Ireland should
+have a separate government;" and he affirmed that "this was an
+insuperable bar to a beneficial Union," quoting a saying of Lord Somers,
+that "if it were necessary to preserve a separate executive government
+at Edinburgh after the Union, he would abandon the measure." Mr. Grey
+even denied that the prosperity of Scotland since the Union was mainly
+attributable to that measure. "It was not the Union; it was the adoption
+of a liberal policy, the application of a proper remedy to the
+particular evils under which the country labored, that removed the
+causes which had impeded the prosperity of Scotland." But this argument
+was clearly open to the reply that the adoption of that liberal policy
+had been a direct effect of the Union, and would have been impracticable
+without it, and was, therefore, a strong inducement to the adoption of a
+similar Union with Ireland, where the existing evils were at least as
+great as those which, a century before, had kept down Scotland. Another
+of his arguments has been remarkably falsified by the event. With a
+boldness in putting forward what was manifestly, indeed avowedly, a
+party objection, and which, as such, must be looked upon as somewhat
+singular, he found a reason for resisting the addition of a hundred
+Irish members to the British House of Commons in the probability that
+they would, as a general rule, be subservient to the minister. He
+instanced "the uniform support which the members for Scotland had given
+to every act of ministers," and saw in that example "reason to apprehend
+that the Irish members would become a no less regular band of
+ministerial adherents." It would be superfluous to point out how
+entirely contrary the result has been to the prediction.
+
+It is, however, beside the purpose of this work to dwell on the
+arguments by which the minister supported his proposal, or on those with
+which the Opposition resisted it, whether apparently founded on
+practical considerations, such as those brought forward by Mr. Grey, or
+those of a more sentimental character, which rested on the loss of
+national "dignity and honor," which, it was assumed, would be the
+consequence of the measure. It seems desirable rather to explain the
+principal conditions on which the Union was to be effected, as Pitt
+explained it to the House of Commons in April, 1800. In the preceding
+year he had confined himself to moving a series of resolutions in favor
+of the principle, which, though they were adopted by both Houses in
+England, he did not at that time endeavor to carry farther, since in the
+Irish House of Commons the utmost exertions of the government could only
+prevail by a single vote;[142] and he naturally thought such a majority
+far too slender to justify his relying on it so far as to proceed
+farther with a measure of such vast importance. But, during the recess,
+he had introduced some modifications into his original draft of the
+measure, which, though slight, were sufficient to conciliate much
+additional support; and the consequence was, that in February of this
+year both the Irish Houses accepted it by sufficient majorities;[143]
+and, therefore, he now felt able to lay the details of the measure
+before the English Parliament. To take them in the order in which he
+enumerated them, that which had appeared to the Irish Parliament "the
+first and most important, was the share which the Irish constituencies
+ought to have in the representation of the House of Commons." On this
+point, "the Parliament of Ireland was of opinion that the number of
+representatives for Ireland ought to be one hundred." And he was not
+disposed to differ from the conclusion to which it had come. He regarded
+it, indeed, as "a matter of but small importance whether the number of
+representatives from one part of the united empire were greater or less.
+If they were enough to make known the local wants, to state the
+interests and convey the sentiments of the part of the empire they
+represented, it would produce that degree of general security which
+would be wanting in any vain attempt to obtain that degree of
+theoretical perfection about which in modern times they had heard so
+much." He approved of "the principle which had been laid down upon this
+part of the subject in the Parliament of Ireland--a reference to the
+supposed population of the two countries, and to the proposed rate of
+contribution. The proportion of contribution proposed to be established
+was seven and a half for Great Britain, and one for Ireland; while in
+the proportion of population Great Britain was to Ireland as two and a
+half or three to one;[144] so that the result, on a combination of these
+two calculations, would be something more than five to one in favor of
+Great Britain, which was about the proportion which it was proposed to
+establish between the representation of the two countries." The
+principle of selection of the constituencies which had been adopted he
+likewise considered most "equitable and satisfactory for Ireland. The
+plan proposed was, that the members of the counties and the principal
+commercial cities should remain entire.... The remaining members were to
+be selected from those places which were the most considerable in point
+of population and wealth.... This was the only plan which could be
+adopted without trenching on the constitution; it introduced no
+theoretical reforms in the constitution or in the representation of this
+country; it made no distinction between different parliamentary rights,
+nor any alteration, even the slightest, in the internal forms of
+Parliament."
+
+Another consideration which he had kept in mind in framing this measure
+was this: "By the laws of England care had been taken to prevent the
+influence of the crown from becoming too great by too many offices being
+held by members of Parliament." And Pitt had no doubt that there would
+be a general feeling "that some provision ought to be made on this
+subject" in the arrangements for the new Parliament. At present, among
+the representatives of the counties and great commercial towns, whose
+seats were to be preserved in the new united Parliament, there were not
+above five or six who held offices; and, though it was impossible to
+estimate the possible number of place-holders with precision, he thought
+what would he most fair for him to propose would be, that "no more than
+twenty of the Irish members should hold places, and that if it should
+happen that a greater number did hold places during pleasure, then those
+who had last accepted them should vacate their seats."
+
+In the House of Peers he proposed that twenty-eight lords temporal of
+Ireland should have seats in the united Parliament, who should be
+elected for life by the Peers of Ireland--an arrangement which differed
+from that which, at the beginning of the century, had been adopted for
+the representative Peers of Scotland; but he argued, and surely with
+great reason, that "the choice of Peers to represent the Irish nobility
+for life was a mode that was more congenial to the general spirit and
+system of a Peerage than that of their being septennially elected, as
+the nobility of Scotland were." Of the spiritual Peers, four were to sit
+in rotation; to the lay Peers a farther privilege was given, which the
+minister regarded as of considerable, and even constitutional
+importance. By the articles of the Scotch Union, a Peer, if not chosen
+as a representative of the Peerage, was not eligible as a candidate for
+the House of Commons in either England or Scotland. But this bill
+"reserved a right to the Peers of Ireland who should not be elected to
+represent their own Peerage, to be elected members of the House of
+Commons of the united Parliament of Great Britain;" and Pitt urged that
+this was "a far better mode of treatment than had been adopted for the
+nobility of Scotland; so that a nobleman of Ireland, if not representing
+his own order, might be chosen as a legislator by a class of inferior
+rank, which he was so far from regarding as improper, that he deemed it
+in a high degree advantageous to the empire, analogous to the practice
+as well as friendly to the spirit of the British constitution." And he
+enforced his argument by pointing out with honest pride the advantage
+which in that respect the spirit and practice of our constitution gave
+to our nobility over the nobles of other countries. "We know full well,"
+he continued, "the advantage we have experienced from having in this
+House those who, in the course of descent, as well as in hopes of merit,
+have had a prospect of sitting in our House of Peers. Those, therefore,
+who object to this part of the arrangement" (for, as he had previously
+mentioned, it had been made a subject not only of objection, but of
+ridicule) "can only do so from the want of due attention to the true
+character of our constitution, one of the great leading advantages of
+which is, that a person may for a long time be a member of one branch of
+the Legislature, and have it in view to become a member of another
+branch of it. This it is which constitutes the leading difference
+between the nobility of Great Britain and those of other countries. With
+us they are permitted to have legislative power before they arrive at
+their higher stations; and as they are, like all the rest of mankind, to
+be improved by experience in the science of legislation as well as in
+every other science, our constitution affords them that opportunity by
+their being eligible to seats in this House from the time of their
+majority. This is one of those circumstances which arise frequently in
+practice, but the advantages of which do not appear in theory till
+chance happens to cast them before us, and makes them subjects of
+discussion. These are the shades of the British constitution in which
+its latent beauties consist;" and he affirmed his conviction that this
+privilege would prove "an advantage to the nobility of Ireland, and an
+improvement in the system of representation in the House."
+
+It will hardly be denied that the arrangement that the representative
+Peers of Ireland should enjoy their seats for life did make it desirable
+that those who were not so elected to the Upper House should be eligible
+as candidates for a place in the Lower House. Otherwise, those who were
+not chosen as representatives of the peerage would have been placed in
+the anomalous and unfair position of being the only persons in the
+kingdom possessed of the requisite property qualification, and not
+disqualified by sex or profession, who were absolutely excluded from the
+opportunity of distinguishing themselves and serving their country in
+Parliament. How great the practical benefit to the House of Commons and
+the country the clause he was recommending was calculated to confer, was
+shown in a remarkable manner the very year of his death, when an Irish
+Peer was returned to the House of Commons, who, retaining his seat for
+nearly sixty years as the representative of different constituencies,
+the University of Cambridge being among the number, during the course of
+that period rose through a variety of offices to that of Prime-minister,
+and, as is admitted even by those who dissented most widely from some of
+his opinions and actions, earned for himself an honorable reputation, as
+one who had rendered faithful services to the crown, and on more than
+one occasion had conferred substantial benefits on the country.
+
+The arrangements proposed with respect to the Peers were not opposed.
+But Mr. Grey--generally acting as the spokesman of the Opposition on
+this question--raised an objection to making so large an addition as
+that of one hundred new members to the British House of Commons. He
+repeated his prophecy, made on a previous occasion, of the subserviency
+to the minister which the Irish members might be expected to exhibit,
+and therefore moved an amendment to reduce the number of Irish
+representatives to eighty-five; but, to obviate the discontent which
+such a reduction might be expected to excite in Ireland, he proposed to
+diminish the number of English members also, by disfranchising forty "of
+the most decayed boroughs," a step which would leave the number of
+members in the new united Parliament as nearly as possible the same as
+it was before. He found, however, very few to agree with him; his
+amendment was rejected by 176 to 34; and the minister's proposal was
+adopted in all its details.
+
+Mr. Pitt touched lightly on the next article, which limited the royal
+prerogative of creating Peers by a provision that the King should never
+confer any fresh Irish peerage till three peerages should have become
+extinct. This, again, was a point of difference between the conditions
+of the Scotch and Irish Unions; since by the terms of the Scotch Union
+the King was forever debarred from creating any new Scotch peerages. But
+it was pointed out that the greater antiquity of the Scotch peerages,
+and the circumstance that in Scotland the titles descended to collateral
+branches, were calculated to make the extinction of a Scotch peerage an
+event of very rare occurrence; while the comparative newness (with very
+few exceptions) of Irish peerages, and the rule by which they are
+"confined to immediate male descendants," rendered the entire extinction
+of the Irish peerage probable, "if the power of adding to or making up
+the number were not given to the crown."
+
+Recent legislation has given such importance to the next resolution,
+that it will be well to quote his precise words:
+
+"5. That it would be fit to propose, as the fifth article of union, that
+the Churches of that part of Great Britain called England and of Ireland
+shall be united into one Church; and that when his Majesty shall summon
+a Convocation, the archbishops, bishops, and clergy of the several
+provinces in Ireland shall be respectively summoned to and sit in the
+Convocation of the united Church, in the like manner and subject to the
+same regulations as to election and qualification as are at present by
+law established with respect to the like orders of the Church of
+England; and that the doctrine, worship, discipline, and government of
+the said united Church shall be preserved as now by law established for
+the Church of England, saving to the Church of Ireland all the rights,
+privileges, and jurisdictions now thereunto belonging; and that the
+doctrine, worship, discipline, and government of the Church of Scotland
+shall likewise be preserved as now by law, and by the Act of Union
+established for the Church of Scotland; and that the continuance and
+preservation forever of the said united Church, as the Established
+Church, of that part of the said United Kingdom called England and
+Ireland, shall be deemed and taken to be an essential and fundamental
+article and condition of the Union."
+
+Pitt's comment on this article was so brief as to show that he regarded
+its justice as well as its importance too obvious to need any elaborate
+justification. He pointed out that that portion of it which related to
+Convocation had been added by the Irish Parliament, and "would only say
+on so interesting a subject that the prosperity of the Irish Church
+could never be permanent, unless it were a part of the Union, to leave
+as a guard a power to the United Parliament to make some provision in
+this respect as a fence beyond any act of their own that could at
+present be agreed on." But, while he thus showed his conviction that the
+permanent prosperity of the Irish Church was essential to the welfare of
+the kingdom, he was by no means insensible to the claims of the Roman
+Catholic Church (as founded not more in policy than in justice) to be
+placed in some degree on a footing of equality with it; not only by a
+recognition of the dignity of its ministers, but also by an endowment
+which should be proportioned to their requirements, and should place
+them in a position of worldly competence and comfort for which hitherto
+they had been dependent on their flocks.[145] To use the expression of a
+modern statesman, he contemplated "levelling up," not "levelling down."
+Perhaps it may be said that he contemplated levelling up, as the surest
+and most permanent obstacle to any proposal of levelling down.
+
+At the same time it is fair to remark, that the argument which on a
+recent occasion was so strongly pressed by the champions of the Church,
+that it was beyond the power of Parliament to repeal what was here
+declared to be "an essential and fundamental article and condition of
+the Union," is untenable, on every consideration of the power of
+Parliament, and, indeed, of common-sense; since it would be an
+intolerable evil, and one productive of the worst consequences, if the
+doctrine were admitted that any Parliament could make an unchangeable
+law and bind its successors forever; and, moreover, since the very words
+of this article do clearly imply the power of Parliament over the
+Church, the power asserted, to "make some provision for the permanence
+of its prosperity," clearly involving a power to make provisions of an
+opposite character. The expediency or impolicy, the propriety or
+unrighteousness, of a measure must always depend on the merits of the
+question itself at the time, and not on the judgment or intentions of
+legislators of an earlier generation. And advocates weaken instead of
+strengthening their case when they put forward arguments which, however
+plausible or acceptable to their own partisans, are, nevertheless,
+capable of refutation.
+
+The next article related to a question of paramount practical
+importance, and of special interest, since, as has been seen before,
+there was no subject on which the past legislation of the English
+Parliament had been so discreditable. But the jealousy of English
+manufacturers, though it had prevailed over the indifference of William
+III., who reserved all his solicitude for matters of foreign diplomacy,
+could find no echo in the large mind and sound commercial and financial
+knowledge of the modern statesman. He laid it down as the principle of
+his legislation on this subject--a principle which "he was sure that
+every gentleman in the House was ready to admit--that the consequence of
+the Union ought to be a perfect freedom of trade, whether of produce or
+manufacture, without exception, if possible; that a deviation from that
+principle ought to be made only when adhering to it might possibly shake
+some large capital, or materially diminish the effect of the labor of
+the inhabitants, or suddenly and violently shock the received opinion or
+popular prejudices of a large portion of the people; but that, on the
+whole, the communication between the two kingdoms should in spirit be
+free; that no jealousy should be attempted to be created between the
+manufacturers of one place or the other upon the subject of 'raw
+materials' or any other article; for it would surely be considered very
+narrow policy, and as such would be treated with derision, were an
+attempt made to create a jealousy between Devonshire and Cornwall,
+between Lancashire and Durham.... He said, then, that the principle of
+the Union on this head should be liberal and free, and that no departure
+from it should ever take place but upon some point of present
+unavoidable necessity." He was even able to add (and he must have felt
+peculiar satisfaction in making the statement, since the change in the
+feelings of the English manufacturers on the subject must have been
+mainly the fruit of his own teaching, and was a practical recognition of
+the benefits which they had derived from his commercial policy taken as
+a whole), that "the English manufacturers did not wish for any
+protective duties; all they desired was free intercourse with all the
+world; and, though the want of protective duties might occasion them
+partial loss, they thought it amply compensated by the general
+advantage." He even thought the arrangements now to be made "would
+encourage the growth of wool in Ireland, and that England would be able
+to draw supplies of it from thence; and he did not fear that there would
+be trade enough for both countries in the markets of the world, and in
+the market which each country would afford to the other." The English
+manufacturers did not, however, acquiesce very cheerfully in every part
+of his commercial arrangements. On the contrary, against the clause
+which repealed all prohibitions of or bounties on exportation of
+different articles grown or manufactured in either country, they
+petitioned, and even set up a claim, which was granted, to be heard by
+counsel and to produce witnesses. But Pitt steadily refused the least
+modification of this part of his measure, not merely on account of its
+intrinsic reasonableness and justice, but because there was scarcely any
+condition to which the Irish themselves attached greater importance.
+
+An equally important and more difficult matter to adjust to the
+satisfaction of both Parliaments was the apportionment of the financial
+burdens between the two nations. It would be tiresome as well as
+superfluous to enter into minute details; the more so as the arrangement
+proposed was of a temporary character. After a long and minute
+discussion, Pitt's appraisement was admitted to come as near to strict
+fairness and equity as any that could be made; the separate discharge of
+its public debt already incurred was left to each kingdom; and it was
+farther settled that for twenty years fifteen parts of the expense of
+the nation out of seventeen should be borne by Great Britain and two by
+Ireland.
+
+Other articles provided that the laws and courts of both kingdoms, civil
+and ecclesiastical, should remain in their existing condition, subject,
+of course, to such alterations as the united Legislature might hereafter
+deem desirable.
+
+The resolutions, when adopted--as they speedily were--were embodied in a
+bill, which passed through the last stage by receiving the royal assent
+at the beginning of July. The state of public feeling in Ireland was not
+yet sufficiently calmed down after the Rebellion for it to be prudent to
+venture on a general election, and it was, consequently, ordained that
+the members for the Irish counties and for those Irish boroughs which
+had been selected for the retention of representation should take their
+seats in the united Parliament on its next meeting. On the 22d of
+January, 1801, the united, or, to give it its more proper designation,
+the Imperial Parliament held its first meeting, being, although in its
+sixth session, so far regarded as a new Parliament, that the King
+directed a fresh election of a Speaker.
+
+The Union, as thus effected, was so far a vital change in the
+constitution of both Great Britain and Ireland, that it greatly altered
+the situation in which each kingdom had previously stood to the other.
+Till 1782 the position of Ireland toward England had been one of entire
+political subordination; and, though that had in appearance been
+modified by the repeal of Poynings' Act, yet no one doubted or could
+doubt that, whenever the resolutions of the two Parliaments came into
+conflict, the Irish Parliament would find submission unavoidable. But by
+the Union that subordination was terminated forever. The character of
+the Union--of the conditions, that is, on which the two countries were
+united--was one of perfect and complete equality on all important
+points, indeed, in all matters whatever, except one or two of minor
+consequence, where some irremovable difference between them compelled
+some trifling variations. It was not a connection of domination on the
+one side and subordination on the other, where every concomitant
+circumstance might tempt the one to overbearing arrogance, while the
+other could not escape a feeling of humiliation. It was rather--to quote
+the eloquent peroration of Pitt, when, in the preceding year, he first
+introduced the subject to the consideration of the House of Commons--"a
+free and voluntary association of two great countries, joining for their
+common benefit in one empire, where each retained its proportionate
+weight and importance, under the security of equal laws, reciprocal
+affection, and inseparable interests; and which wanted nothing but that
+indissoluble connection to render both invincible."
+
+On that occasion Pitt had argued, from the great subsequent increase in
+the population and wealth of Edinburgh and Glasgow, and in the
+prosperity of the whole country of Scotland, that a similar result might
+be looked for in Ireland. And the general trade of Ireland, and
+especially the linen manufacture, within a very few years began to
+realize his prediction. So that it is strange to find Fox, on the great
+minister's death, five years afterward, reiterating his disapproval of
+the Union as a plea for refusing him the appellation of a great
+statesman.[146] In one point alone the intrigues of a colleague
+prevented Pitt from carrying out to the full his liberal and enlightened
+views, and compelled him to leave the Union incomplete in a matter of
+such pre-eminent importance, that it may be said that all the subsequent
+disquietudes which have prevented Ireland from reaping the full benefit
+he desired from the Union are traceable to his disappointment on that
+subject.[147] We have seen that he contemplated, as a natural and
+necessary consequence or even part of the Union, an extensive reform of
+the laws affecting the Roman Catholics. Indeed, the understanding that
+he was prepared to introduce a measure with that object had no small
+weight in conciliating in some quarters support to the Act of Union.
+Accordingly, when describing the arrangements which he had in view for
+the Church of Ireland, he indicated his intention with sufficient
+plainness by the statement, that "it might be proper to leave to
+Parliament an opportunity of considering what might be fit to be done
+for his Majesty's Catholic subjects;" words which were generally
+understood to express his feeling, that both justice and policy required
+the removal of the restrictions which debarred the Roman Catholics from
+the complete enjoyment of political privileges. But the history and
+different bearings of that question it will be more convenient to
+discuss in a subsequent chapter, when we shall have arrived at the time
+when it was partially dealt with by the ministry of the Duke of
+Wellington.
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 125: Mr. Froude says four great families--the Fitzgeralds of
+Kildare, the Boyles, the Ponsonbys, and the Beresfords--returned a
+majority of the House of Commons ("English in Ireland," ii., 5); and
+besides those peers, the arrangement for the Union proved that the
+influence of the Loftuses and the Hills fell little short of them.]
+
+[Footnote 126: Such a system actually had existed in France, where
+articles of ordinary trade could not be transported from one province to
+another without payment of a heavy duty; but Colbert had abolished that
+system in France above one hundred years before the time of which we are
+speaking.]
+
+[Footnote 127: "History of England," vol. v., c. xxiii., p. 57.]
+
+[Footnote 128: "The English in Ireland," ii., 39.]
+
+[Footnote 129: Fronde's "English in Ireland," ii., 345. He does not name
+the author whom he quotes.]
+
+[Footnote 130: _Ibid_., ii, 42.]
+
+[Footnote 131: See p. 164.]
+
+[Footnote 132: Mr. Froude imputes to Grattan a singularly base object.
+"Far from Grattan was a desire to heal the real sores of the country for
+which he was so zealous. These wild, disordered elements suited better
+for the campaign in which he engaged of renovating an Irish
+nationality."--_English in Ireland_, ii., 448. But, however on many
+points we may see reason to agree with Mr. Froude's estimate of the
+superior wisdom of Fitzgibbon, we conceive that this opinion is quite
+consistent with our acquittal of the other of the meanness of
+deliberately aiming at a continuance of evils, in order to find in them
+food for a continuance of agitation.]
+
+[Footnote 133: Froude, "English in Ireland," i., 304.]
+
+[Footnote 134: See especially a letter of Mr. Windham's. quoted by Lord
+Stanhope ("Life of Pitt," ii., 288).]
+
+[Footnote 135: Mr. Archdall, in his place in Parliament, denounced the
+term as utterly inapplicable. "Emancipation meant that a slave was set
+free. The Catholics were not slaves. Nothing more absurd had ever been
+said since language was first abused for the delusion of mankind."]
+
+[Footnote 136: The first beginning of the insurrection was at
+Prosperous, County Kildare, May 24. General Lake dealt it the final blow
+on Vinegar Hill, June 21.]
+
+[Footnote 137: Mr. Sheridan, Mr. Tierney, and Lord William Russell led
+the denunciations of the government in the English House of Commons. A
+protest against Pitt's refusal to dismiss the Lord-lieutenant, Lord
+Camden, the Chancellor Fitzgibbon, and the Commander-in-chief, Lord
+Carhampton, was signed by the Dukes of Norfolk, Devonshire, and
+Leinster; Lords Fitzwilliam, Moira, and Ponsonby, "two of them Irish
+absentees, who were discharging thus their duties to the poor country
+which supported their idle magnificence."--_The English in Ireland_,
+iii., 454.]
+
+[Footnote 138: "Constitutional History," iii., 451 seq.]
+
+[Footnote 139: Massey's "History of England," iv., 397 (quoting the
+Cornwallis correspondence).]
+
+[Footnote 140: Lord Stanhope's "Reign of Queen Anne," p. 89.]
+
+[Footnote 141: In the House of Commons by 158 to 115; in the House of
+Lords, February 10, by 75 to 26.]
+
+[Footnote 142: An amendment pledging the House to maintain "an
+independent Legislature, as established in 1782," was only defeated by
+106 to 105.]
+
+[Footnote 143: In the House of Commons the majority was 158 to 115; in
+the House of Lords, 75 to 26.]
+
+[Footnote 144: This estimate, which was but a guess, proved very
+inaccurate. The first census for the United Kingdom, which was taken the
+next year (1801), showed that Ireland was considerably more populous
+than its own representatives had imagined. The numbers returned (as
+given by Alison, "History of Europe," ii., 335, c. ix., sec. 8) were:
+
+  England..................................... 8,382,484
+  Wales.......................................   547,346
+  Scotland.................................... 1,599,068
+  Army, Navy, etc.............................   470,586
+                                              ----------
+      Total...................................10,999,434
+  Ireland..................................... 5,396,436
+
+So that the proportion of population in Great Britain, as compared with
+that of Ireland, only exceeded two to one by an insignificant fraction.]
+
+[Footnote 145: See his letter to the King, dated January 31, 1801,
+quoted by Lord Stanhope in the appendix to vol. iii. of his "Life of
+Pitt," p. 25.]
+
+[Footnote 146: Mr. Fox, called on by Mr. Alexander to explain his
+expressions (in the debate relative to Mr. Pitt's funeral), by which he
+had declared his disapprobation of the Union, and his concurrence in
+opinion with Mr. O'Hara that it ought to be rescinded. Mr. Fox repeated
+his disapprobation, but disclaimed ever having expressed an opinion or
+entertained a thought of proposing its repeal, that being now
+impracticable, though he regretted its ever having been
+effected.--_Diary of Lord Colchester_, February 17, 1806, ii., 39.]
+
+[Footnote 147: It may be remarked that in another respect also political
+critics have pronounced the Union defective. Archbishop Whately, whose
+long tenure of office in Ireland, as well as the acuteness and candor
+which he brought to bear on every subject he discussed, entitle his
+opinions to most respectful consideration, held this view very strongly.
+In several conversations which he held with Mr. W.N. Senior, in 1858 and
+1862, he condemned the retention of the Lord-lieutenancy as "a half
+measure," which, however unavoidable at the time when "no ship could be
+certain of getting from Holyhead to Dublin in less than three weeks," he
+pronounced "inconsistent with the fusion of the two peoples, which was
+the object of the Union," and wholly indefeasible "in an age of
+steam-vessels and telegraphs." And, besides its theoretical
+inconsistency, he insisted that it produced many great and practical
+mischiefs, among which he placed in the front "the keeping up in
+people's minds the notion of a separate kingdom; the affording a hotbed
+of faction and intrigue; the presenting an image of Majesty so faint and
+so feeble as to be laughed at and scorned. Disaffection to the English
+Lieutenancy is cheaply shown, and it paves the way toward disaffection
+to the English crown." And he imputed its continued retention to "the
+ignorance which prevails in England of the state of feeling in
+Ireland."--_Journals and Conversations Relating to Ireland_, by W.N.
+Senior, ii., 130, 251, and _passim_. And it is worthy of observation
+that a similar view is expressed by a Scotch writer of great ability,
+who, contrasting the mode in which Scotland is governed with that which
+prevails In Ireland, farther denounces the Viceroyalty "as a distinct
+mark that Ireland is not directly under the sovereignty of Great
+Britain, but rather a dependency, like India or the Isle of
+Man."--_Ireland_, by J.B. Kinnear, quoted in the _Fortnightly Review_,
+April 1, 1881. It is remarkable that in 1850 a bill for the abolition of
+the office was passed in the House of Commons by a large majority (295
+to 70), but was dropped in the House of Lords, chiefly on account of the
+opposition of the Duke of Wellington. But it is, at all events, plain
+that the reasons, arising from the difficulty and uncertainty of
+communication, which made its abolition impossible at the beginning of
+the century, have passed away with the introduction of steam-vessels and
+telegraphs. Communication of London with Dublin is now as rapid as
+communication with Edinburgh, and, that being the case, it is not easy
+to see how an establishment which has never been thought of for Scotland
+can be desirable for Ireland.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+
+A Census is Ordered.--Dissolution of Pitt's Administration.--Impeachment
+of Lord Melville.--Introduction of Lord Ellenborough into the
+Cabinet.--Abolition of the Slave-trade.--Mr. Windham's Compulsory
+Training Bill.--Illness of the King, and Regency.--Recurrence to the
+Precedent of 1788-'89.--Death of Mr. Perceval.--Lord Liverpool becomes
+Prime-minister.--Question of Appointments in the Household.--Appointment
+of a Prime-minister.
+
+
+The Union with Ireland was the last great work of Pitt's first
+administration, and a noble close to the legislation of the eighteenth
+century. But the last months of the year were also signalized by another
+enactment, which, though it cannot be said to have anything of a
+character strictly entitled to the name of constitutional, nevertheless
+established a practice so valuable as the foundation of a great part of
+our domestic legislation, that it will, perhaps, hardly be considered
+foreign to the scope and purpose of this volume to record its
+commencement. In November, 1800, Mr. Abbott, the member for Helstone,
+brought in a bill to take a census of the people of the United Kingdom,
+pointing out not only the general importance of a knowledge of the
+population of a country in its entire amount and its different classes
+to every government, but also its special bearing on agriculture and on
+the means requisite to provide subsistence for the people, on trade and
+manufactures, and on our resources for war. Such a census as he proposed
+had been more than once taken in Holland, Sweden, Spain, and even in the
+United States, young as was their separate national existence; it had
+been taken once--nearly fifty years previous--in Scotland; and something
+like one had been furnished in England in the reign of Edward III. by a
+subsidy roll, and in that of Elizabeth by diocesan returns furnished by
+the Bishops to the Privy Council.[148] He farther argued for the
+necessity of such a proceeding from the different notions entertained by
+men of sanguine or desponding tempers as to the increase or diminution
+of the population. "Some desponding men had asserted that the population
+had decreased by a million and a half between the Revolution and Peace
+of Paris, in 1763; others (of whom the speaker himself was one) believed
+that, on the contrary, it had increased in that interval by two
+millions." His motion was unanimously adopted by both Houses; and when
+the census was taken, its real result furnished as strong a proof of its
+usefulness as any of the mover's arguments, by the extent of the
+prevailing miscalculations which it detected. For Mr. Abbott, who had
+spared no pains to arrive at a correct estimate, while he mentioned that
+some persons reckoned the population of England and Wales at 8,000,000,
+pronounced that, according to other statements, formed on a more
+extensive investigation, and, as it seemed to him, on a more correct
+train of reasoning, the total number could not be less than 11,000,000.
+In point of fact, excluding those employed in the army and navy, who
+were nearly half a million, the number for England and Wales fell short
+of nine millions.[149] It would be quite superfluous to dilate on the
+value of the information thus supplied, without which, indeed, much of
+our subsequent legislation on poor-laws, corn-laws, and all matters
+relating to rating and taxation, would have been impracticable or the
+merest guesswork.
+
+As was mentioned in the preceding chapter, Pitt found himself unable to
+fulfil the hopes which, in his negotiations with different parties in
+Ireland, he had led the Roman Catholics to entertain of the removal of
+their civil and political disabilities. So rigorous were those
+restrictions, both in England and Ireland, that a Roman Catholic could
+not serve even as a private in the militia; and a motion made in 1797 by
+Mr. Wilberforce--a man who could certainly not be suspected of any
+leaning to Roman Catholic doctrine--to render them admissible to that
+service, though it was adopted in the House of Commons, was rejected by
+the House of Lords. But Pitt, who on that occasion had supported
+Wilberforce, did not confine his views to the removal of a single petty
+disability, but proposed to put the whole body of Roman Catholics on a
+footing of perfect equality with Protestants in respect of their
+eligibility to every kind of office, with one or two exceptions. And
+during the autumn of 1800 he was busily engaged in framing the details
+of his measure, in order to submit it to his royal master in its
+entirety, and so to avoid disquieting him with a repetition of
+discussions on the subject, which he knew to be distasteful to him. For,
+five years before, George III. had consulted the Chief-justice, Lord
+Kenyon, and the Attorney-general, Sir John Scott (afterward Lord Eldon),
+on the question whether some proposed concessions to Dissenters,
+Protestant as well as Roman Catholic, did not "militate against the
+coronation oath and many existing statutes;" and had received their
+legal opinion that the tests enacted in the reign of Charles II.,
+"though wise laws, and in policy not to be departed from, might be
+repealed or altered without any breach of the coronation oath or Act of
+Union" (with Scotland).[150] Their opinions on the point were the more
+valuable, since they were notoriously opposed to their political
+convictions, and might be supposed to have carried sufficient conviction
+to the royal mind. But his Majesty's scruples were now, unfortunately,
+revived by the Lord Chancellor, who, strange to say, was himself a
+Presbyterian; and who treacherously availed himself of his knowledge of
+what was in contemplation to anticipate the Prime-minister's intended
+explanations to the King. He fully succeeded in his object of fixing the
+King's resolution to refuse his assent to the contemplated concessions
+(which, by a curious confusion of ideas, his Majesty even characterized
+as "Jacobinical"[151]), though not in the object which he had still more
+at heart, of inducing the King to regard him as the statesman in the
+whole kingdom the most deserving of his confidence. The merits of the
+question will be more appropriately examined hereafter. It is sufficient
+to say here that Pitt, conceiving himself bound by personal honor as
+well as by statesman-like duty to persevere in his intended measure, or
+to retire from an office which no man is justified in holding unless he
+can discharge its functions in accordance with his own judgment of what
+is required by the best interests of the state, resigned his post, and
+was succeeded by Mr. Addington.
+
+Addington's ministry was made memorable by the formation of the Northern
+Confederacy against us, and its immediate and total overthrow by
+Nelson's cannon; and for the Peace of Amiens, severely criticised in
+Parliament, as that of Utrecht and every subsequent treaty with a
+similar object had been, but defensible both on grounds of domestic
+policy, as well as on that of affording us a much-needed respite from
+the strain of war; though it proved to be only a respite, and a feverish
+one, since at the end of two years the war was renewed, to be waged with
+greater fury than ever. But it was too short-lived for any
+constitutional questions to arise in it. And when, in 1804, Pitt resumed
+the government, his attention was too completely engrossed by the
+diplomatic arrangements by which he hoped to unite all the nations east
+of the Rhine in resistance to a power whose ever aggressive ambition was
+a standing menace to every Continental kingdom, for him to be able to
+spare time for the consideration of measures of domestic policy, except
+such as were of a financial character. But, though his premature death
+rendered his second administration shorter than even Addington's, it was
+not wholly unproductive of questions of constitutional interest. It
+witnessed a recurrence to that which cannot but be regarded as among the
+most important privileges of the House of Commons, the right of
+impeaching a minister for maladministration. A report of a commission
+appointed for the investigation of the naval affairs of the kingdom had
+revealed to Parliament a gross misapplication of the public money
+committed by the Paymaster of the Navy. And, as that officer could not
+have offended as he had done without either gross carelessness or
+culpable connivance on the part of the Treasurer of the Navy, Lord
+Melville, who had since been promoted to the post of First Lord of the
+Admiralty, the House of Commons ordered his impeachment at the Bar of
+the House of Lords; the vote being passed in 1805, during Pitt's
+administration, though the trial did not take place till the year
+following. In reality, the charge did not impugn Lord Melville's
+personal honor, on which at first sight it appeared to press hardly, Mr.
+Whitbread himself, the member for Bedford, who was the chief promoter
+and manager of the impeachment, admitting that he never imputed to Lord
+Melville "any participation in the plunder of the public;" and, as Lord
+Melville was acquitted on every one of the charges brought against him,
+the case might have been passed over here with the barest mention of it,
+were it not that Lord Campbell has pointed out the mode of procedure as
+differing from that adopted in the great trial of Warren Hastings,
+twenty years before; and, by reason of that difference, forming a model
+for future proceedings of the same kind, if, unhappily, there should
+ever be occasion given for a similar prosecution. The credit of the
+difference Lord Campbell gives to the Chancellor, Lord Erskine, who,
+"instead of allowing the House of Lords to sit to hear the case a few
+days in a year, and, when sitting, being converted from a court of
+justice into a theatre for rhetorical display, insisted that it should
+sit, like every other criminal tribunal, _de die in diem_, till the
+verdict was delivered. And he enforced both upon the managers of the
+House of Commons and on the counsel for the defendant the wholesome
+rules of procedure established for the detection of crime and the
+protection of innocence."[152] It is well known that on the trial of
+Hastings the managers of that impeachment, and most especially Burke,
+claimed a right of giving evidence such as no court of law would have
+admitted, and set up what they entitled "a usage of Parliament
+independent of and contradistinguished from the common law."[153] But on
+that occasion Lord Thurlow, then Chancellor, utterly denied the
+existence of any such usage--a usage which, "in times of barbarism, when
+to impeach a man was to ruin him by the strong hand of power, was quoted
+in order to justify the most arbitrary proceedings." He instanced the
+trial of Lord Stafford, as one which "was from beginning to end marked
+by violence and injustice," and expressed a "hope that in these
+enlightened days no man would be tried but by the law of the land." We
+may fairly agree with Lord Campbell, that it is to be hoped that the
+course adopted by Lord Erskine in this case has settled the principle
+and mode of procedure for all future time; since certainly the
+importance of an impeachment, both as to the state interests involved in
+it, and the high position and authority of the defendant, ought to be
+considered as reasons for adhering with the greatest closeness to the
+strict rules of law, rather than for relaxing them in any particular.
+
+But, as was natural, the public could spare little attention for
+anything except the war, and the arrangements made by the minister for
+engaging in it with effect; the interest which such a state of things
+always kindles being in this instance greatly inflamed by Napoleon's
+avowal of a design to invade the kingdom, though it is now known that
+the preparations of which he made such a parade were merely a feint to
+throw Austria off her guard.[154] During Addington's administration Pitt
+had spoken warmly in favor of giving every possible encouragement to the
+Volunteer movement, and also in support of a proposal made by an
+independent member, Colonel Crawford, to fortify London; and one of his
+first measures after his resumption of office was a measure, known as
+the Additional Force Bill, to transfer a large portion of the militia to
+the regular army. It was so purely a measure of detail, that it would
+hardly have been necessary to mention it, had it not been for an
+objection made to it by the Prime-minister's former colleague, Lord
+Grenville, and for the reply with which that objection was encountered
+by the Chief-justice, Lord Ellenborough; the former denouncing it as
+unconstitutional, since, he declared, it tended to establish a large
+standing army in time of peace; and Lord Ellenborough, on the other
+hand, declaring the right of the crown to call out the whole population
+in arms for the defence of the realm to be so "radical, essential, and
+hitherto never questioned part of the royal prerogative, that, even in
+such an age of adventurous propositions, he had not expected that any
+lord would have ventured to question it."[155]
+
+Pitt died in the beginning of 1806, and was succeeded by an
+administration of which his great rival, Fox, was the guiding spirit
+while he lived, though Lord Grenville was First Lord of the Treasury,
+and, after Fox's death, which took place in September, the undisputed
+Prime-minister. But the formation of the administration was not
+completed without a step which was at once strongly denounced, not only
+by the regular Opposition, but by several members of political
+moderation, as a violation, if not of the letter, at least of the
+spirit, of the constitution, the introduction of the Lord Chief-justice,
+Lord Ellenborough, into the cabinet. It was notorious that he was
+invited to a seat among that body as the representative of a small
+party, the personal friends of Lord Sidmouth. For the ministry was
+formed in some degree on the principle of a coalition; Lord Grenville
+himself having been a colleague of Pitt throughout the greater part of
+that statesman's first ministry, and as such having been always opposed
+to Fox; while Lord Ellenborough had been Attorney-general in Addington's
+administration, which avowedly only differed from Pitt on the single
+subject of the Catholic question.
+
+The appointment was at once made the subject of motions in both Houses
+of Parliament. In the House of Lords, Lord Bristol, who brought the
+question forward, denounced "this identification of a judge with the
+executive government as injurious to the judicial character, subversive
+of the liberty of the people, and having a direct and alarming tendency
+to blend and amalgamate those great elementary principles of political
+power which it is the very object of a free constitution to keep
+separate and distinct." In the House of Commons, Mr. Canning took a
+similar objection; and, though he admitted that a precedent for the act
+might be found in the case of Lord Mansfield who, while Chief-justice,
+had also been a cabinet minister in the administration of 1757, he
+argued forcibly that that precedent turned against the ministry and the
+present appointment, because Lord Mansfield himself had subsequently
+admitted that "he had infringed the principles of the constitution by
+acting as a cabinet minister and Chief-justice at the same time." Fox,
+in reply, relied principally on two arguments. The first was, that "he
+had never heard of such a thing as the cabinet council becoming the
+subject of a debate in that House. He had never known of the exercise of
+the King's prerogative in the appointment of his ministers being brought
+into question on such grounds as had now been alleged." The second, that
+"in point of fact there is nothing in the constitution that recognizes
+any such institution as a cabinet council; that it is a body unknown to
+the law, and one which has in no instance whatever been recognized by
+Parliament." He farther urged that as Lord Ellenborough was a privy
+councillor, and as the cabinet is only a select committee of the Privy
+Council, he was, "in fact, as liable to be summoned to attend the
+cabinet, as a privy councillor, as he was in his present situation."
+
+The last argument was beneath the speaker to use, since not one of his
+hearers was ignorant that no member of the Privy Council unconnected
+with the government ever is summoned to the deliberations of the
+cabinet; and though, as he correctly stated, "there is no legal record
+of the members comprising any cabinet," it may safely be affirmed that
+since July, 1714, when the Duke of Argyll and the Duke of Somerset
+claimed admission to the deliberations of the ministers, on account of
+the danger in which the Queen lay, though they admitted that they had
+received no summons to attend,[156] there has been no instance of any
+privy councillor attending without a summons; nor, except at the
+accession of a new sovereign, of summonses being sent to any members of
+the council except the actual ministers. The second argument was even
+worse, as being still more sophistical. It might be true that no law nor
+statute recognized the cabinet as a body distinct from the Privy
+Council, but it was at least equally true that there was no one who was
+ignorant of the distinction; that it was, in truth, one without which it
+would be difficult to understand the organization or working of any
+ministry. The indispensable function and privilege of a ministry is, to
+deliberate in concert and in private on the measures to be taken for the
+welfare of the state; but there could be little chance of concert, and
+certainly none of privacy, if every one who has ever been sworn a member
+of the Privy Council had a right to attend all its deliberations. Again,
+to say that the King's prerogative, as exercised in the choice of his
+advisers, is a thing so sacred that no abuse of it, or want of judgment
+shown in its exercise, can warrant a complaint, is inconsistent with
+every principle of constitutional government, and with every conceivable
+idea of the privileges of Parliament. In fact, Parliament has claimed a
+right to interfere in matters apparently touching more nearly the royal
+prerogative, and it is only in the reign preceding the present reign
+that hostile comments have been made in Parliament on the appointment of
+a particular person as ambassador to a foreign power. Yet the post of
+ambassador is one which might have been supposed to have been farther
+removed from the supervision of Parliament than that of a minister, an
+ambassador being in a special degree the personal representative of the
+sovereign, and the sovereign therefore, having, it might be supposed, a
+right to a most unfettered choice in such a matter.
+
+Stripped of all technicalities, and even of all reference to the
+manifest possibility of such a circumstance arising as that the
+Chief-justice, if a member of a cabinet, may have a share in ordering
+the institution of a prosecution which, as a judge, it may be his lot to
+try, one consideration which is undeniable is, that a member of a
+cabinet is of necessity, and by the very nature of his position in it, a
+party man, and that it is of preeminent importance to the impartiality
+of the judicial bench, and to the confidence of the people in the
+purity, integrity, and freedom from political bias of their decisions,
+that the judges should be exempt from all suspicion of party connection.
+Lord Campbell even goes the length of saying, what was not urged on
+either side of either House in these debates, that it was alleged by at
+least one contemporary writer that Lord Mansfield's position in the
+cabinet did perceptibly influence some of his views and measures
+respecting the Press;[157] and, though in both Houses the ministry had a
+majority on the question of the propriety of the appointment, he records
+his own opinion[158] that "the argument was all on the losing side;" and
+that Mr. Fox showed his consciousness that it was so by his "concession
+that the Chief-justice should absent himself from the cabinet when the
+expediency of commencing prosecutions for treason or sedition was to be
+discussed." He adds, also, that "it is said that Lord Ellenborough
+himself ere long changed his opinion, and, to his intimate friends,
+expressed deep regret that he had ever been prevailed upon to enter the
+cabinet."
+
+But, if the composition of the cabinet of 1806 has in this respect been
+generally condemned, on the other hand the annals of that ministry,
+short-lived as it was, are marked by the enactment of one great measure
+which has been stamped with universal approbation. It may, perhaps, be
+said that the existence, promotion, discouragement, or suppression of a
+branch of trade has no title to be regarded as a constitutional
+question. But the course which the British Parliament, after a long
+period of hesitation, has adopted respecting, not only the slave-trade,
+but the employment of slave-labor in any part of the British dominions,
+is so intimately connected with the great constitutional principle, that
+every man, whatever be his race or nation or previous condition, whose
+foot is once planted on British soil, is free from that moment, that it
+cannot be accounted a digression to mention the subject here. To our
+statesmen of Queen Anne's time traffic in slaves was so far from being
+considered discreditable, that the ministry of that reign prided
+themselves greatly on what was called the Assiento Treaty with Spain, by
+which they secured for the British merchants and ship-owners the
+privilege of supplying the West India Islands with several thousand
+slaves a year. In 1748 the ministers of George II were equally jealous
+of the credit of renewing it. It had even on one occasion been decided
+in the Court of Common Pleas that an action of trover could be
+maintained for a negro, "because negroes are heathens;" though
+Chief-justice Holt scouted the idea of being bound by a precedent which
+would put "a human being on the same footing as an ox or an ass," and
+declared that "in England there was no such thing as a slave."
+Subsequent decisions, however, of two Lord Chancellors--Lord Talbot and
+Lord Hardwicke--were not wholly consistent with the doctrine thus laid
+down by Holt; and the question could not be regarded as finally settled
+till 1772, when a slave named Somersett was brought over to England from
+Jamaica by his master, and on his arrival in the Thames claimed his
+freedom, and under a writ of _habeas corpus_ had his claim allowed by
+Lord Mansfield. The master's counsel contended that slavery was not a
+condition unsanctioned by English law, for villeinage was slavery, and
+no statute had ever abolished villeinage. But the Chief-justice, in the
+first place, denied that villeinage had ever been slavery such as
+existed in the West Indies; and, in the second place, he pronounced
+that, whether it had been or not, it had, at all events, long ceased in
+England, and could not be revived. "The air of England has long been too
+pure for a slave, and every man is free who breathes it. Every man who
+comes into England is entitled to the protection of English law."[159]
+But this freedom was as yet held to be only co-extensive with these
+islands. And for sixty years more our West India Islands continued to be
+cultivated by the labor of slaves, some of whom were the offspring of
+slaves previously employed, though by far the greater part were imported
+yearly from the western coast of Africa. The supply from that country
+seemed inexhaustible. The native chiefs in time of war gladly sold their
+prisoners to the captains of British vessels; in time of peace they sold
+them their own subjects; and, if at any time these modes of obtaining
+slaves slackened, the captains would land at night, and, attacking the
+villages on the coast sweep off the inhabitants on board their ships,
+and at once set sail with their booty. The sufferings of these unhappy
+captives in what was called the "middle passage"--the passage between
+their native land and the West India Islands--were for a long time
+unknown or disregarded, till, early in Pitt's first ministry, they
+attracted the notice of some of our naval officers who were stationed in
+the West Indies, and who, on their return to England, related the
+horrors which they had witnessed or heard of--how, between decks too low
+to admit of a full-grown man standing upright, the wretched victims,
+chained to the sides of the ships, lay squeezed together in such
+numbers, though the whole voyage was within the tropics, that, from the
+overpowering heat and scantiness of food, it was estimated that
+two-thirds of each cargo died on the passage. Most fortunately for the
+credit of England, the fearful trade was brought under the notice of a
+young member of Parliament singularly zealous in the cause of humanity
+and religion, endowed with untiring industry and powerful eloquence, and
+connected by the closest ties of personal intimacy with Mr. Pitt. To
+hear of such a system of organized murder, as the British officers
+described the slave-trade to be, was quite sufficient to induce Mr.
+Wilberforce to resolve to devote himself to its suppression. He laid the
+case in all its horrors before his friend the Prime-minister, a man as
+ready as himself to grapple with and extinguish all proved abuses; and
+Pitt at once promised him all the support which he could give. It was no
+easy task that he had taken on himself. A year or two before, Burke had
+applied himself to frame some regulations which he hoped might gradually
+remove the evil; but, little as he was moved by considerations of
+popularity or daunted by difficulty, he had abandoned the attempt, as
+one which would meet with a resistance too powerful to be overcome.
+Wilberforce was not a bolder man than Burke, but he had no other object
+to divide his attention, and, therefore, to this one he devoted all his
+faculties and energies, enlisting supporters in every quarter, seeking
+even the co-operation of the French government, and opening a
+correspondence with the French Secretary of State, M. Montmorin, a
+statesman of great capacity, and, what was far rarer in France, of
+incorruptible honesty. M. Montmorin, however, though alive to the
+cruelty of the traffic, was unable to promise him any aid, alleging the
+fears of the French planters that its abolition "would ruin the French
+islands. He said that it was one of those subjects upon which the
+interests of men and their sentiments were so much at variance, that it
+was difficult to learn what was practicable."[160]
+
+Wilberforce had already found that the English merchants were still less
+manageable. Pitt had entered so fully into his views, that in 1788 he
+himself moved and carried a resolution pledging the House of Commons to
+take the slave-trade into consideration in the next session. And another
+friend of the cause, Sir W. Dobben, brought in a bill to diminish the
+horrors of the middle passage by proportioning the number of slaves who
+might be conveyed in one ship to the tonnage of the vessel. But those
+concerned in the West India trade rose up in arms against even so
+moderate a measure, and one so clearly demanded by the most ordinary
+humanity as this. The Liverpool merchants declared that the absence of
+restrictions on the slave-trade had been the chief cause of the
+prosperity and opulence of their town, and obtained leave to be heard by
+counsel against the bill. But Fox united with Pitt on this subject, and
+the bill was carried. But this was all the practical success which the
+efforts of the "Abolitionists," as they began to be called, achieved for
+many years. And even that was not won without extreme difficulty; Lord
+Chancellor Thurlow opposing it with great vehemence in the House of
+Lords, as the fruit of a "five days' fit of philanthropy which had just
+sprung up," and pointing to the conduct of the French government, which,
+as he asserted, had offered premiums to encourage the trade, as an
+example that we should do well to follow. It was even said that he had
+contrived to incline the King himself to the same view; to have
+persuaded him that the trade was indispensable to the prosperity of our
+manufacturers, and, in the Chancellor's words, "that it was his royal
+duty to show some humanity to the whites as well as to the negroes." And
+more than once, when bills to limit or wholly suppress the trade had
+been passed by the Commons, the same mischievous influence defeated them
+in the Lords. The last years of Pitt's first administration were too
+fully occupied with the affairs of Ireland, negotiations with foreign
+powers, and the great war with France, to enable him to keep pace with
+his friend's zeal on the subject. But in his second administration,
+occupied though he was with a recurrence of the same causes, he found
+time to prepare and issue an Order in Council prohibiting the
+importation of slaves into our fresh colonial acquisitions, and the
+employment of British ships to supply the Dutch, French, and Spanish
+islands.
+
+And this Order in Council paved the way for the total abolition. One of
+the earliest proceedings of the new ministry was the introduction by the
+Attorney-general, Sir Arthur Pigott, of a bill to extend and make it
+perpetual; to forbid "the importation of African negroes by British
+ships into the colonies conquered by or ceded to us in war; or into the
+colonies of any neutral state in the West Indies. For at present every
+state that had colonies in America or the West Indies, and that was not
+actually at war with us, availed itself of the opportunity of British
+shipping to carry on the trade." It was resisted as vehemently as any
+former measure with the same object, and partly on the new ground that
+it would in no degree stop the trade or diminish the sufferings of the
+Africans, but would merely rob our ship-owners of their profits to
+enrich the Americans. Mr. Rose, the member for Christchurch, who
+advanced this argument, had been a friend of Pitt; yet, though he quoted
+an instance of a single vessel having buried one hundred and fifty-two
+slaves on one voyage, he was not ashamed to deprecate the bill, on the
+plea that "the manufacturers of Manchester, Stockport, and Paisley would
+be going about naked and starving, and thus, by attending to a supposed
+claim for relief from a distant quarter, we should give existence to
+much more severe distress at home." The bill, however, was carried in
+both Houses, and received the royal assent. And Fox, who supported it
+warmly in his speech on the third reading (one of the last speeches
+which he ever addressed to the House), invited Wilberforce to regard it
+as a stepping-stone to the total abolition of the trade, and as an
+encouragement to renew his motion for that object; and, though he could
+not promise him the support of the government as a government, he "could
+answer for himself and many of his friends who held the highest and most
+dignified stations in the other House of Parliament. They still felt the
+question of the total abolition as one involving the dearest interests
+of humanity, and as one which, should they be successful in effecting
+it, would entail more true glory upon their administration, and more
+honor upon their country, than any other transaction in which they could
+be engaged."
+
+Mr. Fox did not live to see the opening of another session; but, when
+that time came, the position which he had taken up, that the measure of
+which he had thus promoted the passing was an encouragement to do more,
+was adopted to its full extent by the chief of his colleagues, Lord
+Grenville, who, in February, 1807, himself brought forward a motion for
+the entire abolition of the trade. Though he was Prime-minister, he
+could not introduce it as a government measure, since two of his
+colleagues--Lord Sidmouth, the President of the Council, and Mr.
+Windham, the Secretary of State for the Colonies--opposed it; though the
+former professed a desire to see the trade abolished, but would have
+preferred to attain that end by imposing such a tax on every slave
+imported as should render the trade unprofitable. He had another
+obstacle also to encounter, in the vehement opposition of some of the
+princes of the royal family, the Dukes of Clarence and Sussex more
+especially, who were known to be canvassing against the bill, and were
+generally understood, in so doing, to be acting in accordance with the
+views of their elder brothers. But he was confident that by this time
+the feeling of the whole country was with him on the subject. He was
+resolved to rest his case on its justice, and therefore consented that
+the House should hear counsel on the subject, though he resisted their
+demand to be allowed to call witnesses. Accordingly, counsel were heard
+for the whole body of West India planters, and for those of one or two
+separate islands, such as Jamaica and Trinidad; for the Liverpool
+merchants, and even for the trustees of the Liverpool Docks. But some of
+their reasonings he even turned against themselves, refusing for a
+moment to admit "that the profits obtained by robbery could be urged as
+an argument for the continuance of robbery." He denounced the trade as
+"the most criminal that any country could be engaged in," and as one
+that led to other crimes in the treatment of the slaves after they
+reached the West Indies. He instanced "three most horrible and dreadful
+murders of slaves" that had been committed in Barbadoes, and quoted the
+report of Lord Seaforth, governor of the island, who, on investigation,
+had found that by the law of the colony the punishment affixed to such
+murders was a fine of eleven pounds. He was opposed by the Duke of
+Clarence, who directed his remarks chiefly to a defence of the general
+humanity of the planters; and by Lord Westmoreland, who, in a speech of
+singular intemperance, denounced the principle of the measure, as one
+after the passing of which "no property could be rendered safe which
+could fall within the power of the Legislature." He even made it an
+argument against the bill that its principle, if carried to its
+legitimate logical end, must tend to the abolition of slavery as well as
+of the slave-trade. He objected especially to the assertion in the
+preamble that the trade was "contrary to justice and humanity,"
+declaring that those words were only inserted in the hope that by them
+"foreign powers might be humbugged into a concurrence with the
+abolition," and wound up his harangue by a declaration that, though he
+should "see the Presbyterian and the prelate, the Methodist and
+pew-preacher, the Jacobin and the murderer, unite in support of it, he
+would still raise his voice against it." It must have been more painful
+to the minister to be opposed by so distinguished an officer as Lord St.
+Vincent, who resisted the bill chiefly on the ground that "its effect
+would be to transfer British capital to other countries, which would not
+be disposed to abandon so productive a trade," and declared that he
+could only account for Lord Grenville's advocacy of it "by supposing
+that some Obi man had cast his spell upon him." But the case was too
+strong for any arguments to prevail which were based solely on the
+profits of a trade which no one pretended to justify. The bill passed
+the Lords by a majority of nearly three to one; in the House of Commons,
+where the opposition was much feebler, by one infinitely larger;[161]
+and, by a somewhat remarkable coincidence, it received the royal assent
+on the same day on which Lord Grenville announced to his brother peers
+that his administration was at an end.
+
+Even before the abolition had thus become law, the member for
+Northumberland, Earl Percy, endeavored to give practical effect to Lord
+Westmoreland's view, that emancipation of the slaves was its inevitable
+corollary, by moving for leave to bring in a bill for the gradual
+abolition of slavery in the British settlements of the West Indies. But
+he was opposed by Lord Howick,[162] though he had been among the earnest
+advocates of abolition, partly for the sake of the negroes themselves,
+and partly on the ground that the Legislature had no "right to interfere
+with the property of the colonists;" little foreseeing that the measure
+which he now opposed was reserved for his own administration, and that
+its accomplishment would be one of its chief titles to the respectful
+recollection of posterity. And, as the House was presently counted out,
+the discussion would not have been worth recording, were it not for the
+opportunity which it gave of displaying the practical and moderate
+wisdom of Wilberforce himself, who joined in the opposition to Lord
+Percy's motion. "The enemies of abolition had," he said, "always
+confounded abolition with emancipation. He and his friends had always
+distinguished between them; and not only abstained from proposing
+emancipation, but were ready to reject it when proposed by others. How
+much soever he looked forward with anxious expectation to the period
+when the negroes might with safety be liberated, he knew too well the
+effect which the long continuance of abject slavery produced upon the
+human mind to think of their immediate emancipation, a measure which at
+the present moment would be injurious both to them and to the colonies.
+He and those who acted with him were satisfied with having gained an
+object which was safely attainable."
+
+And they had reason to be satisfied. For the good work thus done was not
+limited by the extent of the British dominions, vast as they are. The
+example of the homage thus paid by the Parliament and the nation to
+justice and humanity was contagious; the principle on which the bill was
+founded and was carried being such that, for mere shame, foreign
+countries could hardly persist in maintaining a traffic which those who
+had derived the greatest profit from it had on such grounds renounced;
+though our ministers did not trust to their spontaneous sympathies, but
+made the abolition of the traffic by our various allies, or those who
+wished to become so, a constant object of diplomatic negotiations, even
+purchasing the co-operation of some by important concessions, in one
+instance by the payment of a large sum of money. The conferences and
+congresses which took place on the re-establishment of peace gave them
+great facilities for pressing their views on the different governments.
+And Lord Liverpool's instructions to Lord Castlereagh and the Duke of
+Wellington, as plenipotentiaries of our government,[163] show the keen
+interest which he took in the matter, and the skilful manner in which he
+sought to avail himself of the predominant influence which the exertions
+and triumphs of this country had given her with every foreign cabinet.
+Though Portugal was an ally to whom we regarded ourselves as bound by
+special ties, as well as by the great benefits we had conferred on her,
+yet, as she clung with the greatest pertinacity to the trade, he did not
+scruple to endeavor to put a constraint upon her which should compel her
+submission, and instructed Lord Castlereagh "to induce the Congress to
+take the best means in their power to enforce it by the adoption of a
+law, on the part of the several states, to exclude the colonial produce
+of those countries who should refuse to comply with this system of
+abolition."
+
+And exertions so resolutely put forward were so successful, that the
+trade was avowedly proscribed by every European nation, though
+unquestionably it was still carried on by stealth by merchants and
+ship-owners of more than one country--not, if the suspicions of our
+statesmen were well founded, without some connivance on the part of
+their governments. Nor were our efforts in the cause the fitful display
+of impulsive excitement. We have continued them and widened their sphere
+as occasions have presented themselves, exerting a successful influence
+even over unchristian and semi-civilized governments, of which an
+instance has very recently been furnished, in the assurances given by
+the Khedive of Egypt to our minister residing at his court, that he is
+taking vigorous measures to suppress the slave-trade, which is still
+carried on in the interior of Africa; and that we may believe his
+promise that he will not relax his exertions till it is extinguished, at
+least in the region on the north of the equator.
+
+Individuals, as a rule, are slow to take warning from the experience of
+others; slower, perhaps, to follow their example in well-doing. Nations
+are slower still. When such an example is followed, still more when it
+is adopted by a general imitation, it will usually be found not only
+that the good is of a very unusual standard of excellence, but that he
+or they who have set the example are endowed with a force of character
+that predisposes others to submit to their influence. And credit of this
+kind England may fairly claim for the general abolition of the
+slave-trade; for the condemnation and abolition of the slave-trade had
+this distinguishing feature, that the idea of such a policy was of
+exclusively British origin. No nation had ever before conceived the
+notion that to make a man a slave was a crime. On the contrary, there
+were not wanting those who, from the recognition of such a condition in
+the Bible, argued that it was a divine institution. And they who
+denounced it, and labored for its suppression, had not only inveterate
+prejudice and long custom to contend with, but found arrayed against
+them many of the strongest passions that animate mankind. The natural
+desire for gain united merchants, ship-owners, and planters in unanimous
+resistance to a measure calculated to cut off from them one large source
+of profit. Patriotism, which, however misguided, was sincere and free
+from all taint of personal covetousness, induced many, who wore wholly
+unconnected either with commerce or with the West Indies, to look with
+disfavor on a change which not only imperilled the interests of such
+important bodies of men, but which they were assured by those concerned,
+must render the future cultivation of estates in the West Indies
+impracticable; while such a result would not only ruin those valuable
+colonies, but would also extinguish that great nursery for our navy
+which was furnished by the vessels at present engaged in the West India
+trade. To disregard such substantial considerations to risk a loss of
+revenue, a diminution of our colonial greatness, and a weakening of our
+maritime power, even while engaged in a formidable war, under no other
+pressure but that of a respect for humanity and justice, was certainly a
+homage to those virtues, and also an act of self-denying courage, of
+which the previous history of the world had furnished no similar
+example; and it is one of which, in one point of view, the nation may be
+more justly proud than of the achievements of its wisest statesmen, or
+the exploits of its most invincible warriors. For it was the act of the
+nation itself. No previous sentiment of the people paved the way for
+Pitt's triumphs in finance, for Nelson's or Wellington's victories by
+sea and land; but the slave-trade could never have been abolished by any
+parliamentary leader, had not the nation as a whole become convinced of
+its wickedness, and, when once so convinced, resolved to brave
+everything rather than persist in it. The merit of having impressed it
+with this conviction belongs to Mr. Wilberforce, whose untiring,
+unswerving devotion of brilliant eloquence and practical ability to the
+one holy object, and whose ultimate success, give him a just claim to be
+reckoned among the great men of a generation than which the world has
+seen none more prolific of every kind of greatness. But the nation
+itself is also entitled to no slight credit for having so rapidly
+appreciated the force of his teaching, and for having encouraged its
+representatives to listen to his voice, by the knowledge that by
+adopting his measures they would be carrying out the wish and
+determination of the whole people.
+
+A measure for the strengthening of the army, introduced by the Secretary
+of State for War, Mr. Windham, though not one of perpetual force, since
+it required to be renewed every year, claims a brief mention, from the
+extent to which one of its clauses trenched on the freedom of the
+subject, by making every man of military age (from sixteen years
+old[164] to forty) liable to be compelled to submit to military training
+for a certain period of each year. "Nothing," to quote the Secretary's
+words, "was to exempt any man from the general training but his becoming
+a volunteer at his own expense, the advantage of which would be that he
+could train himself if he chose, and fight, if occasion required it, in
+the corps to which he should belong, instead of being liable to fall in
+among the regulars.... As out of the immense mass of the population some
+selection must be made, those called on to be trained were to be
+selected by lot, and he would have the people divided into three
+classes, between the ages of sixteen and forty: the first class to
+comprehend all from sixteen to twenty-four; the second, those between
+twenty-four and thirty-two; and the third, all from thirty-two to forty.
+The number of days for training he proposed to limit to twenty-six, with
+an allowance of a shilling a day for each man." The result aimed at by
+this part of his measure was the creation of a force different from and
+unconnected with the militia; and he did not conceal his hope that the
+military habits which it would implant in a large portion of the
+population would lead many of those thus about to be trained to enlist
+in the regular army. To the militia itself he paid a high but not
+undeserved compliment, declaring it "for home service certainly equal to
+any part of our regular forces, with the single exception that it had
+never seen actual service." But the militia could not be called on to
+serve out of the kingdom; and his object was to increase the force
+available for foreign service--"to see the great mass of the population
+of the country so far trained as to be able to recruit immediately
+whatever losses the regular army might sustain in action." As yet, the
+number of men yearly obtained by recruiting fell far short of the
+requirements of the service. Wellington had not yet begun that career of
+victory which created a national enthusiasm for war, and filled our
+ranks with willing soldiers. And another clause of the same bill was
+framed in the hope of making the service more acceptable to the
+peasantry, by limiting the time for which recruits were to be enlisted,
+and entering men, at first, in the infantry for seven years, or in the
+cavalry (as that branch of the service required a longer apprenticeship)
+for ten; then allowing them the option of renewing their engagement for
+two periods--in the infantry of seven years each, in the cavalry of six
+and five, with increased pay during each of the two periods, and a small
+pension for life, if the soldier retired after the second period; and
+"the full allowance of Chelsea," which was to be farther raised to a
+shilling a day, for those who elected to serve the whole twenty-one
+years. This principle the present reign has seen carried to a much
+greater extent, but the change is too recent for even the most
+experienced officers to be agreed on its effects. And it is only because
+of this recent extension of it that this clause is mentioned here. But
+the enactment of a law of compulsory service was clearly an inroad on
+the great constitutional right of every man to choose his own
+employment. At the same time, it is equally clear that it was only such
+an inroad as under the circumstances, was fully justifiable. It is true
+that all danger of French invasion had passed away with Trafalgar; but
+the kingdom was still engaged in a gigantic war, and the necessity of
+the case--always the supreme law--was so little denied by the
+Opposition, that their objections to the bill were directed entirely
+against the clause for limited enlistment, and not against that which
+abridged the subject's liberty, by compelling him to learn to serve his
+country in war.
+
+The reign of George III., which had now lasted fifty years, was drawing
+practically to a close. The excitement caused by the ministerial changes
+in 1801 had already brought on one relapse, though fortunately a very
+brief one, of the King's malady of 1788; and in the autumn of 1810 the
+death of the daughter who was supposed to be his especial favorite, the
+Princess Amelia, produced a recurrence of it, which, though at first the
+physicians entertained more sanguine hopes of his speedy recovery than
+on any former occasion, he never shook off. More than one change of
+ministry had recently taken place. In 1807 Lord Grenville had been
+compelled, as Pitt had been in 1801, to choose between yielding his
+opinions on the Catholic question or resigning his office, and had
+chosen the latter alternative. He had been succeeded for two years by
+the Duke of Portland; but in 1809 that nobleman had also retired, and
+had been succeeded by his Attorney-general, Mr. Perceval, the only
+practising barrister who had ever been so promoted. And he now being
+Prime-minister, and, as such, forced to make arrangements for carrying
+on the government during the illness of his sovereign, naturally
+regarded the course pursued in 1789 as the precedent to be followed.
+Accordingly, on the 20th of December he proposed for the adoption of the
+House of Commons the same resolutions which Pitt had carried twenty-two
+years before--that the King was prevented by indisposition from
+attending to public business; that it was the duty of Parliament to
+provide means for supplying the defect of the personal exercise of the
+royal authority, and its duty also to determine the mode in which the
+royal assent to the measures necessary could be signified. And he also
+followed Pitt's example in expressing by letter to the Prince of Wales
+his conviction that his Royal Highness was a person most proper to be
+appointed Regent, and explaining at the same time the restrictions which
+seemed proper to be imposed on his immediate exercise of the complete
+sovereign authority; though the advanced age at which the King had now
+arrived made it reasonable that those restrictions should now be limited
+to a single year. The Prince, on his part, showed that time had in no
+degree abated his repugnance to those restrictions, and he answered the
+minister's letter by referring him to that which he had addressed to
+Pitt on the same subject in 1788. And he induced all his brothers to
+address to Perceval a formal protest against "the establishment of a
+restricted Regency," which they proceeded to describe as perfectly
+unconstitutional, as being contrary to and subversive of the principles
+which seated their family upon the throne of this realm.[165]
+
+Perceval, however, with Pitt's example before him, had no doubt of the
+course which it was his duty to pursue; and the Opposition also, for the
+most part, followed the tactics of 1789; the line of argument now
+adopted by each party being so nearly identical with that employed on
+the former occasion, that it is needless to recapitulate the topics on
+which the different speakers insisted; though it is worth remarking that
+Lord Holland, who, as the nephew of Fox, thought it incumbent on him to
+follow his uncle's guidance, did on one point practically depart from
+it. As his uncle had done, he denied the right of the Houses to impose
+any restrictions on the Prince's exercise of the royal authority; but,
+at the same time, he consented to put what may be called a moral
+limitation on that exercise, by adding to an amendment which he proposed
+to the resolution proposed by the minister an expression of "the farther
+opinion of the House that it will be expedient to abstain from the
+exercise of all such powers as the immediate exigencies of the state
+shall not call into action, until Parliament shall have passed a bill or
+bills for the future care of his Majesty's royal person during his
+Majesty's present indisposition."
+
+It is remarkable that the leaders of the Opposition were in a great
+degree stimulated in the line they took by the very same hopes which had
+animated Fox and his followers in 1789--the expectation that the
+Regent's first act would be to discard the existing ministry, and to
+place them in office. But again they were disappointed in their
+anticipations, of the realization of which they had made so sure that
+they had taken no pains to keep them secret. They even betrayed their
+mortification to the world when the Prince's intentions on the subject
+of the administration became known by the violence of their language in
+Parliament, some of their party denouncing the employment of the Great
+Seal to give the royal assent to the bill as "fraud and forgery." Nor,
+indeed, could the Regent himself, even while expressing his intention to
+make no change in the administration, lest "any act of his might in the
+smallest degree have the effect of interfering with the progress of his
+sovereign's recovery," suppress an expression of dissatisfaction at the
+recent arrangements, which he considered had placed him in "a situation
+of unexampled embarrassment," and had created "a state of affairs ill
+calculated, as he feared, to sustain the interests of the United Kingdom
+in this awful and perilous crisis, and most difficult to be reconciled
+to the general principles of the British constitution."[166] There were
+at this time general and apparently well-founded hopes of the King's
+recovery. For at intervals during the whole of January the
+Prime-minister had interviews with his Majesty; and, on the very day on
+which the bill became law, the King himself mentioned it to Lord Eldon,
+the Chancellor, and said that he acquiesced in it from perfect
+confidence in the advice of his physicians, and on the sound judgment
+and personal attachment of his ministers.
+
+For the present, therefore, no change was made in the administration;
+but when, in the spring of the following year, Mr. Perceval was
+murdered, the necessity for a new arrangement which this strange and
+calamitous atrocity forced upon the Regent--who by this time had come
+into possession of his full authority--led to his making offers of the
+conduct of affairs to more than one prominent statesman, all of them, as
+is somewhat remarkable, being peers. And, though the proposals
+eventually came to nothing, and the negotiations terminated in the
+re-establishment of the former ministry, with Lord Liverpool at its
+head, yet some of the causes to which their failure was publicly or
+generally attributed seem desirable to be recorded, because the first,
+and that most openly avowed, bears a not very distant resemblance to the
+complication which baffled Sir Robert Peel's endeavors to form an
+administration in 1839; and another corresponds precisely to a proposal
+which, in 1827, the Regent--then King George IV.--did himself make to
+the Duke of Wellington. It is unnecessary to dwell on the singular
+manner in which the Regent first professed to give his confidence to
+Lord Wellesley, then transferred it to Lord Moira,[167] and then to a
+certain extent included Lord Grey and Lord Grenville in it. Nor would it
+be profitable to discuss the correctness or incorrectness of the
+suspicion expressed by Mr. Moore, in his "Life of Sheridan"--who was
+evidently at this time as fully in the Regent's confidence as any one
+else--that "at the bottom of all these evolutions of negotiation there
+was anything but a sincere wish, that the object to which they related
+should be accomplished."[168] The reason avowed by Lord Grey and Lord
+Grenville for refusing a share in the projected administration was the
+refusal of Lord Moira, who had been employed by the Prince to treat with
+them on the subject, to allow them to make a power of removing the
+officers at present filling "the great offices of the household"[169] an
+express condition of their acceptance of ministerial office. They
+affirmed that a "liberty to make new appointments" to these offices had
+usually been given on every change of administration. But Lord Moira,
+while admitting that "the Prince had laid no restriction on him in that
+respect," declared that "it would be impossible for him to concur in
+making the exercise of this power positive and indispensable in the
+formation of the administration, because he should deem it on public
+grounds peculiarly objectionable." Such an answer certainly gives a
+great color to Moore's suspicion, since it is hardly possible to
+conceive that Lord Moira took on himself the responsibility of giving it
+without a previous knowledge that it would be approved by his royal
+master. In a constitutional point of view, there can, it will probably
+be felt, be no doubt that the two lords had a right to the liberty they
+required. And the very men concerned, the great officers of the
+household, were evidently of the same opinion, since the chief, Lord
+Yarmouth, informed Sheridan that they intended to resign, in order that
+he might communicate that intention to Lord Grey; and Sheridan, who
+concealed the intelligence from Lord Grey, can hardly be supposed, any
+more than Lord Moira, to have acted in a manner which he did not expect
+to be agreeable to the Prince. But, in Canning's opinion, this question
+of the household was only the ostensible pretext, and not the real
+cause, of those two lords rejecting the Regent's offers; the real cause
+being, as he believed, that the Prince himself had already named Lord
+Wellesley as Prime-minister, and that they were resolved to insist on
+the right of the Whig party to dictate on that point to the Regent,[170]
+just as, in 1782, Fox had endeavored to force the Duke of Portland on
+the King, when his Majesty preferred Lord Shelburne. As has been
+intimated in a former page, it will be seen hereafter that in 1839 a
+similar claim to be allowed to remove some of the ladies of the royal
+household, and the rejection of that claim by the sovereign, prevented
+Sir R. Peel from forming an administration. And, as that transaction was
+discussed at some length in Parliament, it will afford a better
+opportunity for examining the principle on which the claim and practice
+(for of the practice there is no doubt) rest. For the present it is
+sufficient to point out the resemblance between the cases.
+
+But it is remarkable that, unwarrantable as the pretension of the Whig
+leaders was to dictate to the Regent to whom he should confide the lead
+of the government (if, indeed, Canning be correct in his opinion), yet
+it was not one to which the Regent felt any repugnance, since, in 1827,
+when Lord Liverpool's illness again left the Treasury vacant, he, being
+then on the throne as George IV., proposed to the Duke of Wellington to
+desire the remaining members of the administration themselves to select
+a chief under whom they would be willing to continue in his service; but
+the Duke told him that the plan of allowing them to choose their own
+leader would be most derogatory to his position; that the choice of the
+Prime-minister was an act which ought to be entirely his own, for that,
+in fact under the British constitution, it was the only personal act of
+government which the King of Great Britain had to perform.[171] Though
+not generally a great authority on constitutional points, we apprehend
+that the Duke was clearly correct in this view, which, indeed, has been
+so invariably carried out in practice, that the King's suggestion would
+not have deserved mention had it not been a king's. So far from it
+belonging to any individual subject or to any party to name the
+Prime-minister, to do so is even beyond the province of the Parliament.
+Parliament decides whether it will give its confidence to an
+administration of one party or the other; but not only has no vote ever
+been given on the question whether one member of the dominant party be
+fitter or not than another to be its head, but we do not remember a
+single instance of any member of either House expressing an opinion on
+the subject in his place in Parliament. To do so would be felt by every
+member of experience to be an infringement on the prerogative of his
+sovereign; and it may be added that a contrary practice would certainly
+open the door to intrigue, or, what would be equally bad, a suspicion of
+intrigue, and would thus inevitably diminish the weight which even the
+Opposition desire to see a Prime-minister possess both in Parliament and
+in the country.
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 148: It is somewhat remarkable that Lord Macaulay, in his
+endeavors to estimate the population in 1685, takes no notice of any of
+these details mentioned by Mr. Abbott.]
+
+[Footnote 149: The details of this census of 1801 are given in a note in
+the preceding chapter (see page 185), from which it appears that the
+entire population of the United Kingdom was in that year 16,395,870. Sir
+A. Alison, in different chapters of the second part of his "History of
+Europe," gives returns of subsequent censuses, from the last of which
+(c. lvi., s. 34, note), it appears that in 1851 the population amounted
+to 27,511,862. an increase of 11,116,792 in half a century.]
+
+[Footnote 150: "Lives of the Chief-justices," by Lord Campbell, iii.,
+87, life of Lord Kenyon.]
+
+[Footnote 151: "What is this," said George III. to Mr. Dundas, "which
+this young lord (Castlereagh) has brought over, which they are going to
+throw at my head? The most Jacobinical thing I ever heard of! I shall
+reckon any man my personal enemy who proposes any such measure."--_Life
+of Pitt_, iii., 274.]
+
+[Footnote 152: "Lives of the Chancellors," c. clxxxiv., life of Lord
+Erskine.]
+
+[Footnote 153: "Lives of the Chancellors," c. clix., life of Lord
+Thurlow.]
+
+[Footnote 154: See "Memoires de M. de Metternich," ii., 156.]
+
+[Footnote 155: "Lives of the Chief-justices," iii., 175.]
+
+[Footnote 156: Lord Stanhope, "History of England," i., 133.]
+
+[Footnote 157: "Lives of the Chief-justices," ii., 451. He is quoting H.
+Walpole.]
+
+[Footnote 158: Ibid., iii., 187.]
+
+[Footnote 159: Campbell's "Lives of the Chief-justices," II., 139, life
+of Chief-justice Holt; and p. 418, life of Lord Mansfield.]
+
+[Footnote 160: "Life of Wilberforce," i., 158.]
+
+[Footnote 161: The division in the Lords was 100 to 36; in the Commons,
+283 to 16.]
+
+[Footnote 162: Afterward the Earl Grey of 1831.]
+
+[Footnote 163: See especially his "Letters to Lord Castlereagh," p. 814;
+and "Life of Lord Liverpool," i., 512; ii., 35, 49, 127.]
+
+[Footnote 164: Lord Colchester's "Diary," ii., 49, dated April 3, 1806,
+says eighteen years. But Mr. Windham's speech, as reported in the
+"Parliamentary History," second series, vi., 685, says sixteen years;
+and as he divides the ages into three classes, the two latter of which,
+from twenty-four to thirty-two, and from thirty-two to forty, are of
+eight years each, it is probable that the younger class was of the same
+duration, i.e., from sixteen to twenty-four.]
+
+[Footnote 165: Lord Colchester's "Diary," ii., 300.]
+
+[Footnote 166: See "Diary of Lord Colchester" (Speaker at the time), c.
+xxxvi., p. 316. He gives the whole of the Prince's letter to Perceval
+(which had been composed by Sheridan), and of Perceval's reply. The
+Regency Bill became law February 5, 1811.]
+
+[Footnote 167: A letter of Lord Wellesley to Lord Grey, June 4 (given by
+Pearce, "Life of Lord Wellesley," iii., 270), shows that Lord Moira had
+been in communication with Lord Grey and Lord Grenville before Lord
+Wellesley had given up the idea of forming a ministry. And though Lord
+Grey in his reply (p. 272) expresses his conviction that Lord Moira's
+letter was not "an authorized communication," but only "a private
+communication," it is clear that it could not have been written without
+the privity of the Regent.]
+
+[Footnote 168: "Life of Sheridan," ii., 425.]
+
+[Footnote 169: Pearce's "Life of Lord Wellesley," iii., 276. All the
+letters which passed between Lord Grey, Lord Grenville, Lord Moira, and
+Lord Wellesley himself are given at full length by Mr. Pearce in that
+chapter.]
+
+[Footnote 170: Stapleton's "George Canning and his Times," p. 202.]
+
+[Footnote 171: Mr. Stapleton affirms that his Royal Highness actually
+did adopt this plan on this occasion: "His Royal Highness adopted the
+unprecedented course of commanding his servants to elect the
+First-minister. Their choice fell on Lord Liverpool."--_George Canning
+and his Times_, p. 208. Mr. Stapleton, however, gives no authority for
+this assertion, and he was probably mistaken, since Lord Liverpool's
+papers afford no corroboration of it, but rather tend to disprove it.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+
+The Toleration Act.--Impropriety of making Catholic Emancipation (or any
+other Important Matter) an Open Question.--Joint Responsibility of all
+the Ministers.--Detention of Napoleon at St. Helena.--Question whether
+the Regent could Give Evidence in a Court of Law in a Civil
+Action.--Agitation for Reform.--Public Meetings.--The Manchester
+Meeting.--The Seditious Meetings Prevention Bill.--Lord Sidmouth's Six
+Acts.
+
+
+The war was daily becoming of more exciting interest, and, so far as our
+armies were concerned, was rapidly assuming greater proportions. While
+the Duke of Portland was still at the head of affairs, Napoleon, by his
+unprovoked attacks on both the Peninsular kingdoms, had at last opened a
+field of action to our armies, in which even the most sanguine of those
+who placed a loyal confidence in the old invincibility of English
+prowess could not have anticipated the unbroken series of glories which
+were to reward their efforts. For four years Lord Wellington had
+contended against all the most renowned marshals of the Empire,[172]
+driving them back from impregnable lines of defence, defeating them in
+pitched battles, storming their strongest fortresses, without ever
+giving them room to boast of even the most momentary advantage obtained
+over himself; and he was now on the eve of achieving still more
+brilliant and decisive triumphs, which were never to cease till he had
+carried his victorious march far into the heart of France itself.
+
+At such a time it may well be supposed that the attention of the new
+ministry was too fully occupied with measures necessary for the conduct
+of the war to leave it much time for domestic legislation. Yet even its
+first session was not entirely barren.
+
+In the first excitement of the Restoration, when the nation was still
+exasperated at the recollection of what it had suffered under the
+triumphant domination of the Puritans, two laws had been framed to
+chastise them, conceived in a spirit as intolerant and persecuting as
+had dictated the very worst of their own. One, which was called the
+Conventicle Act, inflicted on all persons above the age of sixteen, who
+should be present at any religious service performed in any manner
+differently from the service of the Church of England, in any
+meeting-house, where more than five persons besides the occupiers of the
+house should be present, severe penalties, rising gradually to
+transportation; and gave a single magistrate authority to convict and to
+pass sentence on the offenders. The other, commonly known as the Five
+Mile Act, forbade all ministers, of any sect, who did not subscribe to
+the Act of Uniformity, and who refused to swear to their belief in the
+doctrine of passive obedience, from teaching in any school, and from
+coming within five miles of any city, corporate town, or borough sending
+members to Parliament, or any town or village in which they themselves
+had resided as ministers. The latter statute had fallen into complete
+disuse, and many of the provisions of the former had been relaxed,
+though magistrates in general construed the relaxing enactments as
+leaving the relaxations wholly at their discretion to grant or to
+withhold, and were very much in the habit of withholding or abridging
+them. Other statutes, such as the Test Act, had subsequently been passed
+against every sect of Dissenters, though they had only imposed civil
+disabilities, and had not inflicted penalties. But the new
+Prime-minister was a man to whose disposition anything resembling
+persecution was foreign and repugnant. Before his predecessor's unhappy
+death he had already discussed with him the propriety of abolishing laws
+conceived in such a spirit; and he no sooner found himself at the head
+of the government than he prepared a bill to carry out his views. He
+drew a distinction between the acts inflicting penalties and those which
+only imposed disabilities. With these latter he did not propose to
+interfere; but, in July, his colleague, Lord Castlereagh, introduced
+into the House of Commons a bill to repeal the Conventicle Act and the
+Five Mile Act altogether, and, when it had passed the Commons, he
+himself moved its adoption by the Lords, enforcing his recommendation by
+the argument, that "an enlarged and liberal toleration was the best
+security to the Established Church, a Church not founded on the
+exclusion of religious discussion, but, in its homilies, its canons, and
+all the principles on which it rested, courting the investigation of the
+Scriptures, upon which it founded its doctrines." At the same time,
+while urging the repeal of acts which he truly branded as a disgrace to
+the statute-book, he was not blind to the duty imposed on him, as
+responsible for the public tranquillity, of taking care that meetings
+held ostensibly for purposes of devotion should not be perverted to the
+designs of political agitators; and therefore he provided in the bill
+for the registration of all places appropriated to religious worship,
+and for the exaction from "the preachers and teachers in those meetings
+of some test or security in the oaths to be taken by them." He had
+already secured the acquiescence of the bishops, and he was equally
+successful now in winning the assent of the House. The conditions, such
+as they were, did not prevent the bill from being entirely acceptable to
+the Non-conformists; and though their spokesman in the House of Commons,
+Mr. W. Smith, member for Norwich, confessed a wish "that it had gone a
+little farther, and had granted complete religious liberty," he at the
+same time expressed sincere gratitude on the part of the Non-conformists
+for what was thus done for them; and declared that, "as an act of
+toleration, it certainly was the most complete which had hitherto been
+passed in this country." It was, in fact, the beginning of the
+abandonment of that system of discouragement of and hostility to all
+sects except the Established Church, which had hitherto been regarded by
+a large party as one of the most essential principles of the
+constitution. And as such it makes the year 1812 in some respects a
+landmark in our constitutional history.
+
+Mr. Smith had referred to an omission which prevented him from speaking
+of the bill as complete. He was alluding to the Test and Corporation
+Acts, which had been passed ten years later than the Conventicle Act, in
+the same reign of Charles II., and which many of the Non-conformists,
+and especially the Unitarians, had urged Lord Liverpool to include in
+this measure of repeal, but which he decided on retaining. As has been
+said above, he drew a distinction between acts inflicting penalties and
+those which went no farther than imposing political disabilities,
+feeling that any relief of Protestant Dissenters from such disabilities
+must inevitably lead to the concession of a similar indulgence to Roman
+Catholics, and not being as yet prepared to admit to Parliament the
+members of a Church which recognized the duty of obedience in any matter
+to a foreign sovereign; for, as the disabilities had been originally
+imposed on the Roman Catholics, so they were now maintained on
+political, not religious, grounds; and even those most opposed to a
+relaxation of them were careful to explain their resistance to be one
+which time and a change of circumstances might mitigate.[173]
+
+As a fitter opportunity for discussing the question will be afforded by
+the Duke of Wellington's bill, in 1829, we should not have mentioned it
+at all in this place, had not Lord Liverpool, in arranging his
+administration, adopted a mode of dealing with it which, though rather a
+parliamentary or departmental than a constitutional innovation, was,
+nevertheless, one of so strange a character as to seem to call for
+examination. Ever since the formation of Walpole's ministry it had been
+the invariable rule and practice for all the members of the cabinet to
+act in concert on all measures of importance, or, indeed it may be said,
+on all measures on which a Parliamentary vote was taken. But, in
+arranging his administration after Mr. Perceval's death, Lord Liverpool
+found it absolutely impossible to form one satisfactory either to the
+nation or to himself if it were to be confined to members in perfect
+agreement with himself on the subject of the retention of the
+disabilities affecting the Roman Catholics; and therefore, in order to
+be able to form a ministry generally strong and respected, he adopted
+the strange expedient of allowing every member of it to act
+independently on this one question. He made it what was called an open
+question. The arrangement, as explained to the House of Commons by Lord
+Castlereagh, the ministerial leader of that assembly, was that, "in
+submission to the growing change of public opinion in favor of those
+claims (the Roman Catholic claims), and the real sentiments of certain
+members of the government, it had been resolved upon, as a principle,
+that the discussion of this question should be left free from all
+interference on the part of the government, and that every member of
+that government should in it be left to the free and unbiassed
+suggestions of his own conscientious discretion."
+
+It was an arrangement which secured the Prime-minister the co-operation
+of Lord Castlereagh himself, and eventually of Mr. Canning; but it
+failed to propitiate the Opposition, the leader of which in the House of
+Commons, Mr. Ponsonby, turned it into open ridicule, affirming that
+"nothing could be more absurd than a cabinet professing to have no
+opinion on such an important subject." And it must be confessed that Mr.
+Ponsonby's language on the subject seems the language of common-sense.
+So far from the importance of a question justifying such an arrangement,
+that importance appears rather to increase, if possible, the necessity
+for absolute unanimity in the administration than to diminish it; and on
+a grave and momentous subject to leave each member of a ministry free to
+pronounce a separate and different judgment, so that one may resist what
+his colleague advocates, is to abdicate the functions of government
+altogether. To permit such liberty was either a proof that the ministry
+was weak altogether--which it was not--or that its conduct on this
+question was weak. In either case, it was a mischievous precedent that
+was thus set;[174] and the fact that it has since been followed in more
+than one instance, is so far from being any justification of it, that it
+rather supplies an additional reason for condemning it, as being the
+cause of wider mischief than if it had been confined to one single
+question, or had influenced the conduct of one cabinet only. It has
+often been said that the name "cabinet" is unknown to the law, and that
+what we call the cabinet is, in fact, only a committee of the Privy
+Council. As a statement of law the assertion may be correct, but it is
+certain that for more than a century and a half the constitution has
+adopted the principle that the cabinet consists of the holders of a
+certain, to some extent a fluctuating, number of the principal state
+officers; and, recognizing the responsibility of all for the actions of
+each member of it, does by that recognition sanction an expectation that
+on all questions, or at all events on all but those of the most trivial
+character, they will speak and act with that unanimity which is
+indispensable, not only to the strength of the government itself, but to
+its being held in respect by the people; such respect being, indeed,
+among the most essential elements of its strength.
+
+The incidents of the war itself do not belong to a work such as this;
+but, tantalizing as it must be to an historian of any class to pass over
+the brilliant series of achievements which gave Britain the glory of
+being twice[175] the principal agent in the deliverance of Continental
+Europe, the glories of Salamanca, Victoria, Orthes, and Waterloo must be
+left to other writers, who, it is not unpatriotic to hope, may never
+again have similar cause for exulting descriptions. But out of the
+crowning triumph of Waterloo a difficulty arose which, though it may be
+difficult to characterize the principle on which it was settled, since
+it was not strictly a question of constitutional, international, or
+military law; and though the circumstances were so peculiar that the
+conclusion adopted is never likely to be referred to as a precedent,
+seems still deserving of a brief mention, especially as an act of
+Parliament was passed to sanction the decision of the cabinet. Baffled
+by the vigilance of our cruisers in every attempt to escape from one of
+the western ports of France to America, Napoleon was at last compelled
+to surrender himself to a British squadron. But, though he was our
+prisoner, the Prime-minister considered us, in all our dealings with
+him, as so bound by engagements to our allies, that he was to be
+regarded as "the common prisoner of all, so far that we should not give
+him up or release him without the joint consent of all." The question
+was full of difficulty. There were, probably, very few persons in this
+or any other country who did not coincide in the impropriety of
+releasing him, and so putting it in his power once more to rekindle a
+war in Europe. But it was a political view of the case, founded on a
+consideration of what was required by the tranquillity of Europe; and it
+was not easy to lay down any legal ground to justify the determination.
+Some regarded him as a French subject, and, if that view were correct,
+he could hardly be detained by us as a prisoner of war after we had
+concluded a treaty of peace with France. But, again, it seemed to some,
+the Lord Chancellor being among them, a questionable point whether in
+the last campaign we had been at war with France; whether, on the
+contrary, we had not assumed the character of an ally of France against
+him. And, on the supposition that we had been at war with France, a
+second question was raised by Lord Ellenborough, the Chief-justice,
+"what rights result on principle from a state of war, as against all the
+individuals of the belligerent nations--rights, whatever they may be,
+seldom, if ever, enforced against individuals, because individuals
+hardly ever make war but as part of an aggregate nation." The
+question--as, after consultation with Lord Ellenborough and his own
+brother, Sir William Scott, it finally appeared to Lord Eldon, on whom
+the Prime-minister naturally depended, as his chief legal counsellor,
+though in its political aspect he judged for himself--was, firstly,
+"whether it could possibly be inconsistent with justice or the law of
+nations that, till some peace were made by treaty with some person
+considered as Napoleon's sovereign, or till some peace were made with
+himself, we should keep him imprisoned in some part of our King's
+dominions." And, secondly, "whether there were any person who could
+possibly be considered his sovereign, after the treaty of 1814 had
+clothed him with the character of Emperor of Elba, with imperial dignity
+and imperial revenue." Lord Liverpool himself, however, raised another
+question: whether, by his invasion of France, he had not forfeited his
+right to be regarded as an independent sovereign; resting this doubt on
+a suggestion which, among others, he proposed to the Lord Chancellor,
+that "at Elba he enjoyed only a limited and conditional sovereignty,
+which ceased when the condition on which he held it was violated."
+
+This last suggestion, it must be confessed, appears untenable, as
+totally inconsistent with the language of the Treaty of Fontainebleau,
+under the provisions of which Napoleon became sovereign of Elba, and
+which does not contain a single article which bears out the opinion that
+his sovereignty was limited or conditional. On the contrary, the words
+of the treaty expressly agree that "Elba should form during his life a
+separate principality, which should be possessed by him in full
+sovereignty and property."
+
+There is no need to discuss the views of Blucher. On the news of
+Napoleon's landing at Frejus reaching the plenipotentiaries assembled at
+the Congress of Vienna, they at once issued a declaration that, "in
+breaking the convention which had established him at Elba, Buonaparte"
+(for they refused him his imperial appellation of Napoleon) "had
+destroyed the only legal title on which his existence depended.... He
+had placed himself out of the pale of civil and social relations, and,
+as the enemy and disturber of the peace of the world, he was delivered
+over to public justice." And the old Prussian, burning with a desire to
+avenge the indignities and injuries which he had inflicted on Prussia,
+avowed his determination to execute him as an outlaw, if he should fall
+into his hands. And it is still less worthwhile to inquire--though Lord
+Holland in his place in Parliament did desire the House to consult the
+judges on the point--whether, if Napoleon were a prisoner of war, he
+"were not entitled to his _habeas corpus_, if detained after the
+signature of a treaty of peace with all the powers, or any of which he
+could be considered as the subject."
+
+On the whole, the simplest view of the position and of our detention of
+him, the view most reconcilable with the principles which regulate the
+waging and the relinquishing a state of war, seems to be to consider
+that Napoleon was a sovereign with whom we were at war; that that war
+could only be terminated by a treaty of peace between ourselves and him;
+that it rested with us to conclude, or to abstain from concluding, any
+such treaty; and that, till we should conclude it, we had clearly a
+right to detain him as a prisoner of war. It must, at the same time, be
+admitted that modern history afforded no precedent for the detention of
+a prisoner for his whole life (unless, indeed, Elizabeth's imprisonment
+of the Queen of Scots may be considered as one), and that the most solid
+justification for it was necessity. To quote the language of Lord Eldon,
+"I believe it will turn out that, if you can't make this a _casus
+exceptionis_ or _omissus_ in the law of nations, founded upon necessity,
+you will not really know what to say upon it. _Salus Reipublicae suprema
+lex_, as to one state; _Salus omnium Rerumpublicarum_ must be the
+_suprema lex_ as to this case."[176]
+
+In the course of the year 1818 a somewhat singular question as to the
+position of the Regent was raised by a claim advanced by Colonel
+Berkeley to produce his Royal Highness as a witness in a court of law.
+The Prince consulted the Prime-minister, and the Prime-minister referred
+it to the Attorney and Solicitor General, not concealing his own
+impression that it could not be consistent with his constitutional
+position and prerogative for the King to appear as a witness to be
+subjected to examination and cross-examination.[177] They, in their
+statement of opinion, assumed it to be an undeniable principle of the
+constitution that the sovereign, "by reason of his royal character,
+could not give testimony." And therefore they had no doubt that the
+Regent, exercising his authority, was equally prevented from so doing.
+Colonel Berkeley's counsel had urged that, even if he could not appear
+in open court and be sworn, he had the privilege of communicating his
+evidence in a peculiar mode, by certificate under the Sign Manual or
+Great Seal. But the Attorney and Solicitor General professed that they
+could not discover whence this last privilege was derived; they urged,
+as an insurmountable objection to such a contrivance, that "all
+instruments under the Sign Manual or Great Seal must, in point of form,
+be in the name of and on behalf of the King, which would manifestly be
+incongruous when the evidence certified was not that of the King, but of
+the Regent himself." And they quoted a case in which Lord Chief-justice
+Willes had said "that the certificate of the King, under his Sign
+Manual, of a fact (except in an old case in Chancery) had always been
+refused." As it had been urged also, on Colonel Berkeley's behalf, that
+the Prince had formerly "joined in proving the will of the Duke of
+Brunswick," his brother-in-law, they farther expressed an opinion that
+"he ought not to have done so, but should have left it to the other
+executors."
+
+On the point whether "the King himself could give evidence orally or in
+any other manner," their opinion expressed very plainly the principle on
+which they maintained that he could not. "That he was not compellable to
+do so; that he could not be sworn (there being no power capable of
+administering an oath to him in a court of justice). That, whether his
+testimony be given _vivâ voce_ or otherwise, no question in chief or on
+cross-examination could be proposed to him, was admitted by Colonel
+Berkeley's counsel. And that his testimony must be conclusive as to the
+facts stated by him, appeared necessarily to follow from the perfection
+ascribed by law to his royal character. For such remarkable exceptions,
+therefore, to the case of all other witnesses they could not but think
+that strong and decisive authority ought to be produced; while the
+silence of text-writers on the subject, so far from being favorable to
+the notion that the King can give evidence, appeared to afford a
+directly contrary inference." And they summed up their opinion in a few
+words: "that his Royal Highness the Prince Regent, while in the personal
+exercise of the royal authority, was in the situation of the King in
+this respect, and that the King could not by any mode give evidence as a
+witness in a civil suit."
+
+It is very improbable that Colonel Berkeley should have made the
+application without previously ascertaining the willingness of the
+Prince to give evidence, could such a course be permitted. And as his
+Royal Highness, on receiving this opinion of the law-officers of the
+crown, did not come forward as a witness, that opinion may be held to
+have settled the question. And, apart from the constitutional objections
+relied on by those able lawyers, it is evident that there would be
+serious practical objections to the sovereign being made a witness. It
+would be derogatory to his royal character to put himself in a position
+where comments could be made, either by the opposing barrister or by the
+public outside, on his evidence. And, on the other hand, it would be
+perilously unfair to one litigant for his adversary to be able to
+produce a witness who was not subject to cross-examination, nor to
+remarks upon his testimony.
+
+The reign of George III. was now drawing to its close, and, if it
+produced no legislation affecting the principles of the constitution (it
+will presently be seen that it did produce one measure which its
+opponents branded as a violation of these principles), yet in its last
+years it witnessed the revival of an agitation which was kept up with
+varying animation till it was temporarily quieted by the concession of
+its demands. We have seen that one of Pitt's earliest efforts at
+legislation had been directed to a reform in Parliament, an object which
+to the end of his life he considered of great importance, though the
+revolutionary spirit aroused by the troubles in France, and the open
+sympathy with the French Jacobins and Republicans avowed by a party
+among ourselves--which, if numerically weak, was sufficiently loud and
+active to be dangerous--prevented him from ever re-opening the subject.
+But, though the French Revolution in this way proved for the time an
+insurmountable obstacle to the success of the reformers, in another way
+it insured the revival of the question, by the general spirit of inquiry
+which it awakened among the population at large, and which soon went
+beyond the investigation of any single abuse or anomaly. For even less
+far-sighted statesmen than Pitt confessed the existence of much that was
+not only theoretically indefensible, but practically mischievous. The
+period, little short of a century, which elapsed between the death of
+William III. and Pitt's accession to office had been one of almost
+complete stagnation and apathy. The Scotch Union, the Septennial Bill,
+the establishment of a militia, and the Place Bill of 1743 were the only
+instances of any legislation deserving the name of constitutional which
+made the reigns of Anne and the first two Georges memorable. And in the
+very nature of things it was impossible that, after so long a slumber,
+there should not be much to do, and many, whether capable or incapable,
+eager to bear a share in the work. The sudden cessation of the
+excitement of war had begotten a restless craving for some other
+excitement to take its place, and none seemed so creditable as energy
+and acuteness in the discovery and removal of abuses. Complaints were
+made, and not without reason, of the working of the poor-law; of the
+terrible severity of our criminal code; of the hardships and sufferings
+of the younger members of the working classes, especially in the
+factories; of the ignorance of a large portion of the people, in itself
+as prolific a cause of mischief and crime as any other. But, though
+committees and commissions were appointed by Parliament to investigate
+the condition of the kingdom in respect of these matters, a feeling was
+growing up that no effectual remedy would be applied till the
+constitution of the House of Commons itself were reformed, so as to make
+it a more real representation of the people than it could as yet be
+considered. And a farther stimulus to this wish for such a Parliamentary
+reform was supplied by the distress which a combination of circumstances
+spread among almost all classes in the years immediately following the
+conclusion of the second treaty of peace.[178] The harvests of the years
+1816 and 1817 were unusually deficient, and this pressed heavily on the
+farmers and landed proprietors. The merchants and manufacturers, who,
+while every part of the Continent was disturbed or threatened by the
+operations of contending armies, had practically enjoyed almost a
+monopoly of the trade of the world, found their profits reduced, by the
+new competition to which the re-establishment of peace exposed them, to
+a point which compelled them to a severe reduction of expenditure. The
+uncertainty felt as to the results to be brought about by the inevitable
+repeal of the Bank Act of 1797, and the return to cash payments--results
+which it was impossible to estimate correctly beforehand--had a tendency
+to augment the distress, by the general feeling of uneasiness and
+distrust which it created. And the employers of labor could not suffer
+without those who depended on them for employment suffering still more
+severely. The consequence was, that there was a general stagnation of
+trade; numbers of artisans and laborers of every kind were thrown out of
+work, and their enforced idleness and poverty, which was its result,
+made them ready to become the tools of demagogues such as are never
+wanting in the hour of distress and perplexity. Meetings were convened,
+ostensibly to petition for reform, but in reality to afford
+opportunities for mob-orators, eager for notoriety, to denounce the
+government and those whom they styled the "ruling classes," as the
+causes of the present and past evils. From these meetings multitudes
+issued forth ripe for mischief. In some places they rose against the
+manufacturers, and destroyed their machines, to the recent introduction
+of which they attributed their want of employment. In others, still more
+senselessly, they even set fire to the stores of grain in the
+corn-dealers' warehouses, aggravating by their destruction the most
+painful of their own sufferings. On one occasion, a mob which had
+assembled in one of the eastern districts of London, on pretence of
+framing a petition to be presented to the Prince Regent, at the close of
+the meeting paraded the streets with a tricolor flag, the emblem of the
+French Revolutionists, and pillaged a number of shops, especially those
+of the gun-makers, spreading terror through all that side of the
+metropolis. In at least one instance the violence of the rioters rose to
+the height of treason. Assassins fired at the Regent in the Park as he
+was returning from the House of Lords, whither he had been to open
+Parliament; and when it was found that they had missed their aim, the
+mob attacked the royal carriage, pelting it with large stones, and
+breaking the windows; nor was it without some difficulty that the escort
+of troops cleared a path for him through the mob, and enabled him to
+reach Carlton House in safety.
+
+The first effect of these outrages was to damage the cause of Reform
+itself, even such uncompromising reformers as Lord Grey denouncing
+"meetings at which extensive schemes of Reform were submitted to
+individuals incapable of judging of their propriety." The second
+consequence was to compel the ministers to take steps to prevent a
+recurrence of such tumults and crimes. At first they were contented with
+a temporary suspension of the _Habeas Corpus_ Act; but, even while that
+suspension was in force, it did not entirely prevent meetings, at some
+of which the language of the speakers certainly bordered on sedition;
+and when the suspension was taken off, fresh meetings on a larger scale,
+and of a more tumultuous character than ever, were held in more than one
+rural district; finally, in July of 1819, the whole kingdom was thrown
+into a violent state of excitement by a meeting held at Birmingham, at
+which the leaders, assuming the newly-invented party name of Radicals,
+not only demanded the remodelling of the whole system of government,
+but, because Birmingham as yet sent no members to the House of Commons,
+took it upon themselves to elect Sir Charles Wolseley, a baronet of
+respectable family, as their representative to the Parliament, and
+charged him to claim a place in the House of Commons in the next
+session, by the side of those elected in obedience to the royal writs.
+Sir Charles was at once arrested on the charge of having at this meeting
+used seditious language calculated to lead to a breach of the peace; but
+the Radical leaders, far from being intimidated by this demonstration of
+vigor on the part of the government, immediately summoned a similar
+meeting in Manchester, announcing their intention to elect a
+representative of that great town likewise, which, though the largest of
+all the manufacturing towns, was also unrepresented in the Imperial
+Parliament. The magistrates prohibited the meeting. It was only
+postponed for a week, when the people assembled in such formidable
+numbers (no estimate reckoned them at fewer than 60,000), that the
+ordinary civil authorities deemed themselves unequal to dealing with it,
+and called in the aid first of the Yeomanry and then of a hussar
+regiment. The soldiers behaved with great forbearance, as soldiers
+always do behave on such occasions; but they were bound to execute the
+orders which were given them to arrest some of the leaders, and, in the
+tumult which was the inevitable consequence of their attempt to force a
+way through so dense a crowd, three or four lives were, unfortunately,
+lost.
+
+So unusual a catastrophe called out the energies of both parties. The
+Radical leaders published manifestoes declaring the people had been
+"massacred" by the soldiers by the orders of the government. Meetings
+were held to denounce the conduct of the ministers, one being even
+promoted by Lord Fitzwilliam, as Lord-lieutenant of Yorkshire, a dignity
+of which he was instantly deprived; while, on the other hand, the
+grand-juries of Cheshire and Lancashire made reports of the condition of
+those counties to the Secretary of State, which showed that a most
+alarming spirit prevailed over the greater part of the district. "The
+most inflammatory publications had been issued in the principal towns,
+at a price which put them within the reach of the poorest classes of
+society. The training and military drilling of large bodies of men under
+regular leaders had been carried on to a great extent for some time,
+chiefly by night; and there was no doubt that an extensive manufacture
+of arms was going on." What was a hardly inferior symptom of danger was
+a system of intimidation which prevailed to a most serious degree. Many
+magistrates had received notices threatening their lives, and
+combinations had been formed to withhold custom from publicans and
+shopkeepers who had come forward to support the civil power. In many
+parts of the two counties the grand-juries declared "that no warrant of
+arrest or other legal process could be executed; the payment of taxes
+had ceased, and the landlords were threatened with the discontinuance of
+their rents."
+
+It was admitted that the spirit of disaffection was local, confined to
+three or four counties; but those counties were, next to Middlesex
+itself, the most populous and among the most important in the kingdom,
+and there was danger lest the feeling, if not checked, might spread. The
+crisis seemed so momentous, that some even of the Opposition leaders
+volunteered their counsels and aid to the ministers in dealing with it.
+And the ministers, after long deliberation, decided on calling
+Parliament together in November, and introducing some bills which they
+conceived necessary to enable them to restore and preserve tranquillity.
+They were six in number; and--perhaps, with some sarcastic reference to
+Gardiner's Six Acts in the sixteenth century--they were very commonly
+spoken of as Lord Sidmouth's Six Acts, that noble lord being the
+Home-secretary, to whose department they belonged. It is not necessary
+here to do more than mention the general purport of five of them. One
+prohibited military training without the sanction of the government;
+another empowered magistrates to search for arms which they had reason
+to believe were collected for illegal purposes; the third authorized the
+seizure of seditious and blasphemous libels; the fourth subjected
+publications below a certain size to the same stamp as that required for
+a newspaper; the fifth regulated the mode of proceeding in trials for
+misdemeanor of a political character. But these enactments were regarded
+as little more than arrangements of detail or procedure involving no
+principles, and some of them were admitted even by the most steadfast
+opponents of the ministers to be necessary. But the sixth, designed to
+restrain the practice of holding large open-air meetings--not, indeed,
+forever, but for a certain period, fixed at five years--was strongly
+resisted by the greater portion of the Whig party in both Houses, as a
+denial to the people of one of their most ancient and constitutional
+rights.[179]
+
+Its principal clauses enacted that "no meeting exceeding the number of
+fifty persons (except a meeting of any county or division of any county,
+called by the Lord-lieutenant or sheriff of such county, etc., or by
+five or more acting justices of the peace for such county, or by the
+major part of the grand-jury; or any meeting of any city, borough, etc.,
+called by the mayor or other head officer of such city, etc.) should be
+holden for the purpose or on the pretext of deliberating upon any public
+grievance, or upon any matter relating to any trade, manufacture, etc.,
+or upon any matter of Church or State, or of considering, proposing, or
+agreeing to any petition, address, etc., etc., unless in the parish or
+township within which the persons calling any such meeting usually
+dwell;" and it required six days' notice of the intention to hold such
+meetings, with their time, place, and object, to be given to a
+magistrate. It empowered the magistrate to whom such notice was given to
+alter the time and place. It forbade adjournments intended to evade
+these prohibitions. It forbade any one to attend such meetings except
+freeholders of the county, or parishioners of the parish, or members of
+the corporation of the city or borough in which they were held, or
+members of the House of Commons for such places. It empowered
+magistrates to proceed to the places where such meetings were being
+held, and, if they thought it necessary, to require the aid of
+constables. It enacted that any meeting, the tendency of which should be
+"to incite or stir up the people to hatred and contempt of the person of
+his Majesty, his heirs and successors, or of the government or
+constitution of this country as by law established, should be deemed an
+unlawful assembly." It empowered one or more justices of the peace, in
+the event of any meeting being held contrary to the provisions of this
+act, to warn every one present, in the King's name, to depart; and made
+those who did not depart in obedience to such warning liable to
+prosecution for felony, and, if convicted, to seven years'
+transportation. It forbade the display of flags, banners, or ensigns at
+any meeting, and the employment of any drum, or military or other music;
+but it excepted from its operation "any meeting or assembly which should
+be wholly holden in any room."
+
+There was one peculiarity in the line taken by the opponents of the
+bill, that they did not deny that the meetings which had induced the
+ministers to propose it were an evil, dangerous to the general
+tranquillity; but it was strongly urged by Lord Erskine and others that
+the existing laws were quite strong enough to deal with them, so that a
+new enactment was superfluous; and by others, in both Houses, that such
+meetings were "an ancient and constitutional mode of discussing abuses
+or petitioning Parliament," any interference with which was a greater
+evil than the meetings themselves, as being a violation of the
+constitution. Mr. Brougham in particular admitted, to the full extent of
+the assertions of the ministers themselves, "the wickedness and folly of
+many of the speeches" made at the recent meetings. He expressed with
+great force his entire disapproval of the system on which these meetings
+had been conducted, and admitted that the martial array which had been
+exhibited, and the vastness of the numbers of those who had attended,
+were of themselves calculated to excite alarm; but he declared that "he
+could not on that account acquiesce in a total subversion of a popular
+right." On the other hand, the ministers themselves did not deny "the
+general right of the people to petition the Legislature, or to carry
+their addresses to the foot of the throne. And therefore (as Lord
+Harrowby, the President of the Council, admitted) there could be no
+doubt of their right to assemble, so far as was necessary to agree to
+their petitions or addresses. It was a right that did not depend on the
+Bill of Rights, on which it was usually grounded, but had existed long
+before. But this bill," he contended, "imposed no restrictions on the
+legitimate enjoyment of that privilege; it only regulated the meetings
+at which it was to be exercised." And Lord Liverpool affirmed that the
+bill was not only "consistent with the existing laws and principles of
+the constitution, but was even proposed in furtherance of those
+principles, and for the purpose of protecting the people of this country
+against a series of evils which, if not checked, must subvert their laws
+and liberties."
+
+In attempting to form a correct judgment on the question whether this
+bill were constitutional or unconstitutional, it must, I think, be
+admitted that, as has been remarked before, the terms "constitutional"
+and "unconstitutional" are somewhat vague and elastic. There is no one
+document--not Magna Charta, nor the Petition of Eight, nor the Bill of
+Rights--which can be said to contain the whole of the British
+constitution. Its spirit and principles are, indeed, to be found in all
+the laws, to which they give animation and life, but not in any one law.
+And among its leading principles are those which embrace the right of
+every individual to freedom of action and freedom of speech, so long as
+he does not commit any crime himself, nor tempt others to do so. Yet it
+does not follow that a new enactment which for a while abridges or
+suspends that freedom of action or speech is inconsistent with those
+constitutional principles.
+
+Ministers, to whom the government of a country is intrusted, do wrong if
+they limit their operations to the punishment of offences which have
+been committed. It is at least equally their duty, as far as possible,
+to prevent their commission; to take precautionary measures, especially
+at times when there is notorious danger of offences being committed. At
+the same time they are bound not to legislate under the influence of
+panic; not to yield to fears having no substantial ground. And in their
+measures of precaution they are farther bound to depart from or overstep
+the ordinary law as little as is compatible with the attainment of their
+object. In all such cases each action of theirs must stand or fall by
+its own merits; by the greatness of the emergency which has caused it,
+and by its sufficiency for its end. For as no law, except such as
+forbids moral crimes, is invariable, so even the dearest privileges of
+each subject, being his for the common good, are liable to temporary
+suspension for that common good. But the burden of justification lies on
+those who propose that suspension.
+
+Now, that this bill was such a suspension of the long-established rights
+of the subject, and so far an overstepping of the principles of the
+constitution, is admitted by the very fact of its framers only proposing
+for it a temporary authority. Had it not invaded a valuable and real
+right, it might have been made of perpetual obligation. But it is not
+easy to see how it can be denied that the dangers against which it was
+intended to guard were also real. It was certain that itinerant
+demagogues were visiting districts with which they had no connection,
+for the sole purpose of stirring up political agitation. It was clear
+that such meetings as they convened, where those assembled could only be
+counted by tens of thousands, were too large for deliberation, and were
+only meant for intimidation; and equally clear that, though the existing
+laws may have armed the magistrate with authority to disperse such
+meetings, they did not furnish him with the means of doing so without at
+least the risk of bloodshed (for such a risk must be involved in the act
+of putting soldiers in motion), and still less did they invest him with
+the desirable power of preventing such meetings. It was necessary,
+therefore, to go back to the original principles and objects of every
+constitution, the tranquillity, safety, and welfare of the nation at
+large. And it does not appear that this bill went beyond what was
+necessary for that object. Indeed, though party divisions are not always
+trustworthy tests of the wisdom or propriety of a measure, the unusual
+magnitude of the majorities by which on this occasion the minister was
+supported in both Houses may fairly be regarded as a testimony to the
+necessity of the bill,[180] while its sufficiency was proved by the
+abandonment of all such meetings, and the general freedom from agitation
+in every part Of the country which prevailed in the following year,
+though its most remarkable incident was one of which demagogues might
+well have taken advantage, if they had not had so convincing a proof of
+the power of government, and of the resolution of the ministers to exert
+it.[181]
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 172: Against Junot, at Vimiera and Rolica, in 1808; Soult, at
+Oporto, and Victor, at Talavera, in 1809; Massena and Ney, at Busaco and
+Torres Vedras, in 1810; Masséna and Bessiéres, at Fuentes d'Onor, in
+1811. Ciudad Rodrigo and Badajoz had been taken in 1812, in spite of the
+neighborhood of Soult and Marmont. In July, 1813, a month after the
+formation of Lord Liverpool's ministry, he routed Marmont at Salamanca;
+in 1813 he took Madrid, and routed Jourdain at Vittoria; and, having
+subsequently defeated Soult at Sauroren, he crossed the French frontier
+in October.]
+
+[Footnote 173: A resolution, moved by Mr. Canning, to take the claims of
+the Roman Catholics into consideration in the next session had been
+carried in June by the large majority of 129; and when Lord Wellesley
+brought forward a similar motion in the House of Lords, not only did
+Lord Liverpool "protest against its being inferred from any declaration
+of his that it was, or ever had been, his opinion that under no
+circumstances would it be possible to make any alteration in the laws
+respecting the Roman Catholics," but the Chancellor, Lord Eldon, who was
+generally regarded as the stoutest champion of the existing law, rested
+his opposition entirely on political grounds, explaining carefully that
+he opposed the motion, "not because he quarrelled with the religion of
+the Roman Catholics, but because their religious opinions operated on
+their political principles in such a way as to render it necessary to
+adopt some defence against them," and met the motion by moving the
+previous question, avowedly because "he did not wish, at once and
+forever, to shut the door of conciliation;" and the previous question
+was only carried by a single vote--126 to 125.]
+
+[Footnote 174: "It (difference on the Catholic question) was an evil
+submitted to by the government, of which Mr. Fox, Lord Grenville, and
+Lord Grey were members, in the years 1806, 1807, as well as by the
+governments of Mr. Perceval, Lord Liverpool, and the Duke of
+Wellington."--_Peel's Memoirs_, i., 62. This passage would seem to imply
+that Peel believed the Catholic question to have been left "open" in
+1806; but there is not, so far as the present writer is aware, any trace
+of such an arrangement on record, and Lord Liverpool's letter to the
+King, of November 10, 1826 ("Life," iii., 436), shows clearly that he
+was not aware of such a precedent for the arrangement which, in 1812,
+"he and others advised his Majesty" to consent to. Moreover, the
+condemnation passed on it by Mr. Ponsonby, who had been Chancellor of
+Ireland in 1806 and 1807, seems a clear proof that he knew nothing of
+it, though it is hardly possible that he should have been ignorant of it
+if it had existed.]
+
+[Footnote 175: To whom the chief glory of the Waterloo campaign belongs
+there can, of course, be no doubt; and though the Austrians and
+Prussians put forward a claim to an equal share, and Russia even to a
+preponderating one, in the first deposition of Napoleon, he himself
+constantly attributed his fall more to the Peninsular contest than to
+any of his wars east of the Rhine. And, indeed, it is superfluous to
+point out that almost to the last he gained occasional victories over
+the Continental armies, but that he never gained one advantage over the
+British force; and that Wellington invaded France the first week of
+October, 1813--nearly three months before a single Russian or German
+soldier crossed the Rhine.]
+
+[Footnote 176: Letter to Sir W. Scott, Twiss's "Life of Lord Eldon,"
+ii., 272. It is remarkable that in his "Life of Lord Ellenborough" Lord
+Campbell takes no notice of this case.]
+
+[Footnote 177: The opinion of the Attorney and Solicitor General, Sir S.
+Shepperd and Sir R. Gifford, is given at length in the author's "Life of
+Lord Liverpool," ii., 373.]
+
+[Footnote 178: It is a shrewd observation of Sully, that it is never any
+abstract desire for theoretical reforms, or even for increased
+privileges, which excites in lower classes to discontent and outrage,
+but only impatience under actual suffering.]
+
+[Footnote 179: The bill (entitled "The Seditious Meetings Prevention
+Bill"), 60 George III., c. 6, is given at full length in Hansard's
+"Parliamentary Debates," series 1., vol. xli., p. 1655.]
+
+[Footnote 180: In the House of Lords the majority was 135 to 38; in the
+House of Commons, 851 to 128. And even of this minority, many would have
+supported the bill, if the ministers would have consented to adopt an
+amendment proposed by Lord Althorp, to limit its operation to a few of
+the northern and midland counties, in which alone, as he contended, any
+spirit of dangerous disaffection had been exhibited.]
+
+[Footnote 181: It may be as well to mention that these pages were
+written in the autumn of 1880.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+
+Survey of the Reign of George III.--The Cato Street Conspiracy.--The
+Queen's Return to England, and the Proceedings against her.--The King
+Visits Ireland and Scotland.--Reform of the Criminal Code.--Freedom of
+Trade.--Death of Lord Liverpool.--The Duke of Wellington becomes
+Prime-minister.--Repeal of the Test and Corporation Act.--O'Connell is
+Elected for Clare.--Peel Resigns his Seat for Oxford.--Catholic
+Emancipation.--Question of the Endowment of the Roman Catholic
+Clergy.--Constitutional Character of the Emancipation.--The Propriety of
+Mr. Peel's Resignation of his Seat for Oxford Questioned.
+
+
+In the first month of 1820 George III. died. His had been an eventful
+reign, strangely checkered with disaster and glory; but, if we compare
+its close with its commencement, it was still more remarkably
+distinguished by a development of the resources and an increase in the
+wealth and power of the nation, to which the history of no other country
+in the same space of time affords any parallel.
+
+Regarded from the first point of view, our successes greatly outweighed
+our disasters. The loss of our North American Colonies, the only event
+which can be so described, was far more than counterbalanced by our vast
+acquisitions in India, at the Cape of Good Hope, and Malta; while to our
+maritime supremacy, in the complete establishment of which Rodney and
+Nelson had crowned the work of Anson and Hawke, was now added a splendor
+of military renown far surpassing that achieved by any other of the
+nations which had borne their share in the overthrow of Napoleon.
+
+The increase of our resources is sufficiently shown by a single fact. At
+his accession George III. found the kingdom engaged in the great seven
+years' war; one British army employed beyond the Rhine, another in
+India; fleets traversing the seas in every direction, capturing the
+Havana, in the West Indies; Manilla, in the East; and routing French
+squadrons in sight of their own harbors. While, to maintain these varied
+armaments, supplies were voted by Parliament in 1761 to what Lord
+Stanhope calls "the unprecedented amount of almost twenty millions." In
+1813 the supplies reached nearly six times that amount,[182] and that
+prodigious sum was raised with greater ease than the revenue of 1761,
+the interest on the necessary loans being also lower than it had been on
+the former occasion.
+
+The philosophical man of science will point with at least equal
+exultation to the great discoveries in art and science; to the
+achievements of the mechanic, the engineer, and the chemist; to the
+labors of Brindley and Arkwright and Watts, to which, indeed, this great
+expansion of the resources and growth of the wealth of the country is
+principally owing.
+
+While, as the preceding chapters of this work have been designed to
+show, our political progress and advancement had been no less steady or
+valuable; yet, important from a constitutional point of view as were
+many of the labors of our legislators in these sixty years, they are
+surpassed in their influence on the future history of the nation, as
+well as in the reality and greatness of the changes which were produced
+by them in the constitution, by the transactions of the reigns of the
+next two sovereigns, though the two united scarcely equalled in their
+duration a quarter of that of their venerable father.
+
+It has been seen how Pitt was baffled in his efforts to remodel the
+House of Commons, and to remove the disabilities under which the Roman
+Catholics labored, the reasons for which, even granting that they had
+been sufficient to justify their original imposition, had, in his
+judgment, long passed away. His pursuit of the other great object of his
+domestic policy, the emancipation of trade from the shackles which
+impeded its universal development, was rudely interrupted by the
+pressure of the war forced upon him by that very nation which he had
+desired to make the first partner, if one may use such an expression, in
+the prosperity which he hoped to diffuse by his commercial treaty with
+her. But, as in the case of other men in advance of their age, the
+principles which he had asserted were destined to bear fruit at a later
+period. And the mere fact of a change in the person of the sovereign
+seemed to make a change in the policy hitherto pursued less unnatural.
+
+Yet, memorable as the reforms which it witnessed were destined to make
+it, no reign ever commenced with more sinister omens than that at which
+we have now arrived. The new King had not been on the throne a month,
+when a conspiracy was discovered, surpassing in its treasonable atrocity
+any that had been heard of in the kingdom since the days of the
+Gunpowder Plot; and, even before those concerned in that foul crime had
+been brought to punishment, the public mind was yet more generally and
+profoundly agitated by a scandal which, in one point of view, was still
+more painful, as in some degree involving the whole kingdom in its
+disgrace.
+
+The marriage of the present sovereign to Mrs. Fitzherbert has already
+been mentioned. A few years afterward, in the year 1795, regarding that
+marriage as illegal, he had contracted a second with his cousin, the
+Princess Caroline of Brunswick. But, even in royal families, a more
+unfortunate alliance had never taken place. They had never met till she
+arrived in England for the wedding; and, as he had never professed any
+other motive for consenting to the match than a desire to obtain the
+payment of his debts, he did not think it necessary to disguise his
+feelings, or to change his habits, or even to treat her with decency for
+a single day. On his very first introduction to her he behaved to her
+with marked discourtesy.[183] Shortly after the marriage he formally
+separated himself from her, and, both before and after the separation,
+lived in undisguised licentiousness. She, on her part, indignant at his
+neglect and infidelity, and exasperated at the restrictions which he
+presently placed on her intercourse with their only child, made no
+secret of her feelings, and on many occasions displayed such disregard
+of the ordinary rules of prudence and propriety, that he had some color
+for charges of infidelity to her marriage vows which, after a few years,
+he brought against her. The King, her uncle, could not refuse to appoint
+a commission to investigate the truth of the accusation; but the
+commissioners unanimously acquitted her of any graver fault than
+imprudence. She was again received at court, from which she had been
+excluded while the inquiry was pending; but her husband's animosity
+toward her was not appeased. As time wore on, and as the King's
+derangement deprived her of her only protector, it even seemed as if he
+desired to give it all the notoriety possible, till at last, wearied out
+by his implacable persecution, she sought and obtained his permission to
+quit the country and take up her abode abroad. It was a most unfortunate
+resolution on her part. She fixed her residence in Italy, where she
+gradually learned to neglect the caution which she had observed in
+England, till, after a year or two, reports arose of her intimacy with a
+servant whom she had raised from a menial situation to that of the chief
+officer of her household, and whom she admitted to a familiarity of
+intercourse which others besides her husband thought quite incompatible
+with innocence. He sent agents into Italy to inquire into the truth of
+those rumors; and their report so greatly confirmed them that, even
+before the King's death, he laid it before the Prime-minister, with a
+demand that he should at once take steps to procure him a divorce, in
+which he professed to believe that the Princess herself would willingly
+acquiesce. He was so far correct, that her legal advisers were willing
+to advise her to consent to "a formal separation, to be ratified by an
+act of Parliament." But such an arrangement fell far short of the
+Prince's wishes. The Princess Charlotte, the heiress to his throne, had
+died in childbirth two years before, and he was anxious to be set free
+to marry again. The ministers were placed in a situation of painful
+embarrassment. There was an obvious difficulty in pointing out to one
+who already stood toward them in the character of their sovereign, and
+who must inevitably soon become so, that his own conduct made the
+prospect of obtaining a divorce from the Ecclesiastical Courts hopeless;
+and the only other expedients calculated to attain his end, "a direct
+application to Parliament for relief, founded upon the special
+circumstances of the case," or "a proceeding against the Princess for
+high-treason," were but little more promising. Indeed, it was afterward
+ascertained to be the unanimous opinion of the judges that the charge of
+high-treason could not be legally sustained, since the individual who
+was alleged to be the partner in the criminality imputed to her was a
+foreigner, and therefore, "owing no allegiance to the crown," could not
+be said to have violated it.[184]
+
+He chafed under their resistance to his wish, and would have deprived
+them of their offices, could he have relied on any successors whom he
+might give them proving more complaisant; but, before he could make up
+his mind, the death of George III. forced upon both him and them the
+consideration of his and his wife's position, since it made it necessary
+to remodel the prayer for the royal family, and instantly to decide
+whether her name and title as Queen were to be inserted in it. He was
+determined that they should not be mentioned; and, as the practice of
+praying for a Queen Consort by name appeared not to have been
+invariable, they were willing to gratify him on this point, though it
+was evidently highly probable that she would consider this as a fresh
+insult, sufficient to justify her in carrying out a threat, which she
+had recently held out, of returning to England. Her ablest advisers did
+not, indeed, regard it in this light, since the prayer as now framed
+implored the Divine protection for "all the royal family" in general
+terms, in which she might be supposed to be included, and made no
+separate mention of any member of the family.[185] But, unfortunately,
+she was much more under the influence of counsellors who were neither
+lawyers nor statesmen, but who only desired to use her as a tool to
+obtain notoriety for themselves. A long negotiation ensued. It was
+inevitable that some application should be made to Parliament in
+connection with her affairs, since the annuity which had been settled
+upon her by Parliament in 1814, on the occasion of her departure from
+England, had expired with the life of the late King. And the ministers
+proposed that that annuity should now be raised from £35,000 to £50,000,
+on condition of her remaining abroad, having, by their positive refusal
+to concur in any proceedings against her while she remained abroad,
+extorted the King's acquiescence in this proposal, though he called it a
+"great and painful sacrifice of his personal feelings." They sought to
+conciliate her acceptance of it by mentioning her in it by her title of
+"Queen," and by coupling with it a sanction to her appointment of her
+law-officers, an Attorney and Solicitor General, an act which could only
+be exercised by a Queen. And, though a part of the condition of her
+residence abroad required that she should do so under some other title,
+that seemed only a conforming to an ordinary practice of royal princes
+on their travels. At the same time, the ministers stated frankly to Mr.
+Brougham, a lawyer of the highest reputation as an advocate, whom she
+had appointed her Attorney-general, that, if she should reject the
+offer, and come to England, as she had already announced her intention
+of doing, such a course would leave them no alternative, but would
+compel them to institute proceedings against her.
+
+Eventually she preferred the advice of others to that of Mr. Brougham,
+or, as it may, perhaps, be more consistent with the real fact to say,
+she yielded to her own feelings of hatred of her husband, which, it must
+be confessed, were far from unnatural. She believed, or professed to
+believe, that he had more to dread from an exposure of his conduct than
+she had from any revelations of her actions; and, under this impression,
+in the spring she crossed the Channel and took up her residence in
+London. It was a step which seemed to Lord Liverpool to leave him no
+alternative, and, in consequence, he at once took the course which he
+had from the beginning conceived her arrival would render indispensable.
+He brought down to Parliament a royal message from the King, announcing
+that her return to England had made it necessary to communicate to the
+Houses documents relating to her conduct since her departure from the
+kingdom, which he recommended to their immediate and serious attention.
+He proposed the appointment by ballot of a committee of the House of
+Lords to examine those documents; and when the committee had reported
+that the documents containing "allegations deeply affecting the honor of
+the Queen, etc., ... appeared to the committee calculated to affect not
+only the honor of the Queen, but also the dignity of the crown and the
+moral feelings and honor of the country, so that in their opinion, they
+should become the subject of a solemn inquiry, which might be best
+effected in the course of a legislative proceeding," he introduced a
+"Bill of Pains and Penalties" to deprive her of her title of Queen, and
+to annul her marriage.
+
+No one would willingly dwell on so melancholy and disgraceful a subject.
+As far as the Queen was concerned, a protracted investigation, during
+which a number of witnesses, favorable and unfavorable, were examined,
+left no doubt on the mind of almost all dispassionate people that the
+misconduct alleged against her had been abundantly proved. At the same
+time there was a feeling equally general that the King's treatment of
+her from the very beginning of their married life had disentitled him to
+any kind of relief; and this sentiment was so strongly shown by the
+gradual diminution of the majority in favor of the bill, as it proceeded
+through its several stages, that Lord Liverpool, who had already
+abandoned the clause annulling the marriage, eventually withdrew the
+whole bill, perceiving the impossibility of inducing the House of
+Commons to pass it when it should go down to that House.
+
+No act of Lord Liverpool's ministry has been attacked with greater
+bitterness than that of allowing any proceedings whatever to be taken
+against the Queen, partly on the ground that, however profligate her
+conduct had been, it had certainly not been more gross than that of her
+husband, which had provoked and given opportunity for her errors; partly
+because a great scandal was thus published to the world, and a shock was
+given to the national decency and morality which the ministers, above
+all men, were bound to avoid; partly, also, because the mode of
+proceeding adopted was alleged to be wholly unprecedented; and because,
+as was contended, the power of Parliament ought not to be invoked to
+inflict penalties which, if deserved, should have been left to the
+courts of law. It cannot be denied that there is weight in these
+objections; but, in estimating their force, it must be considered that
+every part of the conduct of the ministers showed that their motive was
+not the gratification of the King's private feelings, whether directed
+to the object of indulging his enmity against his wife or to that of
+obtaining freedom to contract a second marriage; on the contrary, so
+long as the Queen remained abroad, no language could be more distinct,
+consistently with the respect due to his royal dignity, than that in
+which they expressed to him their insurmountable objection to every mode
+of proceeding against her which he had suggested, founded almost equally
+on considerations of "the interests of his Majesty and of the
+monarchy,"[186] and "the painful obligation" under which they conceived
+themselves to lie "of postponing their regard for his Majesty's feelings
+to great public interests."
+
+But when the Queen came to England the case was greatly altered. The
+question now forced on the consideration of the cabinet was, not the
+mode of avoiding an intolerable scandal, but the choice between two
+scandals, both of the gravest character. The scandal to be dreaded from
+the revelations of the conduct of both King and Queen, that could not
+fail to result from the investigation which, in justice, must precede
+any attempt to legislate on the subject, was, indeed, as great as ever;
+but it had now to be compared with the alternative scandal of allowing a
+woman lying under such grievous imputations to preside over the British
+court, as, if resident in England, and in undisturbed possession of her
+royal rank, she of necessity must preside. The consequence would
+evidently have been that the court would have been deserted by all who
+could give lustre and dignity to it by their position and character;
+and, in the slights thus offered to her, royalty and the monarchy
+themselves would seem to be brought into contempt. The latter scandal,
+too, would be the more permanent. Grievous and shameful as might be the
+disclosures which must be anticipated from an investigation in which the
+person accused must be permitted the employment of every means of
+defence, including recrimination, the scandal was yet one which would,
+to a certain extent, pass away with the close of the inquiry. But, if
+she were left undisturbed in the enjoyment of her royal rank, and of
+privileges which could not be separated from it, that scandal would last
+as long as her life--longer, in all probability, than the reign. It is
+hardly too much to say that the monarchy itself might have been
+endangered by the spectacle of such a King and such a Queen; and the
+ministers might fairly contend that, of two great dangers and evils,
+they had, on the whole, chosen the least.
+
+Lastly, if the Queen's conduct was to be investigated, though the mode
+adopted was denounced as unconstitutional by the Opposition (for, not
+greatly to their credit, the leading Whigs made her guilt or innocence a
+party question), it does not seem to deserve the epithet, though it may
+be confessed to have been unsupported by any direct precedent. Isabella,
+the faithless wife of Edward II., had, indeed, been condemned by "the
+Lords" to the forfeiture of many of the estates which she had illegally
+appropriated; but it does not appear that her violation of her marriage
+vows, or even her probable share or acquiescence in her husband's
+murder, formed any portion of the grounds of her deprivation. And the
+Parliament which attainted Catherine Howard proceeded solely on her
+confession of ante-nuptial licentiousness, without giving her any
+opportunity of answering or disproving the other charges which were
+brought against her. Unprecedented, therefore, the course now adopted
+may be admitted to have been. But it was the only practicable one. The
+different minutes of the cabinet, which the Prime-minister laid before
+the King, established most conclusively the correctness of their opinion
+that no impeachment for high-treason could lie against her. She could
+not be an accomplice in such an offence of one who, being a foreigner,
+could not have committed it. It was equally impossible for the King to
+sue for a divorce, as one of his subjects might have done; because it
+was the established practice of Parliament not to entertain a bill of
+divorce without the judgment of the Ecclesiastical Court being
+previously obtained and produced. And, under the circumstances, to
+obtain from the Ecclesiastical Court such a sentence as could alone lay
+the foundation for a bill of divorce was clearly out of the question.
+
+The case was a new and extraordinary one, and, being such, could only be
+dealt with in some new and extraordinary manner. And in all such cases
+an appeal to Parliament seems the most, if not the only, constitutional
+mode of solving the difficulty. Where the existing laws are silent or
+inapplicable, the most natural resource clearly is, to go back to the
+fountain of all law; that is, to the Parliament, which alone is
+competent to make a new law. In one point of view the question may seem
+unimportant, since we may well hope that no similar case will ever arise
+to require the precedent now set to be appealed to; but not unimportant,
+if it in any way or degree contributes to establish the great principle,
+that the solution of all matters of moment to the state belongs to the
+Parliament alone: a principle which, in its legitimate completeness,
+carries with it a condemnation of many a modern association whose
+object, whether avowed or disguised, is clearly to supersede where it
+fails to intimidate the sole constitutional Legislature.
+
+The abandonment of the bill was naturally hailed as a triumph by the
+Queen and her partisans; but with the excitement of the struggle against
+the government the interest taken in her case died away. The next year,
+when she demanded to be crowned with her husband, his refusal to admit
+her claim elicited scarcely any sympathy for her under this renewed
+grievance; in truth, it was one as to which precedent was unfavorable to
+her demand. And the mortification at finding herself already almost
+forgotten contributed to bring on an illness of which she died in less
+than a year after the termination of what was called her trial; and in a
+short time both she and it were forgotten.
+
+For the next few years the history of the kingdom is one of progressive
+correction of abuses or defects. The King paid visits to Ireland and
+Scotland, parts of his dominions which his father had never once
+visited, and in both was received with the most exultant and apparently
+sincere acclamations. And, though one great calamity fell on the
+ministry in the loss of Lord Castlereagh--who, in a fit of derangement,
+brought on by the excitement of overwork, unhappily laid violent hands
+on himself--his death, sad as it was, could not be said to weaken or to
+affect the general policy of the cabinet. Indeed, as he was replaced at
+the Foreign Office by his old colleague and rival, Mr. Canning, in one
+point of view the administration may be said to have been strengthened
+by the change, since, as an orator, Canning had confessedly no equal in
+either House of Parliament. Another change was productive of still more
+practical advantage. Lord Sidmouth retired from the Home Office, and was
+succeeded by Mr. Peel, previously Secretary for Ireland; and the
+transfer of that statesman to an English office facilitated reforms,
+some of which were as yet little anticipated even by the new Secretary
+himself. The earliest of them, and one not the least important in its
+bearing on the well-doing of society, the mitigation of the severity of
+our Criminal Code, was, indeed, but the following up of a series of
+measures in the same direction which had been commenced in the time of
+the Duke of Portland's second administration, and, it must be added, in
+spite of its resistance. The influence of various trades, and of the
+owners of different kinds of property, pressing in turns upon our
+legislators, had rendered our code the most sanguinary that had,
+probably, ever existed in Christendom. Each class of proprietor regarded
+only the preservation of his own property, and had no belief in the
+efficacy of any kind of protection for it, except such as arose from the
+fear of death; nor any doubt that he was justified in procuring the
+infliction of that penalty to avert the slightest loss to himself. The
+consequence was that, at the beginning of the present century, there
+were above two hundred offences the perpetrators of which were liable to
+capital punishment, some of a very trivial character, such as cutting
+down a hop-vine in a Kentish hop-garden, robbing a rabbit-warren or a
+fish-pond, personating an out-pensioner of Greenwich Hospital, or even
+being found on a high-road with a blackened face, the intention to
+commit a crime being inferred from the disguise, even though no overt
+act had been committed. An act of Elizabeth made picking a pocket a
+capital offence; another, passed as late as the reign of William III.,
+affixed the same penalty to shop-lifting, even when the article stolen
+might not exceed the value of five shillings. And the fault of these
+enactments was not confined to their unreasonable cruelty; they were as
+mischievous even to those whom they were designed to protect as they
+were absurd, as some owners began to perceive. In the list of capital
+offences was that of stealing linen from a bleaching-ground. And a large
+body of bleachers presented a petition to Parliament entreating the
+repeal of the statute which made it such on the ground that,
+practically, it had been found not to strike terror into the thieves,
+but almost to secure them impunity from the reluctance of juries to find
+a verdict which would sentence a fellow-creature to the gallows for such
+an offence.
+
+Nor was this by any means the only instance in which the barbarity of
+the law defeated its object. And its combined impolicy and inhumanity
+had some years before attracted the notice of Sir Samuel Romilly, who
+had been Solicitor-general in the administration of 1806, and who,
+shortly after its dissolution, began to apply himself to the benevolent
+object of procuring the repeal of many of the statutes in question, and
+in the course of a few years did succeed in obtaining the substitution
+of milder penalties for several of the less flagitious offences. He died
+in 1818; but the work which he had began was continued by Sir James
+Mackintosh, a man of even more conspicuous ability, and one who could
+adduce his own experience in favor of the changes which he recommended
+to the Parliament, since he had filled the office of Recorder of Bombay
+for eight years, and had discharged his duties with a most diligent and
+consistent avoidance of capital punishment, which he had never inflicted
+except for murder; his lenity, previously unexampled in that land,
+having been attended with a marked diminution of crime. He procured the
+substitution of milder penalties in several additional cases; and at
+last, in 1822, he carried a resolution engaging the House of Commons
+"the next session to take into its serious consideration the means of
+increasing the efficacy of the criminal law by abating its undue rigor."
+And this success had the effect of inducing the new minister to take the
+question into his own hands. Peel saw that it was one which, if it were
+to be dealt with at all, ought to be regulated by the government itself,
+and not be left to independent members, who could not settle it with
+satisfactory completeness; and therefore, in 1823, he introduced a
+series of bills to carry out the principle implied in Mackintosh's
+resolution of the preceding year, not only simplifying the law, but
+abolishing the infliction of capital punishment in above a hundred
+cases. He was unable to carry out his principle as fully as he could
+have desired. The prejudice in favor of still retaining death as a
+punishment for forgery was too strong for even his resolution as yet to
+overbear, though many private bankers supplied him with the same
+arguments against it in their case which had formerly been alleged by
+the bleachers. But the example which he now set, enforced as it was with
+all the authority of the government, was followed in many subsequent
+sessions, till at last our code, instead of the most severe, has become
+the most humane in Europe, and death is now never inflicted except for
+murder, or crimes intended or calculated to lead to murder. It is worth
+remarking, however, that neither Romilly, Mackintosh, nor Peel ever
+entertained the slightest doubt of the right of a government to inflict
+capital punishment. In the last address which Mackintosh delivered to
+the grand-jury at Bombay he had said: "I have no doubt of the right of
+society to inflict the punishment of death on enormous crimes, wherever
+an inferior punishment is not sufficient. I consider it as a mere
+modification of the right of self-defence, which may as justly be
+exercised in deterring from attack as in repelling it."[187] And in his
+diary, when speaking of a death-warrant which he had just signed, he
+says: "I never signed a paper with more perfect tranquillity of mind. I
+felt agitation in pronouncing the sentence, but none in subscribing the
+warrant; I had no scruple of conscience on either occasion."
+
+And it seems that his position is unassailable. The party whose interest
+is to be kept in view by the Legislature in imposing punishments on
+offences is society, the people at large, not the offender. The main
+object of punishment is to deter rather than to reform; to prevent
+crime, not to take vengeance on the criminal. And, if crime be more
+effectually prevented by moderate than by severe punishments, society
+has a right to demand, for its own security (as a matter of policy, not
+of justice), that the moderate punishment shall, on that ground, be
+preferred. That punishments disproportioned in their severity to the
+magnitude of the offence often defeated their object was certain. Not
+only had jurymen been known to confess that they had preferred violating
+their oaths to doing still greater violence to their consciences, by
+sending a man to the gallows for a deed which, in their opinion, did not
+deserve it, but the very persons who had been injured by thefts or
+forgeries were often deterred from prosecution of the guilty by the
+knowledge that the forfeiture of their lives must follow their
+conviction. It was almost equally certain that criminals calculated
+beforehand on the chance of impunity which the known prevalence of these
+feelings afforded them. Wherever the sympathy of the public does not go
+along with the law, it must, to a great extent, fail; and that the
+terrible frequency of sanguinary punishment had failed in all its
+objects, was proved by the fact that, in spite of the numerous
+executions which took place, crimes increased in a still greater
+proportion than the population. Under the reformed system, now first
+inaugurated on an extensive scale, crimes have become rarer, detection
+and punishment more certain--a combination of results which must be the
+object equally of the law-giver and the philanthropist.
+
+It is not quite foreign to this subject to relate that, a year or two
+before, a mode of trial had been abolished which, though long disused,
+by some curious oversight had still been allowed to remain on the
+statute-book. In the feudal times either the prosecutor or the prisoner,
+in cases of felony, had a right to claim that the cause should be
+decided by "wager of battle;" but it was an ordeal which, with one
+exception in the reign of George II., had not been mentioned for
+centuries. In 1817, however, the relatives of a woman who had been
+murdered, being dissatisfied with the acquittal of a man who had been
+indicted as her murderer, sued out "an appeal of murder" against him, on
+which he claimed to have the appeal decided by "wager of battle," and
+threw down a glove on the floor of the court to make good his challenge.
+The claim was protested against by the prosecutor; but Lord
+Ellenborough, the Chief-justice, pronounced judgment that, "trial by
+battle having been demanded, it was the legal and constitutional mode of
+trial, and must be awarded. It was the duty of the judges to pronounce
+the law as it was, and not as they might wish it to be."[188] He gave
+sentence accordingly; and, had the two parties been of equal stature and
+strength, the Judges of the Common Pleas might have been seen, in their
+robes, presiding from sunrise till sunset over a combat to be fought, as
+the law prescribed, with stout staves and leathern shields, till one
+should cry "Craven," and yield up the field. Fortunately for them, the
+alleged murderer was so superior in bodily strength to his adversary,
+that the latter declined the contest. But the public advancement of the
+claim for such a mode of decision was fatal to any subsequent exercise
+of it; and, in spite of the Common Council of London, who, confiding,
+perhaps, in the formidable appearance presented by some of the City
+Champions on Lord Mayor's Day, petitioned Parliament to preserve it, the
+next year the Attorney-general brought in a bill to abolish it, and the
+judges were no longer compelled to pronounce an absurd sentence in
+obedience to an obsolete law, framed at a time when personal prowess was
+a virtue to cover a multitude of sins, and might was the only right
+generally acknowledged.
+
+The foundation, too, was laid for other reforms. Lord Liverpool was more
+thoroughly versed than any of his predecessors, except Pitt, in the
+soundest principles of political economy; and in one of the first
+speeches which he made in the new reign he expressed a decided
+condemnation, not only of any regulations which were designed to favor
+one trade or one interest at the expense of another, but generally of
+the whole system and theory of protection; and one of his last measures
+made an alteration in the manner of taxing corn imported from foreign
+countries, which was greatly to the advantage of the consumer. It was
+known as the "sliding-scale," the tax on imported corn varying with the
+price in the market, rising when the price fell, and falling when it
+rose; the design with which it was framed being to keep the price to the
+consumer at all times as nearly equal as possible. At first, however, it
+was vehemently denounced by the bulk of the agriculturists, who were
+re-enforced on this occasion by a large party from among the Whigs, and
+especially by some of those connected with Ireland. But a more suitable
+period for discussing the establishment of Free-trade as the ruling
+principle of our financial policy will occur hereafter.
+
+The introduction of the sliding-scale was almost the last act of Lord
+Liverpool's ministry. At the beginning of 1827 he was preparing a fresh
+measure on the same subject, the effect of which was intended to
+diminish still farther the protection which the former act had given,
+and which was in consequence denounced by many landholders of great
+wealth and influence, led, on this subject, by the King's favorite
+brother, the Duke of York.[189] But, a few days after the meeting of
+Parliament, he was struck down by an attack of paralysis, from which he
+never recovered.
+
+In his post as Prime-minister he was succeeded by Canning, not without
+great reluctance on the part of the King; not, probably, so much because
+he feared to find in him any desire to depart from the policy of Lord
+Liverpool, except on the Catholic question (for even on matters of
+foreign policy, on which Canning had always been supposed most to fix
+his attention, he had adopted the line which Lord Liverpool had laid
+down for the cabinet with evident sincerity),[190] as because his
+Majesty had never wholly forgiven him for the attitude which he had
+taken, differing on one or two points from that of his colleagues on the
+Queen's case. And, as has been mentioned in a former chapter, he even,
+with the object of evading the necessity of appointing him, suggested to
+the Duke of Wellington the singular scheme of allowing the remaining
+members of Lord Liverpool's cabinet to select their own chief,[191]
+which the Duke, though coinciding with him in his dislike of Canning, of
+whom he entertained a very causeless suspicion, rejected without
+hesitation, as an abandonment of the royal prerogative in one of its
+most essential duties or privileges. Another of his Majesty's notions,
+if it had been carried out, would have been one of the strangest
+violations of constitutional principle and practice which it is possible
+to conceive. The Duke of York, who had for many years been
+Commander-in-chief, died in January of the same year, and on his death
+the King actually proposed to take that office on himself. For the
+moment Lord Liverpool was able to induce him to abandon the idea, and to
+confer the post on the Duke of Wellington. But it had taken such
+possession of his mind that he recurred to it again when, on Canning
+becoming Prime-minister, the Duke resigned the office; and he pressed it
+on the Cabinet with singular pertinacity till, on Canning's death, the
+Duke was prevailed on to resume the command. It is evident that no
+arrangement could possibly be more inconsistent with every principle of
+the constitution. The very foundation of parliamentary government is,
+that every officer of every department is responsible to Parliament for
+the proper discharge of his duties. But the investiture of the sovereign
+with ministerial office of any kind must involve either the entire
+withdrawal of that department from parliamentary control, or the
+exposure of the sovereign to constant criticism, which, however
+essential to the efficiency of the department, and consequently to the
+public service, would be wholly inconsistent with the respect due to the
+crown. The first alternative it is certain that no Parliament would
+endure for a moment; the second, by impairing the dignity of the
+monarch, could scarcely fail in some degree to threaten the stability of
+the monarchy itself.
+
+Canning's ministry was too brief to give time for any transaction of
+internal importance. That of Lord Goderich, who succeeded him, though
+longer by the almanac, was practically briefer still, since it never met
+Parliament at all, but was formed and fell to pieces between the
+prorogation and the next meeting of the Houses. But that which followed,
+under the presidency of the Duke of Wellington, though after a few
+months its composition became entirely Tory, is memorable for the first
+great departure from those maxims of the constitution which had been
+reckoned among its most essential principles ever since the Revolution.
+Of the measures which bear that character, one was carried against the
+resistance of the ministry, the other by the ministers themselves. And
+it may at first sight appear singular that the larger measure of the two
+was proposed by the Duke after those members of his cabinet who had
+originally been supposed to give it something of a Liberal complexion
+had quitted it. The Reform Bill of 1832--to which we shall come in the
+next chapter--has been often called a peaceful revolution. The
+Toleration Acts, as we may call the bills of 1828 and 1829, are scarcely
+less deserving of that character.
+
+The constitution, as it had existed for the last hundred and forty
+years, had been not only a Protestant but a Church of England
+constitution. Not only all Roman Catholics, but all members of
+Protestant Non-conforming sects, all who refused to sign a declaration
+against the doctrine of Transubstantiation, and also to take the
+Sacrament according to the rites of the one Established Church, were
+disqualified for any appointment of trust. That the object with which
+the Test Act had been framed and supported was rather political than
+religious is notorious; indeed, it was supported by the Protestant
+Dissenters, though they themselves were to suffer by its operation, so
+greatly at that time did the dread of Popery and the French King
+overpower every other consideration.[192] On the Roman Catholics, after
+the reign of James II. had increased that apprehension, the restrictions
+were tightened. But those which inflicted disabilities on the Protestant
+Non-conformists had been gradually relaxed. The repeal of two, the Five
+Mile and the Conventicle Acts, had, as we have seen in the last chapter,
+been recent measures of Lord Liverpool. But the Test Act still remained,
+though it had long been practically a dead letter. The Union with
+Scotland, where the majority of the population was Presbyterian, had
+rendered it almost impossible to maintain the exclusion of Englishmen
+resembling the Scotch in their religious tenets from preferments, and
+even from seats in the House of Commons, to which Scotchmen were
+admissible. And though one Prime-minister (Stanhope) failed in his
+attempt to induce Parliament to repeal the Test Act, and his successor
+(Walpole) refused his countenance to any repetition of the proposal,
+even he did not reject such a compromise as was devised to evade it; and
+in the first year of George II.'s reign (by which time it was notorious
+that many Protestant Non-conformists had obtained seats in municipal
+corporations, and even in the House of Commons, who yet had never
+qualified themselves by compliance with the act of 1673) a bill of
+indemnity was introduced by the minister, with at least the tacit
+consent of the English bishops, to protect all such persons from the
+penalties which they had incurred. And the bill, which was only annual
+in its operation, was renewed almost every year, till, in respect of all
+such places or dignities (if a seat in the House of Commons can be
+described by either of those names), no one thought of inquiring whether
+a man, so long as he were a Protestant, adhered to the Established
+Church or not; members of the House of Commons even openly avowing their
+nonconformity, and at times founding arguments on the fact.
+
+The practical nullification of the Test Act by these periodical bills of
+indemnity had been for some time used by two opposite parties--both that
+which regarded the maintenance of the exclusive connection of the
+constitution with the Church of England as of vital importance to both
+Church and constitution, and that which was opposed to all restrictions
+or disqualiflcations on religious grounds--as an argument in their
+favor. The one contended that there could be no sufficient reason for
+repealing a law from which no one suffered; the other, that it was a
+needless provocation of ill-feeling to retain a law which no one ever
+dreamed of enforcing. Hitherto the latter had been the weaker party. One
+or two motions for the repeal of the Test Act, which had been made in
+former years,[193] had been defeated without attracting any great
+notice; but in the spring of 1828 Lord John Russel, then a
+comparatively young member, but rapidly rising into influence with his
+party, carried a motion in the House of Commons for leave to bring in a
+bill to repeal the act, so far as it concerned the Protestant
+Non-conformists, by a very decisive majority,[194] in spite of all the
+efforts of Peel and his colleagues.
+
+The ministry was placed in a difficult position by his success, since
+the usual practice for a cabinet defeated on a question of principle was
+to resign; and it is probable that they would not have departed from
+that rule now, had not this defeat occurred so early in their official
+life. But on this occasion it seemed to them that other questions had to
+be considered besides the constitutional doctrine of submission on the
+part of a ministry to the judgment of the Parliament.[195] Theirs was
+now the fourth administration that had held office within twelve months;
+and their resignation, which would compel the construction of a fifth,
+could hardly fail not only to embarrass the sovereign, but to shake
+public confidence in government generally. It was also certain that they
+could rely on a division in the House of Lords being favorable to them,
+if they chose to appeal from one House to the other. Under these
+circumstances, they had to consider what their line of conduct should
+be, and there never were two ministers better suited to deal with an
+embarrassment of that kind than the Duke of Wellington and Mr. Peel. The
+Duke's doctrine of government was that "the country was never governed
+in practice according to the extreme principles of any party
+whatever;"[196] while Peel's disposition at all times inclined him to
+compromise. He was quite aware that on this and similar questions public
+feeling had undergone great alteration since the beginning of the
+century. There was a large and increasing party, numbering in its ranks
+many men of deep religious feeling, and many firm supporters of the
+principle of an Established Church, being also sincere believers in the
+pre-eminent excellence of the Church of England, who had a conscientious
+repugnance to the employment of the most solemn ordinance of a religion
+as a mere political test of a person's qualifications for the discharge
+of civil duties. In the opinion of the Bishop of Oxford (Dr. Lloyd),
+this was the feeling of "a very large majority of the Church itself,"
+and of the University.[197] Peel, therefore, came to the conclusion--to
+which he had no difficulty in bringing his colleague, the
+Prime-minister--that "it might be more for the real interests of the
+Church and of religion to consent to an alteration in the law" than to
+trust to the result of the debate in the House of Lords to maintain the
+existing state of things. Accordingly, after several conferences with
+the most influential members of the Episcopal Bench, he framed a
+declaration to be substituted for the Sacramental test, binding all who
+should be required to subscribe it--a description which included all who
+should be appointed to a civil or corporate office--never to exert any
+power or influence which they might thus acquire to subvert, or to
+endeavor to subvert, the Protestant Church of England, Scotland, or
+Ireland, as by law established. The declaration was amended in the House
+of Lords by the addition of the statement, that this declaration was
+subscribed "on the true faith of a Christian," introduced at the
+instigation of Lord Eldon, who had not held the Great Seal since the
+dissolution of Lord Liverpool's administration, but who was still looked
+up to by a numerous party as the foremost champion of sound
+Protestantism in either House.
+
+Not that the addition of these words at all diminished the
+dissatisfaction with which the great lawyer regarded the bill. On the
+contrary, he believed it to be not only a weapon wilfully put into the
+hands of the enemies of the Established Church, but a violation of the
+constitution, of which, as he regarded it "the existing securities were
+a part." He pointed out that "the King himself was obliged to take the
+sacrament at his coronation;" and he argued from this and other grounds
+that "the Church of England, combined with the state, formed together
+the constitution of Great Britain; and that the acts now to be repealed
+were necessary to the preservation of that constitution."
+
+With every respect for that great lawyer, his argument on this point
+does not appear sustainable. For the bill in question did not sweep away
+securities for the Established Church, but merely substituted, for one
+which long disuse and indemnity had rendered wholly inoperative, a fresh
+security, which, as it would be steadily put in force, might fairly be
+expected to prove far more efficacious. And it can hardly be contended
+that it was not within the province of the Legislature to modify an
+existing law in this spirit and with this object, however important
+might be the purpose for which that law had originally been framed. Nay,
+it might fairly be argued that the more important that object was, the
+more were they who strengthened the means of attaining that object
+entitled to be regarded as faithful servants and supporters of the
+principle of the constitution.
+
+The measure, however, relieved the Protestant Dissenters alone. Not only
+did Lord Eldon's amendment preserve the Christian character of the
+Legislature, but the requirement to sign the declaration against
+Transubstantiation, which was unrepealed, left the Roman Catholics still
+under the same disqualifications as before. But the days of those
+disqualifications were manifestly numbered. Indeed, many of those who
+had followed the ministers in their original resistance to the repeal of
+the Test Act had been avowedly influenced by the conviction that it
+could not fail to draw after it the removal of the disabilities
+affecting the Roman Catholics. As has been said before, the disabilities
+in question had originally been imposed on the Roman Catholics on
+political rather than on religious grounds. And the political reasons
+for them had been greatly weakened, if not wholly swept away, by the
+extinction of the Stuart line of princes. Their retention or removal
+had, therefore, now become almost wholly a religious question; and the
+late bill had clearly established as a principle that, though the state
+had a right to require of members of other religious sects that they
+should not abuse the power which might arise from any positions or
+employments to which they might be admitted, to the subversion or injury
+of the Established Church of England, yet, when security for their
+innocuousness in this respect was provided, it was not justified in
+inquiring into the details of their faith. And if this were to be the
+rule of government for the future, the conclusion was irresistible that
+a similar security was all that the state was justified in demanding
+from Roman Catholics, and that it could have no warrant for
+investigating their opinion on Transubstantiation, or any other purely
+theological tenet. There could be no doubt that the feelings of the
+public had been gradually and steadily coming round to this view of the
+question. The last House of Commons had not only passed a bill to remove
+Roman Catholic disabilities (which was afterward thrown out in the House
+of Lords), but had also passed, by a still larger majority, a
+resolution, moved by Lord Francis Leveson Gower (who was now the
+Secretary for Ireland), in favor of endowing the Roman Catholic priests
+in Ireland. And at the late general election the opinions of the
+candidates on what was commonly called Catholic Emancipation had been
+the great cardinal question with a great number, probably a majority, of
+the constituencies.
+
+It may be remarked that it was not the Test Act which excluded Roman
+Catholics from Parliament, but a bill which, fifteen years later, had
+been passed (probably under the influence of Lord Shaftesbury) at the
+time when the whole kingdom was excited by the daily expanding
+revelations of the Popish Plot.[198] And this bill had a loop-hole which
+was never discovered till now but the discovery of which totally changed
+the whole aspect of the question. Even before the bill repealing the
+Test Act had passed through all its stages, Sir Francis Burdett had
+again induced the House of Commons to pass a resolution condemning the
+continuance of the Roman Catholic disabilities; to which, however, the
+peers, by a far larger majority, refused their concurrence.[199] But,
+within a month of this division, the aspect of the whole question was
+changed by the shrewdness of an Irish barrister, who had discovered the
+loop-hole or flaw in the bill of 1678 already alluded to, and by the
+energy and promptitude with which he availed himself of his discovery.
+Mr. O'Connell had a professional reputation scarcely surpassed by any
+member of the Irish Bar. He was also a man of ancient family in the
+county of Kerry. And, being a Roman Catholic, he had for several years
+been the spokesman of his brother Roman Catholics on most public
+occasions. He now, on examination of the bill of 1678, perceived that,
+though it forbade any Roman Catholic from taking a seat in either House
+of Parliament, it contained no prohibition to prevent any constituency
+from electing him its representative. And when, on the occasion of some
+changes which were made in the cabinet, the representation of the County
+Clare was vacated by its member, Mr. Vesey Fitzgerald, accepting the
+office of President of the Board of Trade, O'Connell instantly offered
+himself as a candidate in opposition to the new minister, who, of
+course, sought re-election.
+
+Mr. Fitzgerald was a man who had always supported the demands of the
+Roman Catholics; he was also personally popular, and had the undivided
+support of nearly all the gentlemen and principal land-owners of the
+county, in which he himself had large property. But O'Connell's cause
+was taken up by the entire Roman Catholic priesthood; addresses in his
+favor were read at the altars of the different churches; and, after five
+days' polling, Mr. Fitzgerald withdrew from the contest. The Sheriff, in
+great perplexity, made a special return, reporting that "Mr. Fitzgerald
+was proposed, being a Protestant, as a fit person to represent the
+county in Parliament; that Mr. O'Connell, a Roman Catholic, was also
+proposed; that he, Mr. O'Connell, had declared before the Sheriff that
+he was a Roman Catholic, and intended to continue a Roman Catholic; and
+that a protest had been made by several electors against his return."
+
+It was accepted as a return of O'Connell, who, however, made no attempt
+to take his seat, though when he first stood he had assured the electors
+that there was no law to prevent him from doing so; but the importance
+of his success was not to be measured by his actual presence or absence
+in the House of Commons for the remainder of a session. It had made it
+absolutely impossible to continue the maintenance of the disabilities;
+what one Irish constituency had done, other Irish constituencies might
+be depended on to do.[200] And it was quite certain that, as opportunity
+offered, almost every constituency in Munster and Connaught, and many in
+Leinster, would follow the example of Clare, and return Roman Catholic
+representatives; while to retain a law which prevented forty or fifty
+men duly elected by Irish constituencies from taking their seats must
+have appeared impossible to all but a few, whom respect for the
+undoubted sincerity of their attachment to their own religion and to the
+constitution, as they understood it, is the only consideration which can
+save them from being regarded as dangerous fanatics. At all events, the
+ministers were not among them. And the Duke of Wellington, though he had
+previously hoped, by postponing the farther consideration of the
+question for a year or two, to gain time for a calmer examination of it
+when the existing excitement had cooled down,[201] at once admitted the
+conviction that the result of the Clare election had rendered farther
+delay impossible. In his view, and that of those of his colleagues whose
+judgment he estimated most highly, the Irish constituencies and their
+probable action at future elections were not the only parties whose
+opinions or feelings must be regarded by a responsible statesman; but to
+them must be added the constituencies of the larger island also, since,
+while, to quote the language of Mr. Peel, "the general election of 1826
+had taken place under circumstances especially calculated to call forth
+the manifestation of Protestant feeling throughout the country," they
+had returned a majority of members in favor of concession, as was proved
+by the recent division on Sir F. Burdett's motion. Moreover, apart from
+the merits or demerits of concession, taken by itself, there was a
+manifest danger that the keeping up of the excitement on the subject by
+a continued adherence to the policy of restriction might, especially
+among such a people as the Irish, so impulsive, and, in the lower
+classes, so absolutely under the dominion of the priests, kindle an
+excitement on other subjects also, still more difficult to deal with. It
+was even already certain that the Roman Catholic priests were
+endeavoring to tamper with the loyalty of the soldiers of their
+persuasion. Nor was it clerical influence alone that the government had
+to dread. A year or two before a Catholic Association had been formed,
+which included among its members all the wealthiest and ablest of the
+Roman Catholic laymen, noblemen, squires, and barristers. Its
+organization had been so skilfully conducted, and all its measures had
+been so carefully kept within the requirements of the law, that the
+crown lawyers, on being consulted, pronounced it impossible to interfere
+with it; and, by what may be called a peaceful agitation, it had
+attained such extraordinary power over the minds of the bulk of the
+Roman Catholics, that the Lord-lieutenant reported that "he was quite
+certain that they could lead on the people to open rebellion at a
+moment's notice, and that their organization was such that, in the hands
+of desperate and intelligent leaders, they would be extremely
+formidable[202]."
+
+Under all these circumstances, the Duke had no hesitation in deciding
+that it had become absolutely necessary to concede the demands of the
+Roman Catholics and their supporters for a removal of their political
+disabilities. And it was equally obvious that, the more promptly the
+concession was made, the more gracious it would seem, and the greater
+was the probability of its having the conciliatory and tranquillizing
+effect the hope of which made it so desirable. He was not a man to lose
+time when he had once made up his mind. It was already too late in the
+session for anything to be done in 1828; but the Parliament had scarcely
+been prorogued before he put his views on the subject before the King,
+and began, in concert with the Home-secretary, to frame a bill such as
+he hoped might settle the long-agitated question, without doing more
+violence than was necessary to the feelings of those whose opposition or
+reluctance he was aware he should have to encounter: among whom was the
+King himself, who, though thirty years before he had, with an
+ostentation rather unbecoming, considering his position, put himself
+forward as an advocate of Emancipation, had subsequently changed his
+opinion, and had recently taken more than one occasion to declare that
+he had never doubted that, as the head and protector of the Protestant
+religion, he was bound to refuse his assent to any relaxation of the
+existing law.[203] The Duke, however, was too well acquainted with his
+royal master's character to apprehend any real firmness of resistance
+from him; but he knew that a great majority of the clergy, and no small
+portion of the country gentlemen, were conscientiously and immovably
+fixed in opposition to any concession at all, some refusing to regard
+the question in any but a purely religious light, and objecting to
+associate in the task of legislation for those whom they regarded as
+adherents of an idolatrous superstition; while those who mingled
+political reasoning with that founded on theology dwelt also on the
+danger to be apprehended to the state, if political power were given to
+those whose allegiance to the King was divided with another allegiance
+which they acknowledged to a foreign prelate. And he had presently an
+unmistakable proof afforded him how great was the strength of this party
+in the country. Peel was one of the representatives of the University of
+Oxford; and, as from his earliest enjoyment of a seat in Parliament he
+had been a prominent opponent of the Roman Catholic claims, he
+considered that it was to that maintenance of a policy identified in
+their eyes with that Protestant ascendency which his supporters took to
+be both the chief bulwark and one of the most essential parts of the
+constitution that he owed his position as their member. With a
+conscientiousness which was rather overstrained, and not quite
+consistent with the legitimate position of a member of the House of
+Commons as a representative, and not a delegate, he now conceived that
+his change of view on the subject made it proper for him to give his
+constituents an opportunity of making choice of some one else who should
+more faithfully represent them. He accordingly resigned his seat,
+offering himself at the same time for re-election. But he was defeated
+by a very large majority, though his competitor was one who could not
+possibly be put on a level with him either for university distinction or
+for parliamentary eminence.
+
+Not the less, however, for all their difficulties and discouragements,
+did the ministers proceed in the course on which they had resolved. They
+inserted in the speech with which the King opened the session of 1829 a
+recommendation to the Houses "to take into consideration the whole
+condition of Ireland, and to review the laws which imposed civil
+disabilities on his Majesty's Roman Catholic subjects." And with as
+little delay as possible they introduced a bill to remove those
+disabilities. But there was another measure which they felt it to be
+indispensable should precede it. A previous sentence of the royal speech
+had described the Catholic Association as one "dangerous to the public
+peace, and inconsistent with the spirit of the constitution, keeping
+alive discord and ill-will among his Majesty's subjects, and one which
+must, if permitted to continue, effectually obstruct every effort
+permanently to improve the condition of Ireland." And the ministers
+naturally regarded it as their first duty to suppress a body which could
+deserve to be so described. They felt, too, that the large measure of
+concession and conciliation which they were about to announce would lose
+half its grace, and more than half its effect, if it could possibly be
+represented as a submission to an agitation and intimidation which they
+had not the power nor the courage to resist. They determined, therefore,
+to render such an imputation impossible, by previously suppressing the
+Association. It was evident that it could not be extinguished by any
+means short of an act of Parliament. And the course pursued, with the
+discussions which took place respecting it, show in a very clear and
+instructive manner the view taken by statesmen of the difference between
+what is loyal or illegal, constitutional or unconstitutional; their
+apprehension that conduct may be entirely legal, that is to say, within
+the letter of the law, but at the same time perfectly unconstitutional,
+outside of and adverse to the whole spirit of the constitution. The
+royal speech had not ventured to describe the Association as illegal.
+The Duke of Wellington expressly admitted that "in the original
+institution and formation of the society there was nothing strictly
+illegal."[204] And its founder and chief, Mr. O'Connell, had been at all
+times careful to inculcate on his followers the necessity of avoiding
+any violation of the law. But the speech had also declared the
+association to be "inconsistent with the spirit of the constitution."
+And its acts, as the Duke proceeded to describe them, certainly bore out
+that declaration. "Those acts consisted principally in levying a tax
+upon certain of his Majesty's subjects called Catholic rent, and this by
+means and acts of extreme violence; by appointing persons to collect
+these rents; and farther by adopting measures to organize the Catholic
+population; by appointing persons to superintend that organization; and
+by assuming to themselves the government of the country; and, still
+more, affecting to assume it. Besides, they expended this rent in a
+manner contrary to, and utterly inconsistent with, all law and order and
+the constitution of the country." No member of either House denied the
+accuracy of this description of the Association's proceedings. And if it
+were correct, it was incontrovertible that the denunciation of it as an
+utterly unconstitutional body was not too strong. Indeed, the fact of
+its "levying a tax" upon a portion of the King's subjects (to say
+nothing of the intimidation, amounting to compulsion, by which, as was
+notorious, it was in many instances exacted) was the assumption of one
+of the most important functions of the Imperial Parliament; it was the
+erection of an _imperium in imperio_, which no statesmen intrusted with
+the government of a country can be justified in tolerating. And this was
+felt by the Opposition as well as by the ministers; by the Whigs as
+fully as by the Tories. The most eloquent of the Whig party, Mr.
+Stanley, was as decided as Mr. Peel himself in affirming that the
+existence of the Association was "inconsistent with the spirit of the
+constitution," and that it was "dangerous that the people of a country
+should look up to any public body distinct from the government, opposed
+to the government, and monopolizing their attachment and
+obedience."[205]
+
+It was, therefore, with the almost unanimous approval of both parties
+that the bill framed for the suppression of the Association was
+received. The framing of such a bill was not unattended by difficulties,
+as Peel acknowledged,[206] since "no one wished to declare that every
+political meeting was illegal;" while at the same time it was necessary
+to guard against "having its enactments evaded, since a more dangerous
+precedent than the successful evasion of acts of the Legislature could
+scarcely be conceived." But the measure, as it was proposed, skilfully
+steered clear of these difficulties. It met them by intrusting "the
+enforcement of the law to be enacted to one person alone." The bill
+proposed "to give to the Lord-lieutenant, and to him alone, the power of
+suppressing any association or meeting which he might think dangerous to
+the public peace, or inconsistent with the due administration of the
+law; together with power to interdict the assembly of any meeting of
+which previous notice should have been given, and which he should think
+likely to endanger the public peace, or to prove inconsistent with the
+due administration of the law." And farther, "to interdict any meeting
+or association which might be interdicted from assembling, or which
+might be suppressed under this act, from receiving and placing at their
+control any moneys by the name of rent, or any other name." But the act
+was not to be one of perpetual duration. It could not be concealed that
+such a prohibition or limitation of the general right of public meeting
+and public discussion was a suspension of a part of the constitution;
+and therefore the ministers were content to limit its operation "to one
+year and the end of the then next session of Parliament," feeling
+"satisfied that there would be no objection to continue it, if there
+should be any necessity for its continuance." And this limitation was a
+substantial mitigation of its severity. It made the bill, as Mr. Stanley
+correctly described it, "not a permanent infringement on the
+constitution, but a temporary deviation from it, giving those powers
+which were necessary at the moment," but not maintaining them an hour
+longer than they were necessary.
+
+And this seems to be the course most in accordance with the spirit of
+the constitution, with former practice, with common-sense. Deeds which
+violate the letter of the law can be dealt with by the law. But actions
+or courses of action which, even if they may be thought to overstep the
+law, transgress it so narrowly as to elude conviction, can only be
+reached by enactments which also go in some degree beyond the ordinary
+law; and, so going beyond it, are to that extent encroachments on the
+ordinary privileges and rights of the subject, and suspensions of the
+constitution. But the very term "suspension" shows that the power
+conferred is but temporary, otherwise it would be synonymous with
+abrogation. And all parties may wisely agree, as they did in this
+instance, to a temporary suspension of the people's rights, though there
+would be none to whom their permanent abrogation would not be
+intolerable.
+
+The bill, then, for the suppression of the Association passed with
+universal approval, and it may be regarded as furnishing a model for
+dealing with similar associations, if ever they should arise. And as
+soon as it was passed Mr. Peel introduced the greater measure, that for
+the repeal of the disabilities. In drawing the necessary bill the
+ministers had had two questions of special importance to consider:
+firstly, whether it should be unlimited concession which should be
+granted, such as would throw open to the Roman Catholics every kind of
+civil office; and, secondly, whether it should be accompanied by any
+other measure, which might render it more palatable to its adversaries,
+as diminishing a portion at least of the dangers which those who
+regarded the question in a purely political light most apprehended. On
+the first point it was determined that, with the exception of three
+civil offices, those of the Lord Chancellors of England and Ireland and
+the Lord-lieutenant of Ireland,[207] and some of a purely ecclesiastical
+character, such as the Judge of the Court of Arches, every kind of
+preferment should be opened to the Roman Catholics.[208] The declaration
+against Transubstantiation and the oath of supremacy, certain
+expressions in which were the obstacles which had hitherto kept the
+Roman Catholics out of office and out of Parliament, were to be
+repealed, and another to be substituted for them which should merely
+bind him who took it to defend the King, to maintain the Protestant
+succession, and to declare that "it was not an article of his faith, and
+that he renounced, rejected, and abjured the opinion, that princes
+excommunicated or deposed by the Pope might be deposed and murdered; and
+that he disclaimed, disavowed, and solemnly abjured any intention to
+subvert the present Church Establishment as settled by law within this
+realm, and that he would never exercise any privilege to which he was or
+might become entitled to disturb or weaken the Protestant religion or
+Protestant government in this kingdom."[209]
+
+The second question was, it will probably be confessed, even more
+important. Pitt, who had always contemplated, and had encouraged the
+Irish Roman Catholics to contemplate, the abolition of their political
+disabilities as an indispensable appendage to, or, it may be said, part
+of the Union, had designed, farther, not to confine his benefits to the
+laymen, but to endow the Roman Catholic clergy with adequate stipends, a
+proposal which was received with the greatest thankfulness, not only by
+the Irish prelates and clergy themselves, but also by the heads of their
+Church at Rome, who were willing, in return, to give the crown a veto on
+all the ecclesiastical appointments of their Church in the two
+islands.[210] The justice of granting such an endowment could hardly be
+contested. The Reformation in Ireland, if what had taken place there
+could be called a reformation at all, had been wholly different from the
+movement which had almost extinguished Popery in England. The great
+majority of the Irish people had never ceased to adhere to the Romish
+forms, and the Reformation there had been simply a transfer of the
+property of the Romish Church to the Church of England, unaccompanied by
+any corresponding change of belief in the people, who had an undeniable
+right to claim that the state, while making this transfer, should not
+deprive of all provision the clergy to whose ministrations they still
+clung with a zeal and steadiness augmented rather than diminished by the
+discouragements under which they adhered to them.
+
+The policy of granting such endowment was equally conspicuous. No
+measure could so bind the clergy to the government; and no such security
+for the loyalty and peaceful, orderly behavior of the poorer classes
+could be provided, as might be expected from the attachment to the
+government of those who had over them an influence so powerful in its
+character and so unbounded in its strength as their priests. And the
+Duke of Wellington, who had at one time been himself the Irish
+Secretary, and, as an intimate friend of Lord Castlereagh, who held that
+office at the time of the Union, had a perfect knowledge of what had
+been intended at that time--and who was, of course, aware of the very
+decided favor which the House of Commons had so lately shown to the
+project--proposed to follow out Pitt's plan in that particular, and to
+connect a provision[211] for the Roman Catholic clergy with the removal
+of their political disabilities from the laymen. Unluckily, Peel, who,
+throughout the whole transaction, was, of all the cabinet, the
+counsellor on whose judgment he most relied, took a different view of
+the expediency of making such a provision, having, indeed, "no objection
+to it in point of principle." But he saw many practical difficulties,
+which he pressed on the Duke with great earnestness. He argued that for
+the government "to apply a sum of money to the payment of the ministers
+of the Church of Rome in Ireland, granting a license for the performance
+of their spiritual functions, would be a virtual and complete
+supersession, if not repeal, of the laws which prohibit intercourse with
+Rome;" and asked, "Could the state affect to be ignorant that the bishop
+whom it paid derived his right to be a bishop from the See of Rome?"
+Another difficulty he found in the apprehension that "the admission of
+the right of the Roman Catholic clergy to an endowment might produce
+similar claims on the part of the Dissenters in England, who contribute
+in like manner to the support of their own religion and of the
+established religion also." He suggested, farther, that, if the Roman
+Catholic priest were allowed, in addition to his stipend, "to receive
+dues, Easter offerings, etc., from his parishioners, his condition would
+then be better than that of the ministers of the Established Church in
+many of the parishes in Ireland." And, finally, he urged the practical
+objection, that the endowment would greatly strengthen the opposition to
+the whole measure, by the reluctance which, "on purely religious
+grounds," many would feel to the endowment of the Roman Catholic faith,
+who would yet be inclined to acquiesce in the removal of the
+disabilities, "on grounds rather political than religious." He was "not
+insensible to the importance of establishing some bond of connection
+between the Roman Catholic clergy and the state;" but he believed that
+the omission of a provision for their endowment "was important to the
+ultimate success of the government in proposing the measure before
+them."
+
+It is not probable that the Duke was greatly influenced by the first, or
+what may be called the constitutional, objection--that any concert with
+the Papal Court with respect to the appointments or endowments of its
+clergy would be a violation of the act which prohibited any intercourse
+with Rome. The removal of the disabilities required the repeal of one
+act of Parliament; and, if the holding communications with Rome on the
+subject of clerical appointments should be so construed as to require
+the repeal of another, it would hardly seem that there could be any
+greater violation of or departure from the principles of the
+constitution in repealing two acts than in repealing one. As to the
+second of Peel's objections, the English Dissenters could not possibly
+be said to stand on the same ground as the Irish Roman Catholics, since
+their ministers had certainly never been deprived by any act of the
+state of any provision which they had previously enjoyed; but their
+position as unendowed ministers was clearly one of their own making. The
+possible inferiority in point of emolument of some of the Protestant
+cures in Ireland to that which might be enjoyed by some of the Roman
+Catholic clergy could hardly be regarded as the foundation of any
+argument at all, since no law had ever undertaken, or ever could
+undertake, to give at all times and under all circumstances equal
+remuneration to equal labors. But the consideration last suggested was
+exactly the one to influence such a mind as that of the Duke of
+Wellington, generally contented to deal with a present difficulty. He
+was determined to carry Emancipation, because he saw that the Clare
+election had made it impossible to withhold or even to delay it; and,
+being so determined, he was desirous to avoid encumbering it with any
+addition which might increase the opposition to it. At the same time he
+was far from being sanguine of its effect, "with whatever guards or
+securities it might be accompanied, to pacify the country or to avert
+rebellion,"[212] which, in his apprehension, was undoubtedly impending;
+and, under the influence of these combined feelings, he eventually
+withdrew that clause from the bill. It was accompanied by another bill,
+disfranchising the forty-shilling freeholders in Ireland. They were a
+class of voters sunk in the deepest poverty, and such as certainly could
+not well be supposed capable of forming, much less of exercising, an
+independent judgment on political matters. Yet this bill is remarkable
+as having been the only enactment passed since the Revolution to narrow
+the franchise. It had no opposition to anticipate from English or Scotch
+members, and was accepted by the Irish members as the price of
+Emancipation.
+
+No measure that had ever been framed since the Revolution had caused
+such excitement in the country; but the preponderance of feeling in its
+favor was equally marked in both Houses of Parliament. In the House of
+Commons 320 supported it, while only 142 could be marshalled against it.
+In the House of Lords 213 divided for it against 109. And in April it
+received the royal assent.
+
+The general policy of removing the disabilities it is not necessary to
+discuss here. It is quite clear that the Clare election had rendered it
+impossible to maintain them. And if some of those who judge of measures
+solely by their effects still denounce this act, as one which has failed
+in its object of tranquillizing Ireland, many of those who admit the
+failure ascribe it to the omission to accompany it by one securing a
+state endowment for the Roman Catholic clergy, pronouncing it, without
+that appendage, a half measure, such as rarely succeeds, and never
+deserves success. However that may be, it is certain that the measure,
+coupled with the repeal of the Test Act of the previous year, was one
+which made a great and permanent change in the practical working of the
+constitution of the kingdom, as it had been interpreted for the last one
+hundred and fifty years. Of that constitution one of the leading
+features, ever since the Restoration, had been understood to be the
+establishment and maintenance of the political as well as the
+ecclesiastical ascendency of the Church of England. On that ascendency
+the repeal of the Test Act in 1828 had made the first, and that a great,
+inroad, and the present statute entirely abolished it as a principle of
+government. So far as political privileges went, every Christian sect
+was now placed on a footing of complete equality. But so to place them
+may fairly be regarded as having been required not only by justice and
+expediency, but by reasons drawn from the history of the nation and from
+the circumstances under which these disabilities had been imposed.
+Before the Rebellion no one was excluded from the English Parliament on
+account of his religion, whether he was a Roman Catholic, a
+Presbyterian, or a member of any other of the various sects which were
+gradually arising in the country. It was not till after the Restoration
+that a recollection of the crimes of the Puritans, when they had got the
+upper-hand, and the fear of machinations and intrigues, incompatible
+with the freedom and independence of the people, which were imputed to
+the Roman Catholics, gave birth to the statutes depriving both
+Protestant and Roman Catholic Non-conformists of all legislative and
+political power. The restrictions thus imposed on the Presbyterians and
+other Protestant sects had, as we have seen, been gradually relaxed by a
+periodical act of indemnity. Indeed, after the Union with Scotland, it
+was impossible with any show of consistency to maintain them, since, as
+it has been already pointed out, after Presbyterianism had been
+recognized as the established religion of Scotland, it would have seemed
+strangely unreasonable to regard it as a disqualification on the
+southern side of the Border. But, as long as the Stuart princes were
+from time to time disquieting the government by their open invasions or
+secret intrigues, no such relaxation could with safety be granted to the
+Roman Catholics, since it could hardly be expected that they would
+forbear to employ any power which they might acquire for the service of
+a prince of their own religion. That danger, however, which ever since
+1745 had been a very shadowy one, had wholly passed away with the life
+of the last Stuart lay prince, Charles Edward; and his death left the
+rulers of the kingdom and advisers of the sovereign free to take a
+different and larger view of their duty to the nation as a whole.
+
+It was notorious that the number of Non-conformists was large. In the
+middle of the last century it had received a considerable accession
+through the institution of the new sect of Wesleyan Methodists; which,
+through the supineness of the clergy of the Established Church in that
+generation, had gradually increased, till it was estimated that the
+various Dissenting sects in England equalled at least half the number of
+the members of the Established Church. In Wales they were believed to
+form the majority. In Scotland three-fourths of the people were
+Presbyterians; and in Ireland the Roman Catholics outnumbered the
+Protestants in nearly the same proportion. Taking England, Wales,
+Scotland, and Ireland together, a calculation which reckoned the
+different sects of Protestant and Roman Catholic Non-conformists united
+at half the entire population would probably not have erred very widely
+from the truth.
+
+It must have been the aim of every statesman deserving of the name to
+weld these different religious parties into one harmonious whole, as far
+as their civil position went. And measures which had that tendency could
+not be foreign to the constitution, properly understood. A constitution
+which confines its benefits to one-half of a nation hardly merits the
+title of a constitution at all. For every constitution ought to extend
+its protection and its privileges equally to every portion of the
+people, unless there be some peculiarity in the principles or habits of
+any one portion which makes its participation in them dangerous to the
+rest. It had undoubtedly been the doctrine of Pitt, and of the greater
+part of those who since his time had held the reins of government, that
+if any portion of the King's subjects did cherish a temper dangerous to
+the rest, it was because they were debarred from privileges to which
+they conceived themselves to have a just right, and that their
+discontent and turbulence were the fruit of the restrictions imposed on
+them. In proposing to remove such a grievance Pitt certainly conceived
+himself to be acting in accordance with the strictest principles of the
+constitution, and not so much innovating upon it as restoring it to its
+original comprehensiveness. And so of the measure, as it was now
+carried, it will apparently be correct to say that, though it did make
+an important change in the practical working of the constitution, it
+made it only by reverting to the fundamental principles of civil and
+religious liberty, to which every subject had a right; which had only
+been temporarily restrained under the apprehension of danger to the
+state, and which the cessation of that apprehension made it a duty to
+re-establish in all their fulness.
+
+But it is by no means clear that in the conduct of the measure the
+constitution was not violated in one very important point, the proper
+relation subsisting between a constituency and its representative, by
+Mr. Peel's resignation of his seat for the University of Oxford. That he
+was sensible that the act stood in need of explanation is proved by the
+careful statement of the motives and considerations that determined him
+to it, which he drew up twenty years afterward. They were of a twofold
+character. To quote his own words: "When I resolved to advise, and to
+promote to the utmost of my power, the settlement of that question, I
+resolved at the same time to relinquish, not only my official
+station,[213] but the representation of the University of Oxford. I
+thought that such decisive proofs that I could have no object, political
+or personal, in taking a course different from that which I had
+previously taken, would add to my influence and authority, so far, at
+least, as the adjustment of the particular question at issue was
+concerned." "I cannot deny that in vacating my seat I was acting upon
+the impulse of private feelings, rather than upon a dispassionate
+consideration of the constitutional relations between a representative
+and his constituents. I will not seek to defend the resolution to which
+I came by arguments drawn from the peculiar character of the academic
+body, or from the special nature of the trust confided to its members;
+still less will I contend that my example ought to be followed by others
+to whom may be offered the same painful alternative of disregarding the
+dictates of their own consciences, or of acting in opposition to the
+opinions and disappointing the expectations of their constituents. I
+will say no more than that my position was a very peculiar one, that I
+had many painful sacrifices to make, and that it would have been a great
+aggravation of them, if it could have said with truth that I was
+exercising an authority derived from the confidence of the University to
+promote measures injurious, in her deliberate judgment, either to her
+own interests or to those of the Church."
+
+No one would willingly censure too severely an act dictated by a sense
+of honor, even if somewhat overstrained and too scrupulously delicate;
+but when Mr. Peel speaks of "defending" or not defending his deed, he
+clearly admits it to be one open to impeachment. And when he forbears to
+"contend that his example ought to be followed," he seems practically to
+confess a consciousness that any defence against such impeachment must
+fail; while the last sentence quoted above involves an assertion that a
+constituency (in this instance one of the two most important
+constituencies in the kingdom) could be justified in regarding a measure
+required by the safety, or at least by the welfare, of the state, as
+injurious to its own interests; and so far admits a possible severance
+between the interests of a particular class or body and those of the
+whole community, which can have no real existence. That, however, is not
+the point to be investigated here. The charge, as it seems, to which Mr.
+Peel's deed lays him open is, that by it he lowered the position and
+character of a member of Parliament from those of a representative to
+those of a delegate. It was an adoption of the principle laid down for
+his own guidance by a colleague of Mr. Burke above fifty years before,
+and indignantly repudiated by that great political philosopher, as
+proceeding from an entire misapprehension of the rights of a
+constituency and of a member[214] of Parliament. He told the electors of
+Bristol that "when they had chosen their member, he was not a member of
+Bristol, but a member of Parliament; and that if the local constituent
+should have an interest, or should form an opinion, evidently opposite
+to the real good of the rest of the community, the member for that place
+ought to be as far as any other from any endeavor to give it effect;"
+that a representative "owes to his constituents, not his industry only,
+but his judgment, and betrays instead of serving them, if he sacrifices
+it to their opinion." And in so saying he carried with him the
+concurrence and approval of all his contemporaries whose sentiments on
+such a question were entitled to weight.
+
+In the States-general of France each member was, by the original
+constitution of that body, a delegate, and not a representative. He
+could not even remonstrate against the most oppressive grievance of
+which the previous instructions of the constituent body had not
+instructed him to complain; and this limitation of his duties and powers
+was, undoubtedly, one very principal cause which led to the
+States-general so rapidly falling into utter disrepute. It was no light
+thing to take a step which had a tendency to bring down the British
+Parliament to the level of the despised and long-disused States-general.
+And it is the more necessary to put the case in a clear and true light,
+because at the present day there is an evident disposition on the part
+of constituencies to avail themselves of Peel's conduct in this instance
+as a precedent, in spite of his protest against its being so regarded,
+and to fetter their representatives with precise instructions; and a
+corresponding willingness on the part of candidates to purchase support
+at elections by a submissive giving of pledges on a variety of subjects,
+so numerous as to leave themselves no freedom of judgment at all. On the
+great majority of subjects which come before Parliament, a member of
+Parliament, if he be a sensible and an honest man, has a far better
+opportunity of obtaining correct information and forming a sound opinion
+than can be within reach of any constituency, whose proneness to
+misjudge is usually in exact proportion to the magnitude of its numbers.
+Every elector justifiably may, and naturally will, seek to ascertain
+that between the candidate whom he supports and himself there is a
+general conformity of opinion; an absolute identity he will never find,
+and he has no right to ask.[215]
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 182: £118,776,000. Alison, c. lxxvi.]
+
+[Footnote 183: See Lord Malmesbury's account of their first
+interview.--_Diaries of Lord Malmesbury_, iii., 218.]
+
+[Footnote 184: "Parliamentary Debates," series 2, ii., 632.]
+
+[Footnote 185: Mr. Brougham gave his opinion that if the Duke of York,
+or any other member of the royal family, had been named, it would have
+been offensive to the Queen; but the measure adopted he regarded as of a
+neutral character. (Mentioned by Lord Liverpool, "Life of Lord
+Liverpool," iii., 55.)]
+
+[Footnote 186: "Minutes of Cabinet," dated 10th and 14th February, 1820,
+forwarded the King by Lord Liverpool ("Life of Lord Liverpool," iii.,
+35-88).]
+
+[Footnote 187: "Life of Sir J. Mackintosh," by R.J. Mackintosh, ii.,
+110, 116.]
+
+[Footnote 188: "Lives of the Chief-justices," iii., 171.]
+
+[Footnote 189: In a letter on the subject to Lord Liverpool, the Duke
+goes the length of calling the proposed bill "an experiment which,
+should it fail, must entail the dreadful alternative of the entire ruin
+of the landed interests of the empire, with which he is decidedly of
+opinion that the nation must stand or fall."--_Life of Lord Liverpool_,
+iii., 434.]
+
+[Footnote 190: At one time it was the fashion with writers of the
+Liberal party to represent Lord Liverpool as led by Lord Castlereagh in
+the earlier, and by Canning in the later, part of his administration;
+but Lord Liverpool's correspondence with both these ministers shows
+clearly that on every subject of foreign as well as of home policy he
+was the real guide and ruler of his cabinet. Even the recognition of the
+independence of the South American provinces of Spain--which is so often
+represented as exclusively the work of Canning--the memorandum on the
+subject which Lord Liverpool drew up for the cabinet proves that the
+policy adopted was entirely his own, and that as such he adhered to it
+resolutely, in spite of the avowed disapproval of the Duke of Wellington
+and the known unwillingness of the King to sanction it; and it may be
+remarked (as he and Lord Castlereagh have sometime been described as
+favoring the Holy Alliance), that the concluding sentence of his letter
+to the Duke on the subject expresses his hostility, not only to that
+celebrated treaty, but to the policy which dictated and was embodied in
+it. (See Lord Liverpool's memorandum for the cabinet and letter to the
+Duke of Wellington, December 8, 1824.)--_Life of Lord Liverpool_, iii.,
+297-305.]
+
+[Footnote 191: See ante, p. 222.]
+
+[Footnote 192: "With much prudence or laudable disinterestedness," says
+Hallam ("Constitutional History," ii., 532).]
+
+[Footnote 193: The last time had been in 1790, when there had been a
+majority of 187 against it.--_Peel's Memoirs_, i., 99.]
+
+[Footnote 194: 237 to 193.]
+
+[Footnote 195: "Peel's Memoirs," i., 68.]
+
+[Footnote 196: "Wellington's Civil Despatches," iv., 453.]
+
+[Footnote 197: See his letter to Peel, March 23 ("Peel's Memoirs," i.,
+92-100).]
+
+[Footnote 198: The entry of this bill in Cobbett's "Parliamentary
+History" is: "The House of Commons testified a very extraordinary zeal
+in unravelling the Popish Plot, and, to prevent mischief in the
+interval, passed a bill to disable Papists from sitting in either House
+of Parliament," to which the Lords, when the bill came up to their
+House, added a proviso exempting the Duke of York from its operation.
+An. 1678; October 26 to November 21.---_Parliamentary History_, iv.,
+1024-1039.]
+
+[Footnote 199: In the House of Commons the majority for Sir F. Burdett's
+resolution was six--372 to 266. But, in the House of Lords, Lord
+Lansdowne, moving the same resolution, was defeated by forty-five--182
+to 137.]
+
+[Footnote 200: See Fitzgerald's letter to Peel ("Peel's Memoirs," i.,
+114).]
+
+[Footnote 201: "Peel's Memoirs," i., 121.]
+
+[Footnote 202: See "Lord Anglesey's Letters," _ibid._, pp. 126, 147.]
+
+[Footnote 203: As early as the year 1812, on the negotiations (mentioned
+in a former chapter) for the entrance of Lord Grenville and Lord Grey
+into the ministry, the Duke of York mentioned to both those noblemen
+that the Regent had an insuperable objection to the concession of
+Emancipation. And it seems probable that it was the knowledge of his
+sentiments on that point that greatly influenced the course which Lord
+Liverpool subsequently pursued in regard to that question.--See _Life of
+Lord Liverpool_, i, 381.]
+
+[Footnote 204: Speech on moving the second reading of the bill in the
+House of Lords, February 19, 1829 ("Hansard," xx., 389).]
+
+[Footnote 205: Speech on the first reading of the bill, February 10
+("Hansard," xx., 208).]
+
+[Footnote 206: Speech on the first reading ("Hansard," xx., 198).]
+
+[Footnote 207: An amendment was proposed by Lord Chandos to add the
+office of Prime-minister to these three, on the ground that if a Roman
+Catholic were Prime-minister "he might have the disposal of all the
+patronage of the state and the Church vested in his hands." But Mr. Peel
+pointed out that the law of England "never recognized any such office as
+that of Prime-minister. In the eyes of the law the ministers were all on
+an equality." And the position, such as it was, being a conventional
+one, was not necessarily connected with the office of First Lord of the
+Treasury. "In a recent instance his late right honorable friend, Mr.
+Canning, had determined to hold the office of Prime-minister with that
+of Secretary of State. And when Lord Chatham was Prime-minister, he did
+not hold the office of First Lord of the Treasury." At the same time he
+explained that the impropriety of intrusting a Roman Catholic with
+Church patronage was already guarded against in the bill, a clause of
+which provided that "it should not be lawful for any person professing
+the Roman Catholic religion directly or indirectly to advise the crown
+in any appointment to or disposal of any office or preferment, lay or
+ecclesiastical, in the united Church of England and Ireland, or of the
+Church of Scotland."--_Hansard_, xx., 1425.]
+
+[Footnote 208: Many years afterward the restriction as to the Lord
+Chancellorship of Ireland was abolished.]
+
+[Footnote 209: The plan which Pitt had intended to propose was to
+substitute in lieu of the Sacramental test a political test, to be
+imposed indiscriminately on all persons sitting in Parliament, or
+holding state or corporation offices, and also on all ministers of
+religion, of whatever description, etc., etc. This test was to disclaim
+in express terms the sovereignty of the people, and was to contain an
+oath of allegiance and "fidelity to the King's government of the realm,
+and to the established constitutions of Church and state."--Letter of
+Lord Grenville, given in _Courts and Cabinets of George III._, and
+quoted by Lord Stanhope, _Life of Pitt_, iii., 270. This plan seems very
+preferable to that now adopted, since it removed every appearance of
+making a distinction between the professors of the different creeds,
+when the same oath was to be taken by all indifferently.]
+
+[Footnote 210: The question had been discussed with the highest Papal
+authorities more than once since the beginning of the century. In 1812
+Mgr. Quarantotti, the prelate who, during the detention of the Pope in
+France by Napoleon, was invested with the chief authority in
+ecclesiastical affairs at Rome, in a letter to the Vicar-apostolic, Dr.
+Poynter, formally announced the consent of the Papal See to give the
+King a veto on all ecclesiastical appointments within the United
+Kingdom; and, after his return to Rome, Pio VII. himself confirmed the
+former title by a second addressed, by his instructions, to the same Dr.
+Poynter, which letter, in 1816, was read by Mr. Grattan in the House of
+Commons, it being throughout understood that this concession of the veto
+to the King was conditional on the abolition of the disabilities and the
+endowment of the priesthood. And in 1825, after Lord Francis Egerton's
+resolution had been carried in the House of Commons, Dr. Doyle, one of
+the most eminent of the Roman Catholic bishops in Ireland, in an
+examination before a committee of the House of Lords, expressed the
+willingness of the Roman Catholic clergy to accept a state provision, if
+it were permanently annexed to each benefice, and accompanied with a
+concession of an equality of civil rights to the Roman Catholic
+laity.--See _Life of Lord Liverpool_, ii, 145; _Diary of Lord
+Colchester, March_ 17, 1835, iii., 373; _Peel's Memoirs_, i., 306, 333
+_seq._]
+
+[Footnote 211: The sum to be thus employed seems to have been intended
+to be £300,000 a year.--_Peel's Memoirs_, i., 197. On the whole question
+of the payment and Peel's objections to it, see _ibid._, pp. 197, 306.]
+
+[Footnote 212: See his "Civil Despatches," iv., 570. In February, 1829,
+he said to Lord Sidmouth, "It is a bad business, but we are aground."
+"Does your Grace think, then," asked Lord Sidmouth, "that this
+concession will tranquillize Ireland?" "I can't tell; I hope it will,"
+answered the Duke, who shortly discovered, and had the magnanimity to
+admit, his mistake.--_Life of Lord Sidmouth_, iii., 453. It is
+remarkable that the question of endowing the Roman Catholic clergy was
+again considered by Lord John Russell's ministry in 1848. A letter of
+Prince Albert in October of that year says, with reference to it: "The
+bishops have protested against Church endowment, being themselves well
+off; but the clergy would gratefully accept it if offered, but dare not
+avow this."--_Life of the Prince Consort_, ii., 186.]
+
+[Footnote 213: This first extract refers in part to the proposal which
+he made to the Duke to resign his office as Secretary of State, and to
+support the Emancipation as a private member, a design which he only
+relinquished at the Duke's earnest entreaty. The second extract refers
+to the seat in Parliament alone.--See _Peel's Memoirs_, i., 310, 312.]
+
+[Footnote 214: Speech to the electors of Bristol on being declared by
+the sheriffs duly elected member for that city, November 3,
+1774.--_Burke's Works_, iii., 11, ed 1803.]
+
+[Footnote 215: It is worth pointing out, however, that, as if it were
+one of the natural fruits of the Reform Bill, the Liberal Committee of
+the Livery of London in 1832 passed a series of resolutions asserting
+the principle of delegation without the slightest modification; one
+resolution affirming "that members chosen to be representatives in
+Parliament ought to do such things as their constituents wish and direct
+them to do;" another, "that a signed engagement should be exacted from
+every member that he would at all times and in all things act
+conformably to the wishes of a majority of his constituents, or would at
+their request resign the trust with which they had honored
+him."--_Annual Register_, 1832, p. 300; _quoted by Alison_, 2d series,
+v., 355.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+
+Demand for Parliamentary Reform.--Death of George IV., and Accession of
+William IV.--French Revolution of 1830.--Growing Feeling in Favor of
+Reform.--Duke of Wellington's Declaration against Reform.--His
+Resignation: Lord Grey becomes Prime-minister.--Introduction of the
+Reform Bill.--Its Details.--Riots at Bristol and Nottingham.--Proposed
+Creation of Peers.--The King's Message to the Peers.--Character and
+Consequences of the Reform Bill.--Appointment of a Regency.--
+Re-arrangement of the Civil List.
+
+
+One of Pitt's great measures of domestic, apart from financial or
+commercial, policy having become law, it seemed in some degree natural
+to look for the accomplishment of the other, a reform of the House of
+Commons, which, indeed, after the conclusion of the war, had been made
+at times the subject of earnest petition, being one in which a far
+greater number of people had a lively interest than that excited by
+Catholic Emancipation. The Englishmen who had advocated that measure had
+been striving for the adoption of a principle rather than for a
+concession from which they could expect any personal benefit, since very
+few in any English or Scotch constituency were Roman Catholics, or
+desired to return a Roman Catholic representative. But thousands in
+every county, including the whole body of citizens of some of the
+largest and most flourishing towns, felt a personal concern in the
+attainment of Parliamentary Reform, as the measure which would give
+them, and which could alone give them, that voice in the affairs of the
+kingdom to which they felt themselves entitled, but which they had never
+yet enjoyed.
+
+And before the end of the next session the prospect of the early success
+of their aspirations was greatly increased by the death of the King.
+George IV., who in his early manhood had attached himself to the Whigs
+with an ardor and ostentation altogether unbecoming his position as heir
+to the throne, had formally separated himself from them after the death
+of Fox in 1806, and had gradually come to regard their adversaries with
+a favor as exclusive as he had formerly shown to themselves. But the
+Duke of Clarence, who now succeeded to the throne, had always shown a
+leaning toward the Whigs, who of late had been commonly regarded as the
+reforming party. While the war lasted, and during the few remaining
+years of the reign of George III., no active steps toward Reform were
+taken in Parliament; but under George IV. more than one borough
+convicted of gross and habitual corruption, as has been mentioned, was
+disfranchised. Grampound was so punished in the time of Lord Liverpool,
+and its members were transferred to Yorkshire, so as to give that
+largest of the counties four representatives; and it may be remarked
+that this arrangement caused the Prime-minister to suggest an
+improvement in the details of an election--which was afterward
+universally adopted--when, in reply to a remark on the great
+inconvenience that was found to exist in taking the poll at once in so
+large a county as Yorkshire, he hinted at the possibility of obviating
+that difficulty by allowing polls to be taken in different parts of the
+county. And, since the Duke had been in office, two more boroughs,
+Penrhyn and East Retford, had also been disfranchised; though the
+Reformers failed in their endeavor to get the seats thus vacated
+transferred to Manchester and Birmingham. With the accession of the new
+sovereign, however, they became more active. They found encouragement in
+other circumstances also. Many of those who were commonly called the
+Ultra Tories had been so alienated from the Duke's government by the
+Emancipation Act, that they were known to be ready to coalesce with
+almost any party for the sake of overturning his administration.
+Moreover, as forty years before, the French Revolution of 1789 had
+caused great political excitement in England, so now the new French
+revolution of July acted as a strong stimulus on the movement party in
+this as well as in other countries; and altogether there was a very
+general feeling that the time for important changes had come. The Duke
+of Wellington was not blind to the prevalence of the idea; and, being by
+no means willing to admit that his own policy of the preceding year had
+in the least contributed to strengthen it, he conceived it to be his
+duty to discountenance it by every means in his power; but the steps
+which he took with that object only invigorated and inflamed it. As
+Prime-minister, he inserted in the speech with which the new sovereign
+opened his first Parliament in the autumn after his accession a general
+panegyric on that "happy form of government under which, through the
+favor of Divine Providence, this country had enjoyed for a long
+succession of years a greater share of internal peace, of commercial
+prosperity, of true liberty, of all that constitutes social happiness,
+than had fallen to the lot of any other country of the world." And in
+his own character, a few nights afterward, he added a practical
+commentary on those sentences of the royal speech, when, in allusion to
+Lord Grey's expression of a hope that the ministers would prepare "to
+redress the grievances of the people by a reform of the Parliament," he
+repudiated the suggestion altogether, avowing that the government were
+contemplating no such measure, and adding that "he would go farther, and
+say that he had never read or heard of any measure up to that moment
+which in any degree satisfied his mind that the state of the
+representation could be improved or rendered more satisfactory to the
+country at large than at that moment. He was fully convinced that the
+country possessed at that moment a Legislature which answered all good
+purposes of legislation to a greater degree than any Legislature had
+ever answered them in any country whatever.... And he would at once
+declare that, as far as he was concerned, as long as he held any station
+in the government of the country, he should always feel it his duty to
+resist any measure of Reform when proposed by others."
+
+Such uncompromising language was, not unnaturally, regarded by the
+Opposition in both Houses as a direct defiance, and the challenge was
+promptly taken up both in and out of Parliament. It happened that at
+this moment the ministry was extremely unpopular in the City; not,
+indeed, on account of his hostility to Reform, but in consequence of the
+recent introduction by the Home-secretary of a police force in London,
+on the model of one which the Duke himself, when Irish Secretary, had
+established in Dublin. The old watchmen had been so notoriously
+inefficient that it might have been expected that the change would have
+been hailed with universal approval and gratitude, but it met with a
+very different reception. Many of the newspapers which had not yet
+forgiven the passing of Catholic Emancipation made it a ground for the
+strongest imputations on the Duke himself, some of them even going the
+length of affirming that he aimed at the throne, and that the
+organization of this new force was the means on which he reckoned for
+the attainment of his object. No story is too gross for the credulity of
+the populace. To hear of such a plot was to believe it; to believe it
+was to resolve to defeat it; and at the beginning of November the
+government received several warnings that a plan was in agitation to
+raise a formidable riot on Lord Mayor's Day, when the King and the Duke
+himself were expected to dine with the Lord Mayor. The Lord Mayor even
+wrote to the Duke to suggest the prudence of his coming "strongly and
+sufficiently guarded," and the result of this advice was certainly
+strange. The Duke cared little enough about personal danger to himself,
+but he regarded himself as specially bound by his office to watch over
+the public tranquillity, and to do nothing that might be expected to
+endanger it. He was at least equally solicitous that a new reign should
+not open with a tumult which could in any way be regarded as an insult
+to the King; and, under the influence of these feelings, he took the
+responsibility of giving the King the unprecedented advice of abandoning
+his intention of being present at the Guildhall banquet. Such a step had
+an inevitable tendency to weaken the ministry still farther by the
+comments which it provoked. Even his own brother, Lord Wellesley, did
+not spare his sarcasms, pronouncing it "the boldest act of cowardice he
+had ever heard of;" while the Reformers ascribed the unpopularity which
+it confessed to the Duke's declaration against any kind or degree of
+Reform; and, to test the correctness of this opinion, Mr. Brougham, who,
+in the House of Commons, was the most eloquent champion of Reform, gave
+notice of a motion on the subject for the 16th of November. Before that
+day came, however, the ministry had ceased to exist. On the preceding
+evening it had been defeated on a proposal to refer to a select
+committee the consideration of the Civil List, a new settlement of which
+was indispensable at the beginning of a new reign, and on the morning of
+the 16th the Duke resigned, not only advising the King to intrust the
+formation of the new cabinet to Lord Grey--who was universally
+recognized as the head of the Whig party--but recommending his Majesty
+also to be prepared to consent to a measure of moderate Reform, which,
+though he could not bring himself to co-operate in it, he was satisfied
+that the temper of the House of Commons, if not of the people
+out-of-doors also, rendered unavoidable.[216] The advice was taken. Lord
+Grey had no difficulty in forming a ministry in which the Whigs were
+aided by the junction of several of the more moderate Tories, who had
+regarded Canning as their leader; and from the very beginning
+Parliamentary Reform was proclaimed to be the one great object of his
+government. It would be more correct to call it a Reform of the House of
+Commons, since there was no idea of interfering with the House of Lords,
+even in those parts of it which were of a representative character, the
+Scotch and Irish peers. But, by whatever title the ministerial policy
+was designated, no one misunderstood what was intended; and as
+Parliament was, after a few days, adjourned over the Christmas holidays,
+the recess was spent by a sub-committee of the cabinet in framing a
+measure.
+
+The great extension of our trade, which was the fruit partly of his wise
+commercial policy, and partly of the long war; the rapid and prodigious
+growth of our manufactures, developed by the inventive ingenuity of our
+mechanics and engineers, had given a consideration and influence to the
+commercial, manufacturing, and moneyed classes which could not be
+disregarded. The land-owners, who had previously almost monopolized the
+representation, no longer constituted the wealthiest class of the
+community. Pitt himself had raised a banker to the peerage. More
+recently, men closely connected with the commercial classes had become
+cabinet ministers, one of whom had even subsequently sacrificed office
+to his feeling of the propriety of enfranchising a single town,
+Birmingham. But there were other towns at least equal in importance to
+Birmingham which were unrepresented, and it was clearly impossible to
+maintain a system which gave representatives to boroughs like Gatton,
+Old Sarum, or Corfe Castle--where the electors scarcely outnumbered the
+members whom they elected--and withheld them from large and opulent
+manufacturing centres like Manchester, Leeds, and Sheffield. The
+enfranchisement, therefore, of these towns, and of others whose
+population and consequent importance, though inferior to theirs, was
+still vastly superior to those of many which had hitherto returned
+representatives, was so manifestly reasonable and consistent with the
+principles of our parliamentary constitution, that it was impossible to
+object to it. And their enfranchisement unavoidably led to the
+disfranchisement of the smaller boroughs, unless the House of Commons
+were to be enlarged to a number which was not likely to tend to the
+facilitation of business. Indeed, in the opinion of the framers of the
+bill, the House was _already too large_, and they proposed to reduce its
+number by upward of sixty--a step to which it is probable that many of
+those whose opposition contributed to defeat it subsequently repented of
+their resistance. Nevertheless, the line adopted by the Duke of
+Wellington's ministry showed that there was still a large party to whom
+reform on a large scale was altogether distasteful; and accordingly the
+bill which, under the influence of these considerations, Lord Grey's
+administration brought forward in the spring of 1831, gave rise to the
+fiercest struggles in both Houses of Parliament that had been witnessed
+for many generations. One Parliament was dissolved; two sessions of that
+which followed were opened in a single year; once the ministry itself
+was dissolved, though speedily reconstructed; and three bills were
+framed, each in some degree differing from its predecessor in some of
+its details, though all preserved the same leading principles of
+disfranchising wholly or partially the smaller boroughs; of
+enfranchising several large and growing towns; of increasing the number
+of county representatives; and of enfranchising also some classes which
+previously had had no right of voting. It would be a waste of time to
+specify the variations in the three bills. It is sufficient to confine
+our attention to that which eventually became law. Fifty-six boroughs
+were wholly disfranchised; those in which the population fell short of a
+certain number (2000), and where the amount of assessed taxes paid by
+the inhabitants was correspondingly small. Thirty more were deprived of
+one of their members, being those in which the population was between
+2000 and 4000. And the seats thus vacated were divided between the towns
+which since the Revolution had gradually grown into importance, the
+suburbs of the metropolis, and the counties, the majority of which were
+now divided into two halves, each half returning two members, as many as
+had previously represented the whole. The boundaries of the boroughs,
+too, were in most cases extended.
+
+More important, perhaps, in its influence on subsequent legislation was
+the alteration made in the qualifications which constituted an elector.
+Hitherto the franchise, the right of voting at elections, had been based
+on property. The principle had not, indeed, been uniformly adhered to in
+the boroughs, where, as Lord John Russell, in the speech with which he
+introduced the bill, pointed out, a curious variety of courses had been
+adopted. "In some," as he described the existing practice, "the
+franchise was exercised by 'a select corporation;' that is to say, it
+was in the possession of a small number of persons, to the exclusion of
+the great body of the inhabitants who had property and interest in the
+place represented. In ancient times, he believed, every freeman, being
+an inhabitant householder resident in the borough, was competent to
+vote. As, however, this arrangement excluded villeins and strangers, the
+franchise always belonged to a particular body in every town--a body
+undoubtedly possessed of property, for they bore the charges of their
+members, and on them were assessed the subsidies and taxes voted by
+Parliament. But when villeinage ceased, various and opposite courses
+seemed to have been pursued in different boroughs. In some, adopting the
+liberal principle that all freemen were to be admitted, householders of
+all kinds, down to the lowest degree, and even sometimes beyond, were
+admitted. In others, adopting the exclusive principle that villeins and
+strangers were no part of the burgesses, new corporations were erected,
+and the elective franchise was more or less confined to a select body."
+But all these diversities and varieties were now swept away, and a
+uniform franchise was established, all tenants whose rent amounted to
+£10 receiving the franchise in boroughs, while by a kindred amendment,
+which was forced on the ministers at a very early stage of the measure,
+tenants at will whose tent amounted to £50 became entitled to vote in
+the counties.
+
+The arrangements for taking the poll were also greatly changed. Instead
+of the fifteen days which had of late been allowed for a county
+election, two were now thought sufficient.[217] In boroughs the time was
+abridged in a similar proportion, and the arrangement was facilitated by
+a division of counties into several convenient polling districts, so
+that no elector should require to travel more than a few miles to record
+his vote.
+
+This last change was universally accepted as a great practical
+improvement, from its tendency to lessen the expense of election
+contests, which had risen to an enormous and ruinous height. But every
+other part of the scheme was viewed with the greatest repugnance, not to
+say dread, by the Opposition; and every one of the bills was fought step
+by step in the House of Commons. The first bill was only carried by a
+majority of one; the second was absolutely rejected by the House of
+Lords; and on the third the ministers, after carrying it triumphantly
+through the Lower House, were defeated in the Upper House on a point of
+detail, which, though of no great importance in itself, they regarded as
+an indication that the peers, though they had consented to read it a
+second time, would insist on remodelling it to a great degree, and, if
+they were not allowed to do so, would again reject it altogether.
+
+Meanwhile, the people were wrought up to a pitch of frenzy absolutely
+unprecedented. Never had agitators, among whom some of the ministers
+themselves were not ashamed to appear, been so unscrupulous in their
+endeavors to excite discontent. One cabinet minister wrote inflammatory
+articles in the newspapers; another publicly called the legitimate
+opposition of the peers "the whisper of a faction." And their exertions
+soon bore fearful fruit. In London some of the peers who had been most
+prominent in their objections to the bill were hooted and pelted, and
+one, Lord Londonderry, was nearly murdered. The King and Queen were
+insulted by mobs in the Park, some of the rioters even openly
+threatening the Queen with death, because she was believed to be
+favorable to the anti-Reformers. In some of the most important
+provincial towns the discontent broke out into actual insurrection. At
+Bristol a tumultuous mob, whose numbers were swelled by crowds of the
+worst ruffians of the metropolis, sought to murder the Recorder, Sir
+Charles Wetherall, when he came down to that city to hold the
+quarter-sessions; and, when defeated in their attack on him, stormed the
+Mansion House, and set it, with the Bishop's Palace and other public
+buildings, and scores of private houses, on fire, several of the rioters
+themselves, who had got drunk, perishing in the flames. A similar mob
+rose in arms at Derby, but did less mischief, as there the magistrates
+knew their duty better. But Nottingham almost equalled Bristol in its
+horrors. Because the Duke of Newcastle was a resolute anti-Reformer, a
+ferocious gang attacked and set on fire the fine old Castle; and, not
+content with committing fearful ravages in the town, roamed over the
+adjacent district, attacked the houses of many of the leading country
+gentlemen, plundering and burning the dwellings, and in more than one
+instance murdering some of the inhabitants.
+
+The King had hitherto borne himself between the contending parties in
+the state with scrupulous fairness to both. Though, he had, probably,
+been taken by surprise by the sweeping character of the changes his
+ministers had proposed, he had given them a frank support, consenting,
+even at a moment's notice, to dissolve the Parliament after the
+unfavorable division in the House of Commons on the first bill; but he
+had, at the same time, warned them that he would never consent to employ
+any means of coercion to overbear the free decision of the House of
+Lords. And he had more than once rejected as unconstitutional their
+solicitations to allow them to make peers with that object. At last they
+endeavored to compel his consent by resigning their offices, though the
+ground for so decided a step can hardly be deemed sufficient, since the
+provocation which they alleged was only Lord Lyndhurst's success in
+carrying an amendment to take the enfranchising clauses of the bill
+before those of disfranchisement, so as to give the latter a more
+gracious appearance, as if the boroughs to be extinguished were made to
+suffer, not so much for their own positive unworthiness as in order to
+make room for others which had become of undeniably greater importance.
+The King took the strictly constitutional line of accepting their
+resignation and intrusting the Duke of Wellington with the task of
+forming a new administration, warning the Duke, at the same time, that
+he considered himself now pledged to grant a large measure of Reform;
+but the Duke found the task impracticable, and then, as the only means
+of averting farther insurrectionary tumults, which bore no slight
+resemblance to civil war, and might not impossibly end in it, the King
+did at last consent to permit the creation of a sufficient number of
+peers to insure the passing of the bill. But he could not overcome his
+repugnance to the measure as a severe blow to the constitution--one
+which would in effect be tantamount to the extinction of the
+independence of the Upper House as a legislative body; and, thinking no
+means unjustifiable that would avert the necessity of such a creation,
+he conceived the idea of authorizing his private secretary, Sir Herbert
+Taylor, to request the chief peers on the Opposition side to absent
+themselves from the division on the third reading. It seemed to him, and
+indeed to many of them, the only thing that could be done. Their
+judgment of the character and eventual consequences of the ministerial
+bill was unaltered; but they saw the violence of the public feeling on
+the subject, and the danger to the state of too stubborn and
+uncompromising a resistance to it, and, yielding loyal obedience to
+their royal master's wish, they retired from the House without voting.
+Those who remained passed the bill, and in the beginning of June, 1832,
+it became law.
+
+We have ventured in a previous chapter to call in question the propriety
+of the conduct of the King's father, George III., in using his personal
+entreaties to influence the House of Lords against the India Bill of Mr.
+Fox. The transaction which has been related here is the second and only
+other instance since the Revolution of a sovereign having recourse to
+such a device to sway the votes of members of either House. But the
+circumstances were so entirely different, nay, so diametrically
+opposite, that an opinion of the impropriety of the sovereign's deed in
+the former case imposes no obligation on the ground of consistency to
+censure it in the later instance. The interference of George III. was
+designed to thwart and defeat his ministers on a measure of which he had
+not previously intimated any disapproval. William IV., on the other
+hand, was exerting himself to support his ministers, not, as it seems
+probable, without some sacrifice of his own judgment. His father acted
+as he did to avert an inroad on his prerogative and independence, which
+he had been persuaded to apprehend, but the danger of which can hardly
+be said to have been proved beyond all question; so that even those who
+think the result of his action fortunate for the nation cannot defend
+the action as one that on any constitutional principle can be justified.
+The son, at a far more critical moment, adopted the course which he did
+adopt as the only means which he saw of extricating the state and the
+nation from an alternative of great calamities: the extinction of, or at
+least a deep wound to, the legislative independence of the House of
+Lords, by the following of a single precedent[218] which had ever since
+been universally condemned; or, on the other hand, a continuance of
+outrages and tumults which had already disgraced the nation in the eyes
+of the world, and which, if renewed and continued, could not fail to
+imperil the safety of the state. Such a motive may certainly be allowed
+to excuse the irregularity of the act.
+
+When, however, we come to consider the proposal to create peers, which
+drove the King to take such a step, that is a question on which, while
+it is still more important, it is also more difficult to form a
+satisfactory judgment. It was denounced by the Duke of Wellington and
+other peers as utterly unconstitutional and revolutionary; as a
+destruction of the great principle of the equality of the two Houses; as
+a denial to the peers of their right to form and act upon their own
+deliberate judgment; and as a reduction of their position to that of a
+body existing merely to register the decrees of the other House. Indeed,
+that it had this character was admitted by Lord Grey himself, with no
+abatement beyond such mitigation as might be found in the idea that it
+was only intended to affect their decision on a single question. So far
+it may be said that even while defending it he condemned it; _Habemus
+confitentem reum_. But the task of a ruler or legislator is often but a
+choice between difficulties, or even between manifest evils. And, even
+if an act or course be admitted to be intrinsically evil, taken by
+itself, yet, if the evil which it is calculated or designed to avert be
+a greater evil still, the defence is complete, or, at all events,
+sufficient. And this, in fact, is the principle of the justification
+which Lord Grey alleged. He was, perhaps, unconsciously referring to a
+passage in Mr. Hallam's great work on "Constitutional History" (then
+very recently published), in which, while discussing Sunderland's
+Peerage Bill, and admitting that "the unlimited prerogative of
+augmenting the peerage is liable to such abuses, at least in theory, as
+might overthrow our form of government," he proceeds to point out that
+in the exercise of this, as of every other power, "the crown has been
+carefully restrained by statutes, and by the responsibility of its
+advisers;" but that, while "the Commons, if they transgress their
+boundaries, are annihilated by a proclamation" (that is, by a
+dissolution) "against the ambition, or, what is much more likely, the
+perverse haughtiness of the aristocracy, the constitution has not
+furnished such direct securities.... The resource of subduing an
+aristocratical faction by the creation of new peers could never be
+constitutionally employed, except in the case of a nearly equal balance;
+but it might usefully hang over the heads of the whole body, and deter
+them from any gross excesses of faction or oligarchical spirit. The
+nature of our government requires a general harmony between the two
+Houses of Parliament."[219] In the present case no one could impute the
+difference between the two Houses to any "perverse haughtiness" on the
+part of the peers. But the difference existed, and was too deeply
+founded on the cautious principles of the Tory party to be surmountable
+by ordinary means. It was certain also that the Commons would not give
+way; that, without danger to the public peace, they could not give way.
+And this was, in fact, Lord Grey's contention: that a crisis had arisen
+in which compulsion must be exercised on one or other of the disagreeing
+parties; and that coercion of the peers by an augmentation of their
+number, or a threat of it, was the only compulsion practicable. In
+upholding this position, however, it must be remarked that he was
+betrayed into the use of language which was as great a violation of
+constitutional and parliamentary principle and usage as the action which
+he was recommending; language, too, which was quite unnecessary to
+strengthen his argument. He accused the Lords of "opposing the declared
+and decided wishes both of the crown and the people;" of "acting
+adversely to the crown;" and this introduction of the sovereign's name
+to overawe the assembly was unconstitutional in the highest degree. For,
+constitutionally, the sovereign has no right to signify his opinion,
+nor, indeed, any recognized means of signifying it but by giving or
+withholding his royal assent to measures which the two Houses have
+passed. On any bill which has not yet been passed by them he has, as has
+been already implied, no legitimate means whatever of expressing his
+judgment. The time has not come for him to do so. Moreover, the
+statement was, probably, not believed by any one to be strictly true,
+for it was pretty generally understood that the King would have
+preferred a far more moderate measure. But, indeed, in the very speech
+in which the Prime-minister made this use of the King's name he
+presently added an observation which was a sufficient condemnation of
+his previous language. For, in denouncing the "vile attacks which had
+been made on his Majesty in the public press," and disclaiming all share
+in them (a disclaimer which however true of himself, could not, it is
+believed, have been uttered with equal truth by all his colleagues), he
+pointed out that "it ought always to be recollected that it is contrary
+to the principles of the constitution to arraign the personal conduct of
+the sovereign." It follows, as a matter of course, that it is equally
+contrary to those principles to allege his personal opinions in either
+House on any measure before it, since, if alleged, they must be open to
+criticism; unless, indeed, the mere allegation of the royal sentiments
+were to be taken as decisive of the question, in which case all freedom
+of discussion would be at once extinguished.
+
+But this irregularity, into which the Prime minister was apparently
+betrayed by his desire of victory, must not be allowed to affect our
+verdict on the main question; and, now that the lapse of time has
+enabled us to contemplate dispassionately the case on which he had to
+decide, it will, probably, be thought that his justification of his
+conduct in recommending a creation of peers is fairly made out. That,
+under any pressure short of that, the peers would have again rejected
+the Reform Bill, or at least would have pared it down to much smaller
+proportions than would have satisfied the popular demand for Reform, may
+be regarded as certain; and equally certain that such a line of conduct
+would have led to a renewal of disgraceful and dangerous tumults. The
+minister, therefore, as has been said before, had to choose between two
+evils. It was a grievous dilemma; but those who had to deal with it
+(even while it may be admitted that they cannot be held wholly free from
+blame, as having themselves contributed by their own language to the
+popular excitement and irritation)[220] may be excused for thinking the
+wound inflicted on the constitution, by thus overbearing the voice of
+one House of Parliament on a single occasion, less formidable in its
+immediate fruit, and more capable of being remedied and retrieved, than
+that which would have followed from a renewal of insurrectionary
+tumults, even if they should have come short of actual civil war.
+
+One critic of these transactions[221] whose experience and high
+reputation entitle his opinion to respectful consideration, after
+reminding his readers that, "although Parliament is said to be
+dissolved, a dissolution extends, in fact, no farther than to the
+Commons, and that the Peers are not affected by it; no change can take
+place in the constitution of their body, except as to a small number of
+Scotch representative peers," proceeds to argue that, "so far as the
+House of Peers is concerned, a creation of peers by the crown on
+extraordinary occasions is the only equivalent which the constitution
+has provided for the change and renovation of the House of Commons by a
+dissolution. In no other way can the opinions of the House of Lords be
+brought into harmony with those of the people." But it may be feared
+that this comparison is rather ingenious than solid. Indeed, the writer
+himself limits such an expedient as a creation of peers to insure the
+passing of a particular measure to "extraordinary occasions." But a
+dissolution of the House of Commons is so far from being so limited,
+that it is the natural and inevitable end of every House of Commons
+after an existence which cannot exceed seven years, and which is very
+rarely so protracted. And though it may be, and probably has been, the
+case that a House of Commons has passed measures to which it had no
+great inclination, lest it should provoke a minister to a premature
+dissolution, yet no submission on its part can long postpone it; and a
+threat or apprehension of a dissolution would certainly fail to overcome
+the opposition of the House of Commons, or of a party within it, if the
+measure before them seemed open to serious objection. The presumed or
+presumable immortality of the one body, and the limited existence of the
+other, seem to constitute so essential a difference between them as must
+prevent the measures adopted toward one being fairly regarded as any
+guide to a justification of those employed in the case of the other.
+
+The Reform Bill of 1832 has sometimes been called a new Revolution, and
+to some extent it deserved the name; for it was not, like the Catholic
+Emancipation Act, a mere restoration of privileges to any class or
+classes of the people which had once been enjoyed by them, and had
+subsequently been withdrawn, but it was a grant of a wholly new
+privilege to places and to classes which had never enjoyed it; while it
+was manifest that the political power thus conferred on these classes
+involved a corresponding diminution of the powers of those who had
+hitherto monopolized it. It was also the introduction of a new
+principle. The old doctrine of the constitution had been, that the
+possession of freehold property, as the only permanent stake in the
+country, was the only qualification which could entitle a subject to a
+voice in the government and legislation of the kingdom. The new doctrine
+was that, as others besides owners of land contributed to the revenue by
+the payment of taxes, those who did so contribute to a sufficient amount
+had a right to a voice, however indirect or feeble, in the granting of
+those taxes; and so far it was the extension and application to subjects
+at home of the principle for which Lord Chatham and Burke had contended
+sixty years before in the case of the American Colonies, that taxation
+and a right to representation went together; a principle which, many
+ages before, had been laid down by the greatest of our early kings as
+the foundation of our parliamentary constitution and rights. But this
+principle, however generally it may have been asserted, had hitherto
+been but very partially carried out in practice, and the old borough
+system had been skilfully devised by successive kings and ministers to
+keep the political power in the hands of the crown and the aristocracy.
+It was with that object that most of the boroughs which were first
+allowed to return members under the Tudors had been enfranchised,[222] a
+great noble or landholder, whose affection to the government could not
+be doubted, being often able to obtain the promotion of some village or
+petty town in the neighborhood of his estates to the dignity of a
+parliamentary borough, and thus acquiring a great addition to his
+political and social importance by his power of influencing the
+election. No one could deny that the existence of such boroughs was an
+abuse, or at least an anomaly, rendered the more conspicuous as time
+went on by the denial of representatives to towns which contained as
+many thousands of citizens as they could boast single burgesses. At the
+same time it was equally undeniable that the aristocracy, generally
+speaking, exerted their influence advantageously for the state. A peer
+or great squire who could return the members for a borough took a worthy
+pride in the abilities and reputation of those whom he thus sent to
+Parliament; especially the leaders of the two parties sought out
+promising young men for their seats; and it has often been pointed out
+that, of the men who in the House of Commons had risen to eminence in
+the country before the Reform Bill, there was scarcely one who had not
+owed his introduction to Parliament to the patron of one of those
+boroughs which were now wholly or partially disfranchised; while on one
+or two occasions these "rotten boroughs," as, since Lord Chatham's time,
+they were often derisively called, had proved equally useful in
+providing seats for distinguished statesmen who, for some reason or
+other, had lost the confidence of their former constituents. So, when
+Bristol had disgraced itself by the rejection of Burke, Malton had
+averted the loss with which Parliament and the country were threatened
+by again, through the influence of Lord Rockingham, returning the great
+statesman as their representative. So, to take a later instance,
+Westbury, under the influence of Sir Manasseh Lopes, had provided a
+refuge for Sir Robert Peel, when the course which he had taken on
+Catholic Emancipation had cost him his seat for Oxford. And these
+practical uses of these small boroughs--anomalies in a representative
+system, as they were called in the debates on the subject, and as they
+must be confessed to have been--were so important, that some even of
+those who felt compelled by their principles to vote for their
+parliamentary extinction have, nevertheless, confessed a regret for the
+sacrifice, lamenting especially that it has, in a great degree, closed
+the doors of the House of Commons against a class whose admission to it
+is on every account most desirable, the promising young men of both
+parties.
+
+In one point of great importance the framers of the Reform Bill of 1832
+proved to be mistaken. They justified the very comprehensive or sweeping
+range which they had given it by their wish to make it a final
+settlement of the question, and by the expression of their conviction
+that the completeness with which it had satisfied all reasonable
+expectations had effectually prevented any necessity for ever re-opening
+the question. Their anticipations on this head were not shared by their
+opponents, who, on the contrary, foretold that the very greatness of the
+changes now effected would only whet the appetite for a farther
+extension of them; nor by a growing party, now beginning to own the
+title of Radicals, which till very recently had only been regarded as a
+reproach, and who, even before the bill passed,[223] expressed their
+discontent that it did not go farther, but accepted it as an instalment
+of what was required, and as an instrument for securing "a more complete
+improvement." And their expectations have been verified by subsequent
+events. Indeed, it may easily be seen that the principles on which one
+portion of the bill--that which enfranchised new classes of voters--was
+framed were such as, in shrewd hands, might easily be adduced as
+arguments in favor of the necessity of reconsideration of the question
+from time to time. So long as the right of voting was confined to owners
+of property, or members of corporate bodies, the line thus laid down was
+one which was not liable to be crossed. But the moment that tenancy was
+added to ownership, and a line was drawn distinguishing electors from
+non-electors, not by the nature of their qualifications, but by the
+amount of their rent, detail was substituted for principle; and the
+proposer or maintainer of the rule that the qualification should be a
+yearly rental of £10 might be called on to explain why, if £10 were a
+more reasonable limit than £15, £8 were not fairer than £10. Or again,
+if the original argument were, that a line must of necessity be drawn
+somewhere, and that £10 was the lowest qualification which seemed to
+guarantee such an amount of educated intelligence in the voter as would
+enable him to exercise the franchise conferred on him judiciously and
+honestly, such reasoning would from time to time invite the contention
+that the spread of education had rendered £8 tenants now as enlightened
+as £10 tenants had been some years before. And thus the measure of 1832,
+instead of forever silencing the demand for Reform by the completeness
+of its concessions, did in fact lay the foundation for future agitation,
+which has been farther encouraged and fed by farther submission to it,
+and which its leaders, who have so far triumphed, show no purpose to
+discontinue. To discuss whether such extensions of the franchise as have
+already been adopted, and those farther steps in the same direction
+which are generally understood to be impending, will eventually be found
+compatible with the preservation of our ancient monarchical
+constitution, is a fitting task for the statesmen and senators whose
+duty it is to examine in all their bearings the probable effects of the
+measures which may be proposed. But the historian's business is rather
+"to compile the records of the past" than to speculate on the
+future.[224] And the course which was too perilous or difficult for Mr.
+Hallam to undertake we will follow his example in avoiding. But it
+cannot be denied that, if the Reform Bill of 1832 transferred the chief
+political power of the state from the aristocracy to the middle classes,
+a farther lowering of the qualification for the exercise of the
+franchise must transfer it from the middle to the lower classes; and
+that those who view such transfer with alarm, and deprecate it as
+fraught with peril to all our ancient institutions, maintain their
+opinions by arguments as old, indeed, as the days of the Roman
+republic,[225] but which have not lost strength by lapse of time, if
+indeed, they have not been fortified by events in the history of more
+than one modern nation.
+
+Even before the introduction of the first Reform Bill one measure had
+been passed of constitutional importance, though the concurrence of both
+parties in its principle and details prevented it from attracting much
+notice. Two daughters who had been born to the King and Queen had died
+in their infancy, and the royal pair were now childless; and, as some
+years had elapsed since the birth of the last, it was probable that they
+might remain so. The presumptive heiress to the throne was, therefore,
+the daughter of the deceased Duke of Kent, the Princess Victoria, our
+present most gracious sovereign, and, as she was as yet only eleven
+years of age, it was evidently necessary to provide for the contingency
+of the death of the King before she should attain her majority. A
+Regency Bill for that purpose had, therefore, been prepared by the Duke
+of Wellington's cabinet, and had been introduced by Lord Chancellor
+Lyndhurst in the House of Lords before the resignation of the ministry.
+It could not be so simple in its arrangements as such bills had
+sometimes been, since there was more than one contingency possible, for
+which it was requisite to provide. It was possible not only that William
+IV. might die within the next seven years, but also that at his death he
+might leave a child, or his widow in a state which warranted the
+expectation of one, the latter case being the more difficult to decide
+upon, since no previous Regency Bill furnished any precedent for the
+ministers' guidance.
+
+The first point, however, to be settled was, who was the most proper
+person to administer the affairs of the kingdom as Regent, in the event
+of the heiress to the crown being still a minor at the King's death. It
+was a question on which it was evidently most desirable that no
+difference of opinion should be expressed. And, in fact, no difference
+existed. The leaders of both parties--the Duke and his colleagues, who
+had framed the bill, and Lord Grey, with his colleagues, who adopted
+it--agreed that the mother of the young sovereign would be the fittest
+person to exercise the royal authority during the minority; and,
+farther, that she should neither be fettered by any limitations to that
+authority, nor by any councillors appointed by Parliament nominally to
+advise and assist, but practically to control her. It was felt that a
+Regent acting for a youthful daughter would need all the power which
+could be given her; while, as she could never herself succeed to the
+throne, she could be under no temptation, from views of personal
+ambition, to misuse the power intrusted to her.
+
+At first sight it seemed a more difficult and delicate question what
+course should be pursued with reference to the possible event of the
+King dying while the Queen, his widow, was expecting to become a mother.
+As has been said above, no precedent was to be found in any former bill;
+yet it seemed to be determined by the old constitutional maxim, that the
+King never dies. Not even for a moment could the throne be treated as
+vacant, and, therefore, it was proposed and determined that in such a
+case the Princess Victoria must instantly be proclaimed Queen, and the
+Duchess of Kent must instantly assume the authority of Regent; but that,
+on the birth of a posthumous child to the Queen Dowager, the Princess
+and the Duchess, as a matter of course, should resume their previous
+rank, and Queen Adelaide become Regent, and govern in the name of her
+new-born infant and sovereign. The strict constitutional correctness of
+the principle elaborately and eloquently expounded to the peers by Lord
+Lyndhurst was unanimously admitted, and the precedent now set was
+followed, with the needful modification, when, ten years afterward, it
+became necessary to provide for the possibility of Queen Victoria dying
+during the minority of her heir. The parent of the infant sovereign,
+Prince Albert, was appointed Regent, with the cordial approval of the
+nation; the dissent of the Queen's uncle, the Duke of Sussex who, with a
+very misplaced ambition, urged instead the appointment of a Council of
+Regency, of which he hoped to become the most influential member, only
+serving to make the unanimity of the rest of the Parliament more
+conspicuous.
+
+A somewhat kindred question, inasmuch as it affected the personal
+arrangements, if they may be so termed, of the sovereign, was settled in
+the same session, and on a new principle. What was called the Civil List
+had hitherto been placed on a footing which was at once unintelligible
+and misleading. The expression was first used at the Revolution, and was
+applied not only to that portion of the revenue which was devoted to the
+personal expenses of the sovereign, but also to many branches of the
+civil expenditure of the state, with which, in fact, he had no concern
+whatever. Not only the salaries of the great officers of the household,
+but those also of the ministers, ambassadors, and of the judges, were
+paid out of it, as well as those of many place-holders of various
+classes, and pensions to a large amount. Amounts embracing such a
+variety of miscellaneous and unconnected expenses could hardly be
+expected to be kept with regularity, and there was lavish waste in every
+department. Burke's bill had rectified some of the abuses, and had also
+pointed out the way to some other reforms which were gradually adopted;
+but still numbers of charges were left untouched, and there was scarcely
+any one subject which afforded more topics to unscrupulous demagogues
+than the amount of the Civil List, which the ignorant multitude were
+constantly assured that the King enjoyed to squander on his own
+pleasures, though, in fact, the greater part of it was expended in the
+service of the state, and was entirely free from his control. Only a
+portion of the sum which went under this name was voted annually by the
+Parliament. A portion was derived from the Crown Lands, from duties
+known as Droits of the Crown and Droits of the Admiralty, etc., the
+amount of which fluctuated, and with which Parliament was admitted to
+have no right to interfere. But the working of the whole was
+satisfactory to no one--neither to the King himself, nor to those who
+upheld the right of the Parliament to have a predominant control of
+every branch of expenditure of the public money. The feeling that the
+whole of the royal income and expenditure should be placed on a
+different footing was general, and the fall of the Duke of Wellington's
+ministry had been immediately caused by the success of a proposal that,
+before fixing the new sovereign's Civil List, Parliament should refer
+the matter to a committee, that inquiry might be made into every part of
+it. Lord Grey's ministry were bound to act in conformity with a
+resolution on which they had, as it were, ridden into office; and the
+arrangement which they ultimately effected was one in which common-sense
+and the royal convenience and comfort were alike consulted. That portion
+of the Civil List of his predecessor which was voted by Parliament
+amounted to nearly £850,000 a year; but, besides that sum, George IV.
+enjoyed the income already mentioned as derived from Crown Lands,
+Droits, etc., while a farther large sum was furnished by the ancient
+revenue of the crown of Scotland, and another was received from Ireland.
+The ministers now proposed that all these sources of income should be
+handed over to the Treasury, and that the Civil List should henceforward
+be fixed at £510,000, being at the same time relieved from all the
+foreign and extraneous charges on it which had invidiously swelled the
+gross amount, without being in any way under the control of the
+sovereign, or in any way ministering to his requirements, either for
+personal indulgence or for the maintenance of the state and magnificence
+imposed on him by his position.
+
+Such a change was on every ground most desirable. It was clearly in
+accordance with our parliamentary constitution that grants of money made
+by the Parliament should express distinctly and unmistakably the objects
+to which they were really to be applied; and that the charges of
+departments connected with the government, the administration of
+justice, or the foreign service of the country, should not be mixed up
+with others of a wholly different character, so as to make what was, in
+fact, the expenditure of the nation wear the appearance of being the
+expenditure of the sovereign. Moreover, the assignment of many of the
+charges to the Civil List even gave a false character to the
+appointments themselves. If a sovereign was to pay ambassadors and
+judges out of what seemed to be his private income, the logical
+conclusion could hardly be avoided that he had a right to lower those
+salaries, or even to diminish the number of those appointments. And it
+may even be said that the less any real danger of such a right being so
+exercised was to be apprehended, the more unadvisable was it to retain
+an arrangement which in theory could be described as liable to such an
+abuse.
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 216: But it may be remarked that till very recently the people
+out-of-doors had ceased to show any great anxiety about Reform. Two or
+three years before, Lord Althorp, who, in Lord Grey's ministry, was
+Chancellor of the Exchequer and leader of the House of Commons, told
+Peel that the people had become so indifferent to it, that he never
+meant to bring forward the question again, and in the last seven years
+only fourteen petitions had been presented to Parliament in favor of it.
+In reality, such a feeling in the people would have been eminently
+favorable to a calm framing of a Moderate measure; but this indifference
+was soon changed into a more violent and widely diffused excitement than
+there was any record of since the days of the Popish Plot; that
+excitement, however, according to the confession of the historian of the
+Whig ministry and the Reform Bill, himself an ardent reformer, being "no
+spontaneous result of popular feeling, but being brought about by the
+incessant labors of a few shrewd and industrious partisans forming a
+secret, but very active and efficient, committee in London."--Roebuck's
+_History of the Whig Ministry_, etc., ii., 309.]
+
+[Footnote 217: In 1835 the two days were reduced to one.]
+
+[Footnote 218: The creation of twelve peers, in the reign of Queen Anne,
+to secure a majority in favor of the Peace of Utrecht.]
+
+[Footnote 219: "Constitutional History," iii., 331. See the whole
+passage.]
+
+[Footnote 220: Lord John Russell had publicly described the language of
+the Tory Peers in the debate on Lord Lyndhurst's amendment as "the
+whisper of a faction." And many articles of most extreme violence which
+appeared in the _Times_ about the same time were generally believed to
+have been written (in part at least) by the Lord Chancellor, Lord
+Brougham.]
+
+[Footnote 221: "Constitutional History of England," by Sir J.E. May, 1.,
+262.]
+
+[Footnote 222: Elizabeth enfranchised no fewer than sixty-two in the
+course of her reign, "a very large proportion of them petty boroughs,
+evidently under the influence of the crown or the peerage."--Hallam,
+_Constitutional History_ i., 360.]
+
+[Footnote 223: Sir A. Alison, "History of Europe," xxiii., 55, quotes a
+paragraph from the _Examiner_ newspaper, which says: "The ground,
+limited as it is, which it is proposed to clear and open to the popular
+influence, will suffice as the spot desired by Archimedes for the plant
+of the power which must ultimately govern the whole system. Without
+reform, convulsion is inevitable. Upon any reform farther reform is
+inevitably consequent, and the settlement of the constitution on the
+democratic basis certain."]
+
+[Footnote 224: Hallam, "Constitutional History," c. xvi., _in fin._]
+
+[Footnote 225: "Semper in republicâ timendum est ne plurimum valeant
+plurinn."--Cicero.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+
+Abolition of Slavery.--Abridgment of the Apprenticeship.--The East India
+Company's Trade is Thrown Open.--Commencement of Ecclesiastical
+Reforms.--The New Poor-law.--State of Ireland.--Agitation against
+Tithes.--Coercion Bill.--Beginning of Church Reform.--Sir Robert Peel
+becomes Prime-minister.--Variety of Offices held Provisionally by the
+Duke of Wellington.--Sir Robert Peel Retires, and Lord Melbourne Resumes
+the Government.--Sir Robert Peel Proposes a Measure of Church
+Reform.--Municipal Reform.--Measures of Ecclesiastical Reform.
+
+
+Apart from the consideration of the abstract principle, on which the
+advocates of Parliamentary Reform had insisted, of the light of many
+classes hitherto unrepresented to representation, they had also dwelt on
+the practical advantage which might be expected to ensue from the
+greater degree in which public opinion would henceforth be brought to
+bear on the action of the Houses, and, by a natural consequence, on the
+administrative government also. And the bill had hardly passed when this
+result began to show itself, not only in transactions of domestic
+legislation, but in others which affected our most remote dependencies,
+both in the East and West. We have seen in a previous chapter how
+Wilberforce, after twenty years of labor and anxiety, reaped the reward
+of his virtuous exertions in the abolition of the slave-trade. But he
+had not ventured to grapple with the institution which gave birth to
+that trade, the employment of slaves in our West India Islands. Yet it
+was an evil indefensible on every ground that could possibly be alleged.
+It was not only a crime and an injustice, but it was an anomaly, and a
+glaring inconsistency, in any British settlement. The law, as we have
+seen, had been laid down as absolutely settled, that no man within the
+precincts of the United Kingdom could be a slave; that, even had such
+been his previous condition, the moment his foot touched English soil he
+became a free man. By what process of reasoning, then, could it be
+contended that his right to liberty according to English law depended on
+what portion of the British dominion he was in--that what was
+incompatible with his claims as a human being in Kent ceased to be so in
+Jamaica? The sentiment that what was just or unjust in one place was
+just or unjust in every place; that a man's right to freedom did not
+depend on the country of his birth or the color of his skin, had
+naturally and logically been widely diffused and fostered by the
+abolition of the slave-trade. It was but a small step from admitting
+that there could be no justification for making a man a slave, to
+asserting that there was an equal violation of all justice in keeping
+one in slavery; and this conclusion was strengthened by tales, which
+were continually reaching those most interested in the subject, of
+oppression and cruelty practised by the masters, or oftener by their
+agents and overseers, on the unfortunate beings over whom they claimed
+power and right as absolute as any owner could pretend to over any
+description of property. They made so general an impression that, ten
+years before the time at which we have now arrived, a society had been
+formed in London whose object was the immediate extinction of slavery in
+every British settlement; and Canning, then Secretary of State, had
+entered warmly into the general object of the society; not, indeed,
+thinking the instant abolition practicable, but inducing Parliament to
+pass a body of resolutions in favor of at once improving the condition
+of the slaves, as the best and necessary preparation for their entire
+enfranchisement;[226] and the next year, 1824, the subject was
+recommended to the attention of the Houses in the King's speech, and an
+Order in Council was issued enjoining the adoption of a series of
+measures conceived in the spirit of those resolutions, among which one
+was evidently meant as a precursor of the slaves' entire emancipation,
+since it gave the "negro who had acquired sufficient property" a title
+"to purchase his own freedom and that of his wife and family." And it
+was, probably, from regarding it in this light that the planters (as the
+owners of estates in the West Indies were generally called) selected
+that provision as the object of their most vehement remonstrances. But,
+though they were not so open in their remonstrances against the other
+clauses of the order, they did worse, they disregarded them; and the
+stories of the ill-treatment of the slaves were neither less frequent
+nor less revolting than before.
+
+Fresh Orders in Council, avowedly designed as the stepping-stones to
+eventual emancipation, were issued; and one which reached the West
+Indies at the end of 1831 was, unhappily, so misconstrued by the slaves
+in Jamaica, who regarded it as recognizing their right to instant
+liberation, that, when their masters refused to treat it as doing so,
+they broke out into a formidable insurrection, which was not quelled
+without great loss of life and destruction of property. The planters
+were panic-stricken; many of them, indeed, were almost ruined. The
+colonial Legislatures,[227] which had been established in the greater
+part of the islands, addressed the ministers with strong protests
+against the last Order in Council; and the mischief which had
+confessedly been already done, and the farther mischief which was not
+unreasonably dreaded, were so great that the cabinet consented to
+suspend it for a while; and the House of Commons made a practical
+confession that the planters were entitled to sympathy as well as the
+slaves, by voting nearly a million of money to compensate those of
+Jamaica for their recent losses.
+
+But out-of-doors the feeling rather was that the insurrection had been
+caused, not by the unreasoning though natural impatience for freedom
+entertained by the negro--whom Canning had truly described as
+"possessing the form and strength of a man, but the intellect of a
+child"--but by the slackness and supineness of the local Legislature,
+too much under the influence of the timid clamors of the planters to
+listen to the voice of justice and humanity, which demanded to the full
+as emphatically, if somewhat less vociferously, the immediate
+deliverance of the slave. The object, however, thus desired was not so
+free from difficulty as it seemed to those zealous but irresponsible
+advocates of universal freedom; for, in the first place the slaves were
+not the only persons to be considered; the planters also had an
+undoubted right to have their interests protected, since, however
+illegitimate property in human beings might be, it was certain that its
+existence in that portion of the King's dominions had been recognized by
+Parliament and courts of justice for many generations, and that suddenly
+to withdraw a sanction and abrogate a custom thus established, and, as
+it might fairly be believed, almost legalized by time, would be not only
+ruinous to the planters, who would have no other means of cultivating
+their lands, but, as being ruinous to them, would also manifestly be
+most unjust. Even in the interests of the slaves themselves, instant
+emancipation before they were fit for it might prove to them a very
+doubtful blessing. The state, too, and the general interests of the
+kingdom had to be considered, for the shipping employed in the West
+India trade, and the revenue derived by the Imperial Exchequer from it,
+were both of great amount. It was a very complicated question, and
+required very cautious handling; but it was plain that the people were
+greatly excited on the subject. One or two of the ministers themselves
+had deeply pledged themselves to their constituents to labor for the
+cessation of slavery; and eventually, though by no means blind to the
+difficulty of arriving at a thoroughly safe solution of the question,
+the ministry decided that "delay was more perilous than decision," and
+they brought in a bill, in which they endeavored to combine the three
+great objects--justice to the slave, by conferring on him that freedom
+to which he, in common with all mankind, had an inviolable right;
+justice to the slave-owner, by compensating him fairly for the loss of
+what (however originally vicious the practice may have been) he was
+entitled by long usage and more than one positive law to regard as
+property; and a farther justice to the slave, that justice which
+consists in being careful so to confer benefits as to do the greatest
+amount of good to the recipient. The first object was attained by
+enacting that those who had hitherto been slaves should be free; the
+third was arrived at by making the freedom thus given, not
+instantaneous, but by leading them to it, and preparing them for its
+proper and useful enjoyment, by a system of apprenticeship. The slave
+was to be apprenticed to his master for seven years, receiving, partly
+in money and partly in kind, a certain fair amount of wages, and having
+also one-fourth of his time absolutely at his own disposal. And the
+second was secured by granting the planters the magnificent sum of
+twenty millions of money, as compensation for the injury done to them;
+or, in other words, as purchase-money for the property they were
+compelled to surrender. The apprenticeship system did not wholly
+succeed. The slaves were not sufficiently enlightened to appreciate the
+character of the new arrangement; and, as the light in which it appeared
+to them was rather that of deferring than of securing their
+emancipation, it made them impatient rather than thankful. In the
+majority of cases it proved difficult to induce them to work even
+three-fourths of their time, and eventually the planters themselves were
+driven to the conclusion that it was best to abridge the period of
+apprenticeship. By the act of the colonial Legislatures themselves it
+was shortened by two years, and the emancipation was completed on the
+1st of August, 1838.
+
+Still, though on this single point the success of the scheme did not
+fully correspond to the hopes of those who had framed it, it was one
+which did great honor to their ingenuity as well as to their
+philanthropy (Lord Stanley, as Colonial Secretary, being the minister to
+whose department it belonged). And the nation itself is fairly entitled
+to no small credit for its cordial, ungrudging approval of a measure of
+such unprecedented liberality. Indeed, the credit deserved was frankly
+allowed it by foreign countries. To quote the language of an eloquent
+historian of the period, "the generous acquiescence of the people under
+this prodigious increase of their burdens has caused the moralists of
+other nations to declare that the British Act of Emancipation stands
+alone for moral grandeur in the history of the world."[228] And, in
+respect of the personal liberty of the subject, it may be said to have
+completed the British constitution; establishing the glorious principle,
+that freedom is not limited to one part of our sovereign's dominions, to
+these islands alone, but that in no part of the world in which the
+British flag is erected can any sort of slavery exist for a single
+moment.
+
+The abolition of the political authority of the East India Company,
+which took place some years after the time at which we have arrived, and
+which will be mentioned in a subsequent chapter, would make it
+unnecessary to mention the renewal of its charter, which took place at
+this time, were it not that the force of public opinion again made
+itself felt in some important limitations of its previous rights. The
+monopoly of the trade with China which the Company had hitherto enjoyed
+was resented as an injustice by the great body of our merchants and
+ship-owners, who contended that all British subjects had an equal right
+to share in advantages which had been won by British arms. The
+government and Parliament adopted their view, and the renewed charter
+extinguished not only that monopoly, but even the Company's exclusive
+trading privileges in India itself, though these, like the rights of the
+West India planters over their slaves, were purchased of it by an
+annuity for forty years, which was estimated as an equivalent for the
+loss of profit which must result to the proprietors of the Company's
+stock from the sudden alteration. It cannot be said that any
+constitutional principle was involved in what was merely a commercial
+regulation, or relaxation of such regulations. Yet it may not be thought
+inopportune to mention the transaction thus briefly, as one important
+step toward the establishment of free-trade, which, at the end of fifty
+years from the time when Pitt first laid the foundation of it, was
+gradually forcing itself on all our statesmen, as the only sound
+principle of commercial intercourse between nations. The laborious
+historian of Europe during these years finds fault with the arrangements
+now made, but only on the ground that they did not go far enough in that
+direction; that, while "everything was done to promote the commercial
+and manufacturing interests of England, nothing was done for those of
+Hindostan;"[229] that, "while English cotton goods were admitted for a
+nominal duty into India, there was no corresponding advantage thought of
+to the industry of India in supplying the markets of the country." The
+objection was not unfounded; but the system of which it complains was
+too one-sided to be long maintained, and in less than ten years a great
+financial reform had swept away the great mass of import duties, and so
+far had placed the Indian manufacturer on the same level with his
+fellow-subjects of English blood.
+
+The disturbances which agitated the first years of the reign of William
+IV. were not caused solely by the excitement attendant on the passing of
+the Reform Bill. There had been extensive agricultural distress in
+England, which had shown itself in an outbreak of new crimes, the
+burning of ricks in the farm-yards, and the destruction of machinery, to
+which the peasantry were persuaded by designing demagogues to attribute
+the scarcity of employment. But statesmen of both parties were agreed in
+believing that a great deal of the poverty which, especially in the
+agricultural counties, had become the normal condition of the laborer,
+might be ascribed to the pernicious working of the Poor-law, which
+subsisted with scarcely any alteration as it had been originally enacted
+in the reign of Elizabeth. There was even reason to doubt whether the
+slight changes which had been made had been improvements. If they had
+been in the direction of increased liberality to the poor man who needed
+parish relief, and had to some extent lessened his discomforts, they had
+at the same time tended greatly to demoralize both him and his employer,
+by introducing a system of out-door relief, which, coupled with the
+practice of regarding such relief as a legitimate addition to wages, led
+the former to feel no shame at underpaying his workmen, and the workman
+to feel no shame at depending on the parish for a portion of his means
+of subsistence. It was not to be wondered at that under such a system
+the poor-rates gradually rose to the prodigious amount of seven millions
+and a quarter of money; or that the rate-payers began to clamor against
+such a state of things, as imposing on them a burden beyond their power
+to bear. It was evident that it was an evil which imperatively demanded
+a remedy; and accordingly one of the first objects to which Lord Grey's
+Cabinet turned its attention after the completion of the Reform Bill was
+the amendment of the Poor-law.
+
+The scheme which in the spring of 1834 they introduced to Parliament was
+the first instance of the adoption in this country of that system of
+centralization which has long been a favorite with some of the
+Continental statesmen, but which is not equally in harmony with the
+instincts of our people, generally more attached to local government.
+But, if ever centralization could commend itself to the English mind, it
+might well be when a new law and a new principle of action were to be
+introduced, in the carrying out of which uniformity of practice over the
+whole kingdom was especially desirable. Accordingly, the government bill
+proposed the establishment of a Board of Commissioners to whom the
+general administration of the Poor-laws over the whole kingdom was to be
+intrusted. They were to have power to make rules and regulations as to
+the mode or modes of relief to be given, subject to the approval of the
+Secretary of State, that thus the establishment of one uniform system
+over the whole country might be secured. Power was to be given to unite
+several parishes into one union, and to erect large workhouses for the
+several parishes thus massed together;[230] and every union was to be
+under the management of boards of guardians, elected by the rate-payers
+of the different parishes, with the addition of the resident magistrates
+as ex officio guardians. Lord Althorp, who introduced the bill, admitted
+that such extensive powers as he proposed to confer on the Board of
+Commissioners were "an anomaly in the constitution," but pleaded the
+necessity of the case as their justification, since it was indispensable
+to vest a discretionary power somewhere, and the government was too
+fully occupied with the business of the nation, while the local
+magistrates would be destitute of the sources of information requisite
+to form a proper opinion on the subject. The commissioners alone, being
+exclusively devoted to the subject, and being alone in possession of all
+the information that could be collected, were really the only body who
+could fairly be trusted to form correct opinions on it.[231] The fact of
+the creation of such a board being "an anomaly," or, as it might rather
+have been called, a novelty in the constitution, does not seem an
+insuperable objection, unless it were also inconsistent or at variance
+with the fundamental principles of the constitution, and that can hardly
+be alleged in this instance. It is true that local management, whether
+its range were wide or narrow, whether covering the business of a county
+or limited to a single parish, had been the general rule; but, like
+every other arrangement for the conduct of affairs of any kind, that
+local management was inherently subject to the supreme authority and
+interference of Parliament. Nor, as the maintenance of this
+Parliamentary authority, as the supreme referee in the last resource,
+was provided for by the subordination of the commissioners for the
+approval of their regulations to the Secretary of State, does it seem
+that the arrangement now proposed and adopted can be said to have been
+inconsistent with constitutional principle. And the necessity for some
+change of that nature was clearly made out by the abuses which,
+undeniably, had been suffered to grow up under the old system.
+
+If the habitual condition of the Irish peasant were to be taken into
+account, it would be correct to say that there was less distress at this
+time in England than in Ireland; but there was still greater discontent,
+and infinitely more of dangerous disturbance. Catholic Emancipation had
+stimulated the agitators, not pacified them; they regarded it as a
+triumph over the English government; and, being so, as at once a reason
+for demanding, and a means of extorting, farther concessions. But this
+notion of theirs, when inculcated on the peasantry, bore terrible fruit,
+in such an increase of crime as had probably never been known in any
+country in the world. In the provinces of Leinster, Munster, and
+Connaught murders, deeds of arson, and rapine were of far more than
+daily occurrence.[232] Lord Althorp asserted in the House of Commons
+that more lives had been sacrificed in Ireland by murder in the
+preceding year than in one of Wellington's victories. And what was, if
+possible, a still worse symptom of the disposition of the common people,
+was exhibited in the impossibility of bringing the criminals, even when
+well known, to justice. Jurors held back from the assizes, witnesses who
+had seen murders committed refused to give evidence. The Roman Catholic
+prelates, and the higher class of the Roman Catholic clergy--most of
+whom, greatly to their credit, exerted themselves to check this fearful
+progress of wickedness--found their denunciations unheeded; while
+O'Connell, in his place in the House of Commons, used language which to
+an ignorant and ferocious peasantry looked almost like a justification
+of it, affirming it to be caused wholly by the "unjust and ruinous
+policy of the government" in refusing to abolish tithes. It was not the
+first time that the existence of tithe had been alleged as an Irish
+grievance. In the three southern provinces by far the greater portion of
+the tenantry were Roman Catholics, and they had long been complaining
+that they were forced to pay for the support of the Protestant clergyman
+of their parish, whose ministrations they could not attend, as well as
+for the maintenance of their own priest, whose livelihood depended on
+their contributions. According to strict political economy, there could
+be no doubt that the burden of the tithe fell, not on the tenant, but on
+the landlord, in the calculation of whose rent the amount of tithe to
+which each holding was liable was always taken into consideration; and
+that being the true doctrine, it was equally plain that in reality the
+Protestant clergy were paid, not by Roman Catholics, but by Protestants,
+since it was not disputed that by far the greater part of the
+land-owners in every province were Protestants.[233] But an ignorant
+peasant is no student of political economy or of logic; and the fact
+that the payment of the tithe passed through his hands was in his eyes,
+an incontrovertible proof that it came out of his pocket. The discontent
+had gradually begotten an organized resistance to the payment, and the
+mischief of allowing the continuance of such a state of feeling and
+conduct, which was manifestly likely to impair the respect for all law,
+made such an impression on the government that, in the royal speech with
+which he opened the session of 1832, the King recommended the whole
+subject to the consideration of Parliament, urging the Houses to inquire
+"whether it might not be possible to effect improvements in the laws
+respecting this subject."
+
+In compliance with this recommendation, committees were appointed by
+both Houses; and the result of their investigations was a recommendation
+that a new arrangement should be made, under which the tithe should be
+commuted to a rent-charge. Accordingly, the next year the ministers
+proceeded to give effect to this recommendation. But they reasonably
+judged that an alteration of a particular law in compliance with the
+clamor raised against it would be a concession pregnant with mischief to
+the principle of all government, if it were not accompanied, or rather
+preceded, by a vindication of the majesty of all law; and therefore the
+first measure affecting Ireland, which they brought in in 1833, was a
+"Coercion Bill," which empowered the Lord-lieutenant not only to
+suppress the meetings of any assembly or association which he might
+consider dangerous to the public peace, but also to declare by
+proclamation any district in which tumults and outrages were rife to be
+"in a disturbed state;" and in districts thus proclaimed no person was
+to be permitted to be absent from his house from an hour after sunset to
+sunrise. Houses might be searched for arms, martial law was to be
+established, and courts-martial held for the trial of all offences
+except felonies; and the _Habeas Corpus_ Act was suspended for three
+months. O'Connell and his party protested with great vehemence against
+such an enactment, as a violation of every right secured to the subject
+by the constitution. And a bill which suspended the ordinary courts of
+justice must be admitted to have been incompatible with the constitution
+as commonly understood and enjoyed. But if the measure thus proposed was
+extraordinary, the state of affairs which had led to its proposal was so
+also in a far greater degree. The records of no nation had ever
+presented such a fearful catalogue of crimes as was now laid before the
+Parliament, and at such a crisis the statesmen to whom the tranquillity
+of the country and the safety of the citizens were intrusted were
+undoubtedly called upon to go back from the letter of the constitution
+to that which is the primary object of every constitution--the safety of
+those who live under it. _Salus populi suprema lex_. And the argument of
+necessity was regarded, and rightly regarded, by both Houses of
+Parliament as a sufficient and complete justification of even so
+exceptional an enactment.
+
+And concurrently with this enactment, which, however indispensable for
+the repression of crime, no one could deny to be severe, the ministers
+endeavored also to remove the causes of discontent by a large measure of
+Church reform, not confining their aim to settling the tithe question,
+but dealing with the whole question of the Irish Church in such a way as
+to lay down, as an undoubted principle of the constitution, the doctrine
+that the Church existed for the benefit of the nation; that its property
+was bestowed on it for the same object; and that, consequently, the
+nation, or in other words the Parliament, had a perfect right to deal
+with its property and endowments of all kinds, always keeping the same
+end in view, the general advantage of the whole nation. Proceeding on
+these maxims, they introduced a Church Reform Bill, in which, perhaps,
+the most remarkable circumstance of all was, that the evil which had
+been the original cause of their taking up the subject at all was the
+last thing settled, not, indeed, being finally arranged for four years;
+while the principal detail in the way of reform which was completed in
+this first session was one which, however reasonable, had hitherto
+received but little attention, and had certainly provoked no great
+outcry. It could not be denied that the Episcopal Establishment in
+Ireland was out of all proportion to the extent of the country and the
+number of the Protestant population, or of the parishes. The entire
+population in communion with the Church fell short of 900,000. The
+number of parishes scarcely exceeded 1400. But over this comparatively
+scanty flock were set no fewer than eighteen bishops and four
+archbishops; while England, with 12,000 parishes, was contented with
+twenty-four bishops and two archbishops. It was proposed to consolidate
+these bishoprics into ten, the archbishoprics into two, a reduction
+which could hardly fail to commend itself to all. But with this
+reduction was combined a variety of other details relating to the
+Episcopal revenues, to the right of the bishops to grant leases, and
+other matters of finance, which the ministers proposed so to remodel as
+to create a very large fund to be at the disposal of the state. On this
+point the greater part of the ministerial scheme was wrecked for the
+time. They succeeded in carrying that part of it which consolidated the
+bishoprics, and in inducing the House of Commons to grant, first as a
+loan, which was originally turned into a gift, a million of money to be
+divided among the incumbents of the different parishes, who were reduced
+to the greatest distress by the inability to procure payment of their
+tithes, the arrears of which amounted to a far larger sum.
+
+But the assertion that any surplus fund arising from redistribution of
+the Episcopal revenues ought to belong to the state, not only called
+forth a vigorous resistance from the whole of the Tory party at its
+first promulgation, but, when the subject was revived the next year, and
+one of the supporters of the ministry, Mr. Ward, proposed a resolution
+that any such surplus might be legitimately applied to secular purposes,
+it produced a schism in the ministry itself. The resolution was
+cordially accepted by Lord John Russell, but was so offensive to four of
+his colleagues, Mr. Stanley and Sir James Graham being among the number,
+that they at once resigned their offices. The breach thus made was not
+easily healed; and before the end of the session other dissensions of a
+more vexatious and mortifying character led to the retirement of the
+Prime-minister himself. All attempts to deal with the tithe question
+failed for the time, four more years elapsing before it was finally
+settled. But, curtailed as it was, the bill of 1833 still deserves to be
+remembered as a landmark in constitutional legislation, since it
+afforded the first instance of Parliament affirming a right to deal with
+ecclesiastical dignities and endowments, thus setting a precedent which,
+in the next reign, was followed with regard to the Church of England.
+
+Lord Melbourne succeeded Lord Grey at the Treasury; but every one saw
+that the ministry was greatly weakened. The King, too, had become
+greatly dissatisfied both with their general policy, especially in
+regard to the Irish Church--which he took an opportunity of assuring the
+Irish bishops he was unalterably resolved to uphold--and also with the
+language and conduct of one or two individual ministers, to which it is
+not necessary to refer more particularly; and when, on the death of Lord
+Spencer, father of Lord Althorp, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, which
+took place in November, 1834, it became necessary for Lord Melbourne to
+propose to him a re-arrangement of some of the cabinet offices, he at
+once dismissed the whole body of the ministers. It was a somewhat
+singular step to take, for they had not been defeated in Parliament, and
+he did not himself allege any special dissatisfaction with anything
+which they had yet done, though he did apprehend that some of them would
+press upon him measures disadvantageous to "the clergy of the Church of
+England in Ireland," to which he had an insuperable objection; and,
+moreover, that the subject would cause fresh divisions in the ministry,
+and the resignation of one or two more of its most important members. He
+had, indeed, six months before, given a practical proof of his distrust
+of the ability of Lord Melbourne and the colleagues who remained to him
+to carry on the government of the kingdom satisfactorily, by desiring
+the new Prime-minister to enter into communication with the leaders of
+the Opposition, "to endeavor at this crisis to prevail upon them to
+afford their aid and co-operation toward the formation of an
+administration upon an enlarged basis, combining the services of the
+most able and efficient members of each" party.[234] Nor had he
+relinquished the idea of bringing about such a coalition, till he
+learned that both Lord Melbourne and Sir Robert Peel considered the
+differences which divided them to be too deeply founded on principle to
+render their union in one administration either beneficial to the state
+or creditable to themselves. And it may be said that the letter in which
+Lord Melbourne had in November announced to his Majesty the death of
+Lord Spencer, and the necessity for new arrangements which that event
+had created, by the expression that "in these new and altered
+circumstances it was for his Majesty to consider whether it were his
+pleasure to authorize Viscount Melbourne to attempt to make such fresh
+arrangements as might enable his present servants to continue to conduct
+the affairs of the country, or whether his Majesty deemed it advisable
+to adopt any other course," and that "Lord Melbourne earnestly entreated
+that no personal consideration for him might prevent his Majesty from
+taking any measures or seeking any other advice which he might think
+more likely to conduce to his service and to the advantage of the
+country," did not only contemplate, but to a certain degree even
+suggested, the possibility of his Majesty's preferring to have recourse
+to fresh advisers.
+
+The King's subsequent acts and their result, however, certainly took the
+kingdom by surprise. He applied to the Duke of Wellington to undertake
+the formation of a new ministry; and the Duke, explaining to the King
+that "the difficulty of the task consisted in the state of the House of
+Commons, earnestly recommended him to choose a minister in the House of
+Commons," and named Sir Robert Peel as the fittest object for his
+Majesty's choice. Sir Robert was in Italy at the time; but, on receiving
+the royal summons, he at once hastened to England, the Duke of
+Wellington in the mean time accepting the offices of First Lord of the
+Treasury and Secretary of State, as a provisional arrangement, till he
+should arrive in London.
+
+Sir Robert reached England early in December; and though, if "he had
+been consulted beforehand, he would have been inclined to dissuade the
+dismissal of the last ministry as premature and impolitic," he did not
+consider it compatible "with his sense of duty" to decline the charge
+which the King laid upon him, and at once accepted the office of
+Prime-minister, being fully aware that by so doing he "became
+technically, if not morally, responsible for the dissolution of the
+preceding government, though he had not had the remotest concern in
+it."[235] In the formation of his ministry he so far endeavored to carry
+out the views which the King had suggested to Lord Melbourne in the
+summer as to invite the co-operation of Mr. Stanley (who, by the death
+of his grandfather, had recently become Lord Stanley) and Sir J. Graham,
+who, as has been mentioned before, had retired from Lord Grey's cabinet.
+A new name, that of "Conservative," had recently been invented for the
+more moderate section of the old Tory party; and it was one which,
+though Lord Grey had taunted them with it, as betraying a sense of shame
+at adhering to their old colors, Peel was inclined to adopt for himself,
+as characteristic of his feelings and future objects; and perhaps he
+thought it might help to smooth the way for a junction with him of those
+who would flinch from proclaiming so decided a change in their opinions
+as would be implied by their becoming colleagues of one who still
+cherished the name of Tory. But they declined his offers; and
+consequently he was forced to select his cabinet entirely from the party
+of anti-Reformers. He dissolved Parliament, a step as to which it seemed
+to him that the universal expectations of, and even preparation for, a
+dissolution, left him practically scarcely any option;[236] but he soon
+found, as, indeed, he had feared he should find, the attempt to
+establish a Conservative government premature. The party of the late
+ministry, following the example set by Mr. Fox in 1784 with better
+fortune, divided against him in the House of Commons on every occasion,
+defeating him in every division; and at the beginning of April he
+retired, and Lord Melbourne and his former colleagues resumed their
+offices with very little change.
+
+They had, as was natural, not been contented with opposing the
+Conservative ministry in its general policy, but in both Houses they had
+attacked it with great energy. They had begun the battle in both Houses
+in the debate on the address, in which they selected three points in the
+recent transactions for special condemnation, affirming that in every
+one of them the royal prerogative had been unconstitutionally
+exercised--the dismissal of the late ministry, the dissolution of
+Parliament, and the appointment of the Duke of Wellington to a variety
+of offices. In the House of Commons the attack was led by Lord Morpeth
+and Lord John Russell; in the House of Lords by Lord Melbourne himself.
+It was urged that, though the prerogative of the sovereign to dismiss
+his ministers was undoubted and inalienable, yet the Houses had a clear
+right to sit in judgment on any particular exercise of it; and that the
+circumstances of the late ministry having been but recently formed, of
+its possessing in a conspicuous degree the confidence of the great
+majority of the House of Commons, and of its being occupied at the
+moment of its dismissal with matters of high national concern, justified
+the House in calling on the new ministers to show valid reasons for its
+sudden dismissal. As to the dissolution, it was asked what misdemeanor
+the late House of Commons had committed? No difference had occurred
+between it and the other House of Parliament. It had passed no hostile
+vote against any administration. It had been in existence but a very
+short time. All these circumstances, they affirmed, made it reasonable
+for the Houses to express to his Majesty their disapprobation of the
+dissolution. Lord Morpeth argued, moreover, that the right of the House
+of Commons to inquire into such an exercise of the royal prerogative was
+proved by the example of Mr. Pitt, who, in 1784, had introduced into the
+speech from the throne a paragraph inviting Parliament to approve of the
+recent dissolution; and what Parliament could be asked to approve of, it
+manifestly had an equal right to censure. But the most vehement of the
+censures of the Opposition were directed against what Lord Morpeth
+called "the most unseemly huddling of offices in the single person of
+the Duke of Wellington; an unconstitutional concentration of
+responsibility and power, at which there was hardly an old Whig of the
+Rockingham school whose hair did not stand on end." He admitted that in
+the present instance the arrangement had only been provisional and
+temporary, and that "no harm had been done;" but, he asked, "what harm
+might not have been done? If the country had been suddenly obliged to go
+to war, who would have been responsible for the Foreign Department? If
+an insurrection of the negroes had occurred, who was responsible for the
+Colonial Office? If in Ireland any tithe dispute had arisen, who was
+responsible as Home-secretary?" And Lord Melbourne, though a speaker
+generally remarkable for moderation, on this subject went much farther;
+and, after urging that, "if one person held the situation of First Lord
+of the Treasury, and also that of Secretary of State for the Home
+Department, it would not only place in his hands without any control the
+appointment to every great office in the state, but a person so situated
+would also have the pecuniary resources of the state at his disposal
+without check or investigation," he proceeded to assert that "an
+intention to exercise those offices would amount to a treasonable
+misdemeanor." He did not, indeed, go so far as his late
+Attorney-general, Sir J. Campbell, who, in vexation at his loss of
+office, had even threatened the Duke with impeachment; but, though he
+admitted that the Duke had been free from the guilty intention of
+exercising the authority of these offices, he suggested that "the Lords
+ought to pass some resolution calculated to prevent so great a breach of
+the constitution from being drawn into a precedent."
+
+On the first point thus raised, for the dismissal of the late ministry
+without any such cause as is usually furnished by an adverse vote of one
+of the Houses of Parliament, Peel frankly admitted that his acceptance
+of office rendered him constitutionally responsible, though, as he also
+said, it was notorious that in fact he had, and could have had, no
+previous knowledge of it; but he denied that any constitutional question
+whatever was involved in it, since the King's right was denied by no
+one; and he could, therefore, only consent to discuss it as a question
+of policy and expediency. And, looking at it in this light, he regarded
+his defence as easy and complete. He contended that the events of the
+past year, the resignation of several of the subordinate ministers, and
+finally of Lord Grey himself, and the proposal which had been made to
+him (Peel) and several of his friends to coalesce with Lord Melbourne,
+rendered the act by which the late government had been removed perfectly
+justifiable on the part both of the King and of himself; that the King
+was justified in thinking a wholly fresh arrangement preferable to a
+re-arrangement of Lord Melbourne's cabinet; and he himself in obeying
+his sovereign's commands to form a new administration.
+
+The wisdom and propriety of the dissolution, too, could only be examined
+as a question of expediency; but in this instance every consideration
+not only recommended but compelled it. "When he undertook the arduous
+duties now imposed upon him, he did determine that he would leave no
+constitutional effort untried to enable him satisfactorily to discharge
+the trust imposed in him. He did fear that if he had met the late
+Parliament he should have been obstructed in his course, and obstructed
+in a manner and at a season which might have precluded an appeal to the
+people. It was the constant boast of the late government that the late
+Parliament had unbounded confidence in them. And, if that Parliament
+was, as had been constantly asserted, relied upon as ready to condemn
+him without a hearing, could any one be surprised at his appeal to the
+judgment of another, a higher and a fairer tribunal, the public sense of
+the people?" Precedent, too, was in his favor on this point, since,
+"whenever an extensive change of government had occurred, a dissolution
+of Parliament had followed;" and he referred to the year 1784, and to
+1806, when the administration of which Lord Grey was the leading member
+at once dissolved the existing Parliament on coming into office; though
+he believed "the present to be the first occasion on which a House of
+Commons had been invited to express its dissatisfaction at the exercise
+of the prerogative of dissolution."
+
+To the strictures of Lord Melbourne and Lord Morpeth on the Duke of
+Wellington's temporary assumption of a combination of offices, it was
+replied by Sir Robert and the Duke that, though there might be
+inconvenience from the assumption of all those powers by one individual,
+it was so far from being unconstitutional, that it was a common practice
+for the Secretary for one department to act for another during intervals
+of recreation, or periods of ill-health; that there was ample precedent
+for such a proceeding. In the last week of the life of Queen Anne, the
+Duke of Shrewsbury had united three of the greatest posts of the
+kingdom, those of Lord Treasurer, Lord Chamberlain, and Lord-lieutenant
+of Ireland, with the sanction of that great constitutional lawyer, Lord
+Somers. And in 1827 Mr. Canning had retained the seals of the Foreign
+Office for some weeks after his appointment as First Lord of the
+Treasury. Moreover, there was actually a law which provided that when
+the office of Chancellor of the Exchequer is vacant the seals of that
+office shall be delivered to the Chief-justice; and under this rule, in
+the latter part of the reign of George II., Chief-justice Lord Mansfield
+had continued finance-minister for above three months. And, as to the
+practical result of what had been done in the present instance, the Duke
+affirmed, what, indeed, was universally admitted, that the arrangement
+had from the first been understood to be merely temporary; that no
+inconvenience had resulted from it; indeed, that "not a single act had
+been done in any one of the offices which had not been essentially
+necessary for the service of the country."
+
+The first two points on which the ministry was assailed it seems
+superfluous to examine, since it is clear that the position taken up by
+Sir Robert Peel is impregnable: that, on every view of the principles
+and practice of the constitution, there was no doubt of the right of the
+sovereign to dismiss his ministers or to dissolve the Parliament at his
+pleasure; and that those acts can only be judged of by a consideration
+of their expediency. Inexpedient, indeed, the dismissal of the preceding
+ministry is generally considered to have been, even in the interest of
+the Conservatives themselves. But inexpedient the dissolution can hardly
+be pronounced to have been, since, though the new election failed to
+give them a majority in the House of Commons, it beyond all doubt
+greatly strengthened their minority. On the other hand, though it cannot
+be denied that the House of Commons has a perfect right to express its
+disapproval of any or every act of the minister, it is not so clear that
+Lord Morpeth's invitation to it to express its dissatisfaction with this
+particular act of dissolution was, on general principles, expedient or
+safe; since such a vote is making a perilous approach to claiming for
+the House the right of being asked for its consent to its own
+dissolution, a claim the admission of which had been one of the most
+fatal, if not the most fatal, of all the concessions of Charles I.
+
+As to the Duke of Wellington's assumption of a variety of offices, it is
+probable that when he first proposed to the King to confer them on him,
+he anticipated no objection whatever from any quarter, since he had so
+little idea of there being any impropriety in holding two offices, were
+they ever so apparently incongruous, if his Majesty should have directed
+him to do so, that seven years before, when he became Prime-minister, he
+had at first designed permanently to retain the command of the army in
+conjunction with the Treasury, and had only been induced to abandon the
+intention by the urgent remonstrance of Sir Robert Peel; and,
+constitutionally, there does not seem to be any limitation of the
+sovereign's power to confer offices, to unite or to divide them. Indeed,
+the different Secretary-ships of State seem to owe their existence
+entirely to his will, and not to any act of Parliament. He can diminish
+the number, if he should think fit, as he did in 1782, when, on the
+termination of the American war, he forbore to appoint a successor to
+Lord George Germaine, in Lord Rockingham's administration; or he can
+increase the numbers, as he did in 1794, when he revived the third
+Secretaryship, which he had suppressed twelve years before, without any
+act of Parliament being passed to direct either the suspension or the
+revival. He can even leave the most important offices vacant, and
+intrust the performance of their duties to a commission, as was done in
+this very year 1835, when the Great Seal was put in commission, and the
+duties, for above two years, were performed by commissioners, who had
+other duties also to discharge; and these instances may, perhaps,
+warrant the conclusion that the distribution of the different posts in
+what is generally known as the cabinet is dictated by considerations of
+what is practicable and expedient rather than by any positive and
+invariable rule or principle.
+
+Yet it does not follow that, because the constitution was not violated
+or endangered by such an arrangement, the leaders of the Opposition did
+other than their duty in calling attention to it. Unquestionably, it is
+historically true that the liberties of the people owe their
+preservation, growth, and vigor to the jealous watchfulness to check the
+first and slightest appearance of any attempt to encroach upon them,
+which has been constantly exercised from the very earliest times by an
+almost unbroken series of fearless and independent patriots. And in this
+instance the very novelty of such an arrangement as had taken place did
+of itself make criticism a duty; though it may also be thought that the
+critics acted wisely in contenting themselves with calling notice to it,
+and abstaining from asking Parliament to pronounce a formal judgment on
+it, since any express censure would have been unwarranted either by the
+facts of the case or by any inference to be drawn from previous usage,
+while an approval of it would wear the appearance not only of
+sanctioning, but even of inviting a repetition of an arrangement which,
+if ever attempted to be carried out in actual practice, must tend to
+grave inconvenience, if not to discredit.
+
+Lord Melbourne resumed office, and, being strengthened by the manifest
+inability of the opposite party to command the confidence of the House
+of Commons, began to apply himself with vigor to the carrying out of
+several measures of internal reform, some of which involved not only the
+property but the long-established rights of very considerable bodies,
+and, as so doing, have an importance in a constitutional point of view,
+besides that arising from their immediate effects. Peel had been equally
+alive to the desirableness, so cogent as almost to amount to a moral
+necessity, of introducing reforms into more than one old institution,
+such as should bring them more into harmony with the spirit of the age,
+remodelling or terminating some arrangements which were manifest abuses,
+and others which, though, if dispassionately examined and properly
+understood, they, perhaps, were not really grievances, yet in their
+operation caused such discontent and heart-burnings that they were as
+mischievous as many others far more indefensible in theory. And,
+short-lived as his administration had been, he had found time to frame
+and introduce an extensive measure of Church reform, not only dealing
+with the question of tithes, the levy and collection of which in some of
+their details had long been made subjects of bitter complaints by the
+farmers, but including also provision for the creation of two new
+bishoprics, those of Ripon and Manchester. No part of his measure was
+more imperatively called for by the present circumstances of the nation,
+or of greater importance in its future operation. There had been no
+increase in the number of bishops since the reign of Elizabeth; but
+since her time not only had the population of the entire kingdom been
+quadrupled, but some districts which had then been very scantily peopled
+had become exceedingly populous. These districts had hitherto been
+almost destitute of Episcopal supervision, which now was thus to be
+supplied to them. But the new legislation did more. It might be expected
+that the growth of the population would continue, and would in time
+require a farther and corresponding increase of the Episcopate; and the
+erection of these new dioceses was, therefore, not only the supplying of
+a present want, but the foundation of a system for increasing the
+efficiency of the Church which should be capable of gradual progressive
+expansion, as the growth of the population in various districts might be
+found to require additional facilities for supervision. And the judgment
+with which the new arrangement met the requirements of the community may
+be regarded as proved by the circumstance that now, after the lapse of
+nearly half a century, it is maintained in active operation, and is
+admitted by all parties not only to be of the greatest practical
+benefit, but also to have a moral effect scarcely less valuable in the
+degree in which it has stimulated the application of private munificence
+to the great work of Church extension.
+
+But before Lord Grey quitted office his government had also called the
+attention of Parliament to the necessity of a large municipal reform,
+which, indeed, it seemed to them that the Reform Bill had bound them, in
+all consistency, to introduce. In the speech with which the King had
+closed the session of 1833, he had informed the Houses that he had
+"directed commissions to be issued for investigating the state of the
+municipal corporations throughout the United Kingdom, the result of
+whose inquiries would enable them to mature some measure which might
+seem best fitted to place the internal government of corporate cities
+and towns upon a solid foundation in respect of their finances, their
+judicature, and their police." He reminded them that they had recently
+passed acts "for giving constitutions upon sound principles to the royal
+and parliamentary boroughs of Scotland," and warned them that "their
+attention would hereafter be called to the expediency of extending
+similar advantages to the unincorporated towns in England which had now
+acquired the right of returning members to Parliament." The commission
+of which his Majesty thus spoke had now presented its report, strongly
+condemnatory of the existing system in almost every point of view; of
+the constitution and mode of election of the existing corporations, and
+of their government of the towns over which they presided. It declared
+that "even where they existed in their least imperfect form, and were
+most rightfully administered, they were inadequate to the wants of the
+present state of society." But they charged them also with positive
+offences of no venial kind. "They had perverted their powers to
+political ends, sacrificing local interests to party purposes. They had
+diverted from their legitimate use revenues which ought to have been
+applied for the public advantage, wasting them in many instances for the
+benefit of individuals; sometimes even employing for purposes of
+corruption funds originally intended for charitable uses." And they
+asserted that this too common misconduct of these bodies had engendered
+"among a great majority of the inhabitants of the incorporated towns a
+general and just dissatisfaction with their municipal institutions, a
+distrust of the self-elected municipal councils, and of the municipal
+magistracy, tainting with suspicion the local administration of
+justice." And therefore they "felt it their duty to represent to his
+Majesty that the existing municipal corporations of England and Wales
+neither possessed nor deserved the confidence and respect of his
+Majesty's subjects; and that a thorough reform must be effected before
+they could become what they ought to be, useful and efficient
+instruments of local government."
+
+It would be superfluous here to repeat the story of the rise of the
+boroughs, whose gradual acquisition of charters, with privileges and
+powers of various degrees, has been sufficiently investigated by
+Hallam.[237] What the Parliament had now to deal with was the way in
+which the system worked in the nineteenth century; and here it must be
+confessed that the report of the commissioners, severe as it was, did in
+no degree exaggerate the prevailing evils. The corporations had
+gradually become self-elected oligarchies of the worst kind. It must be
+admitted that, in perverting their authority to political purposes, they
+might plead the excuse that they were but following the example set them
+by the ministers of William III., who introduced into their bill for
+restoring the corporations which James II. had suppressed clauses
+manifestly intended to preserve the ascendency of the Whig party, "by
+keeping the Church or Tory faction out of"[238] them. But no such
+palliation (if, indeed, that had any right to be called a palliation)
+could be alleged for their abuse of the trusts committed to them; abuse
+which, if committed by single individuals, would have been branded, and
+perhaps punished, as malversation and fraud of the deepest dye. A
+sufficient specimen of the kind and extent of their misdeeds in one
+branch of their duties was afforded by a single paragraph of Lord John
+Russell's speech, in which he affirmed that, in some of the reports of
+their management of charitable estates committed to their care, it was
+proved that "the property, instead of being employed for the general
+benefit of the town, had been consumed for the partial benefit of a few
+individuals, and not unfrequently in the feastings and entertainments in
+which the mayor and other corporators had been in the habit of
+indulging. In some not very large boroughs these expenses had amounted
+to £500 and £600 a year; and the enjoyment had been confined to freemen
+of only one party." And the perpetuity of this mismanagement was in most
+instances secured by the members of the corporation themselves electing
+their new colleagues on the occasion of any vacancy.
+
+To put an end to this discreditable state of affairs, the government had
+prepared a very sweeping scheme of reform, though that it was not too
+sweeping was proved by the approval with which not only its principle
+but most of its details were received by the greater part of the
+Opposition; the leading principle being, to quote the words of the
+minister in introducing the bill, "that there should be one uniform
+government instituted, applicable to all; one uniform franchise for the
+purpose of election; and a like description of officers in each, with
+the exception of some of the larger places, in which there would be a
+recorder, or some other such magistrate. The first thing to be amended
+was the mode of election to the corporation, which was now to be
+intrusted to all such rate-payers in each borough as had paid poor-rates
+for three years, and resided within seven miles of the place." Lord John
+Russell had considered, he said, "whether this franchise should be
+limited to those paying a certain amount of rates; to the ten-pound
+householders, for instance, to whom the parliamentary franchise was
+confined;" but he decided on proposing to extend it to _all_
+rate-payers, because, according to the established principle, to the
+known and recognized principle of the constitution, it is right that
+those who contribute their money should have a voice in the election of
+the persons by whom the money is expended. The old modes of acquiring
+the freedom of a corporation, such as birth, apprenticeship, etc., were
+to be abolished, as also were all exclusive rights of trade, vested
+rights, however, being preserved. The next point to be decided was the
+composition of the corporation which these rate-payers were to elect,
+and the ministerial proposal was that each corporation should consist of
+a mayor, aldermen, and councillors, possessing a certain amount of
+property as a qualification, and varying in number according to the
+population of the borough; the larger towns being also divided into
+wards, with a certain number of common-councilmen and aldermen to be
+chosen in each ward. The mayor was to be a yearly officer; of the
+aldermen and councillors a certain number were to retire each year,
+being, however, capable of re-election. The mayor was to be elected by
+the councils, and was to be a magistrate during his year of office. And
+the body thus constituted was to have the entire government of the
+borough; of its police, its charities, and generally, and most
+especially, of the raising and expenditure of its funds,[239] which had
+been too often dealt with in a manner not only wasteful, but profligate.
+Cases had been brought forward in which "corporations had been incurring
+debts year by year, while the members were actually dividing among
+themselves the proceeds of the loans they raised." The revenue derived
+from charitable estates had been "no less scandalously mismanaged." And
+the bill provided for the appointment of finance committees, trustees,
+auditors, and a regular publication of all the accounts, as the only
+efficient remedy and preventive of such abuses. The whole police of the
+town and administration of justice was also to be completely under the
+control of the council; and for the appointment of magistrates the
+council was to have the power of recommending to the crown those whom
+they thought fit to receive the commission of the peace; and in the
+large towns it should have power also to provide a salary for
+stipendiary magistrates. Another clause provided that towns which could
+not as yet be included in the bill, since they had never been
+incorporated, might obtain charters of incorporation by petition to the
+Privy Council.
+
+Such were the general provisions of this great measure of reform; a bill
+similar in principle having already been enacted for Scotland, and
+another being shortly after passed, with such variations of detail as
+the differences in the circumstances of the country required, for
+Ireland. Some of the clauses, especially those which preserved the
+vested rights of freemen and their families, and which required a
+certain amount of property or rating qualifications in the town
+councillors, were not originally included in the bill, but were inserted
+as amendments in the House of Lords; and it may be remarked that the
+result of the discussion in that House afforded a proof of the sagacity
+of those peers who, though conscientiously opposed to the Reform Bill,
+preferred allowing it to pass by their own retirement from the final
+divisions to driving the minister to carry his point by a creation of
+peers, since the avoidance of such an addition to their numbers as had
+been threatened enabled them now to force the adoption of these
+amendments on a reluctant minister. And it seems difficult to deny that
+the first was required by justice, and that the second was most
+desirable in the interests of the measure itself. Without it the town
+councillors, from among whom the mayor was to be chosen, might have been
+selected from the poorest, the least educated, and least independent
+class of the rate-payers. In some boroughs, or in some wards of many
+boroughs, it may be regarded as certain that they would have been so
+chosen; and such an admixture of unfit persons would have tended to
+bring some degree of discredit on the whole council, while to the
+successful inauguration of a new system the establishment of a general
+feeling of respect for it and confidence in it was of primary
+importance. The danger, too, of so ill-judged a selection would have
+been greatest in the larger boroughs, those being, at the same time, the
+very places in which the occasional difficulty of maintaining order and
+tranquillity made it even more necessary than in smaller towns that the
+council should enjoy the esteem and confidence of their fellow-citizens.
+
+The principle that every man who contributed to the rates had a right to
+claim a voice in the election of those who were to expend them, which
+the minister laid down as the justification of the clause conferring the
+municipal franchise on all the rate-payers, was strongly contested by
+Sir Robert Peel, though neither he nor those of his party in the Upper
+House proposed any alteration of the bill in this respect; but he
+pointed out that, though Lord John affirmed it to be the known and
+recognized principle of the constitution, he had not acted on it in the
+Reform Bill; and it is certainly open to question whether the adoption
+of some limitation would not have been an improvement on the present
+measure. The doctrine established in this instance by Lord John gave a
+preponderance at every municipal election to mere numbers, since the
+poorest class is everywhere the most numerous, and its admission led
+almost inevitably to a reduction of the parliamentary franchise at some
+future day, though certainly at this time, and for many years afterward,
+Lord John was far from contemplating any alteration of the Reform Bill,
+but, on the contrary, took every opportunity of proclaiming his
+adherence to it as a final solution of the question.
+
+But though in this particular it is possible that the bill might have
+been improved, it must be allowed to have been a measure very creditable
+to its framers. Few reforms have been conceived in a more judicious and
+more moderate spirit; few have been so carefully limited to the removal
+of real and proved abuses, and the prevention of their recurrence, while
+avoiding any concessions to the insidious demands of revolutionists, or
+the ill-regulated fancies of metaphysical theorists. It was a reform
+strictly in accordance with some of the most important principles of the
+constitution, as they have been gradually developed by the practical
+experience of successive generations. It combined with felicitous skill
+representative with local government; it secured uniformity in working,
+and that peculiarly English principle of publicity, without which the
+best-devised system cannot long be preserved from degeneracy.
+
+The Church reforms in England and Ireland, which were carried out about
+the same time, cannot be said to have involved any constitutional
+principle, though one of them greatly extended the principle of
+religious toleration and indulgence to the Dissenters of various sects.
+No alteration had been made in the Marriage Act of 1754, which declared
+it indispensable to the validity of a marriage that it should be
+performed in a church and by a clergyman of the Established Church. And
+it was not strange that this should be felt as a grievance by those who
+were not in communion with that Church. But some of the Dissenting sects
+had an additional cause of discontent in the words of the marriage
+service, which gave a religious character to the ceremony, while they
+regarded it as a civil contract. In his short administration Sir Robert
+Peel had recognized the validity of the arguments against the unmodified
+maintenance of the existing law, and had framed a measure calculated, in
+his view, to give the Dissenters the relief their title to which could
+not be denied. But his bill had been extinguished by his retirement. And
+Lord John Russell now availed himself of the machinery of another
+measure, which he introduced at the same time, to make the relief
+somewhat wider and more effective.
+
+Hitherto there was no record of births and marriages beyond that which
+was preserved in the registers of different parishes, which in former
+years had in many instances been carelessly and inaccurately kept. But
+at the beginning of 1836, the ministers, justly urging that it was
+important, in a national point of view, both with regard to the security
+of titles to property, and to that knowledge of the state of population
+the value of which was recognized by the establishment of the practice
+of taking a decennial census, that there should be a general register of
+all such occurrences, introduced a bill to establish a registry and
+registrar in every Poor-law union, with a farther registry for each
+county, and a chief or still more general one in London for the whole
+kingdom, subject to the authority of the Poor-law Commissioners. And by
+a second bill they farther proposed that the registries to be thus
+established should be offices at which those who desired to do so might
+contract purely civil marriages. Previous clauses in it provided that
+members of any sect of Protestant Dissenters might be married in their
+own chapels, and by ministers of their own persuasion. After enactments
+removing all the civil disabilities under which Nonconformists had
+labored for one hundred and fifty years had been placed on the
+statute-book, it was clearly inconsistent in the highest degree to
+retain still more offensive and unreasonable religious disabilities, and
+to deny to them the right of being married by their own ministers,
+according to the rites most agreeable to their consciences or
+prejudices. And though some of the details of the ministerial measure
+were objected to and slightly altered in its passage through Parliament,
+the general principle was admitted by the warmest friends and most
+recognized champions of the Established Church, who wisely felt that a
+bulwark which is too ill-placed or too unsubstantial to be defended, is
+often a treacherous source of weakness rather than strength, and that a
+temperate recognition of the validity of claims founded on justice was
+the best protection against others which had no such foundation, and
+that measures such as these adopted in a spirit of generous conciliation
+could only strengthen the Church by taking at least one weapon from the
+hands of its enemies.
+
+Another of the measures relating to the Church, of which Peel had
+prepared a sketch, had for its object the removal of a grievance of
+which the members of the Church itself had long been complaining, the
+mode of the collection of tithe. It would be superfluous here to
+endeavor to trace the origin of tithes, or the purposes beyond the
+sustentation of the clergymen to which they were originally
+applied.[240] They had undoubtedly been established in England some time
+before the Conquest, and the principle that the land should support the
+National Church was admitted by a large majority of the population; it
+may probably be said with something nearly approaching unanimity on the
+part of those who really paid it, namely, the land-owners. The objection
+to the tithe system was founded rather on the way in which it worked,
+operating, as Lord John Russell described it, as "a discouragement to
+industry; a penalty on agricultural skill; a heavy mulct on those who
+expended the most capital and displayed the greatest skill in the
+cultivation of the land." The present mode of levying the tithes forced
+the clergy to forbearance at the expense of what they deemed to be their
+rights, or led them to enforce them at the expense of the influence
+which they ought to possess with their parishioners, compelling them to
+lose either their income by their indulgence, or their proper weight and
+popularity in the parish by the exaction of what the law gave them for
+"the support of themselves and their families." And this dilemma was
+felt so keenly by the clergy themselves, that it had become a very
+general feeling with them that, "if any sort of commutation could be
+devised, they would be delighted to be delivered from this objectionable
+mode of payment." Indeed, Sir Robert Peel, whose measure of the
+preceding year had been chiefly directed to the encouragement of
+voluntary commutations, had stated to the House that there were already
+two thousand parishes in the kingdom in which a commutation between the
+clergyman and his parishioners had been agreed upon, and established as
+a durable settlement by separate acts of Parliament. Indeed,
+arrangements of this kind existed very generally; the parishes in which
+the tithe was taken in kind being comparatively few, and the plan
+usually adopted being for the occupier of land to pay the incumbent a
+fixed annual sum bearing a certain proportion to his rent. But
+arrangements which were optional were, of course, liable to be
+rescinded; and Peel desired to establish a system which should be
+universal and permanent. And with this view he had designed the
+appointment of a temporary commission, one member of which should be
+nominated by the Primate, as the representative of the Church, under
+whose supervision the tithes of every parish in the kingdom should be
+commuted into a rent-charge, regulated partly by the composition which
+had hitherto been paid, and partly by the average price of grain--wheat,
+barley, and oats. It was no new idea, since as far back as 1791 Pitt had
+proposed a general commutation of tithes for a corn rent, and had
+submitted a plan with that object to the Primate, though circumstances
+of which we have no accurate knowledge prevented him from proceeding
+with it.[241] Objections[242] were taken to this last part of the
+arrangement, chiefly because it would render perpetual the terms of
+existing compositions, the extreme augmentation of them which was
+provided for in the bill being only ten per cent., while it was
+notorious that the majority of incumbents had shown such liberality in
+these matters that the compositions rarely amounted to two-thirds of the
+sum to which they were legally entitled. And it was hardly denied that
+the measure did involve some sacrifice of the extreme legal rights of
+the clergy; but it was urged and generally felt by the most judicious
+friends of the Church that the peace and harmony which might be expected
+to be the fruit of the measure was worth some sacrifice, and the bill
+was passed with very general approval; a bill on similar principles,
+with such variations as were required by the differences between the two
+countries, being also passed for Ireland.
+
+The last measure on ecclesiastical subjects was also chiefly of a
+financial character, though its details were calculated, some directly,
+others indirectly, to produce benefits of a still more important nature.
+The condition of the property of the bishops and the ecclesiastical
+chapters had long been a subject of censorious remark. The various
+dioceses differed greatly in extent, as did, therefore, the labors of
+the diocesans. Some sees contained above 1000, one (London) even above
+1200 parishes; others contained under 150. The revenues of some were
+very large, in one or two instances approaching £20,000 a year, while
+those of others scarcely exceeded £1000 or £1500 a year, thus affording
+incomes palpably inadequate to the support of the Episcopal dignity; so
+inadequate, indeed, that they were generally supplemented by the
+addition of some better endowed deanery or canonry. It was universally
+felt that such a deficiency and such a mode of supplying it were in
+themselves a scandal, which was greatly augmented by the system of
+translations to which it had given birth. The poorer bishoprics would
+hardly have been accepted at all had they not been regarded as
+stepping-stones to others of greater value; and the hope of such
+promotion had in some cases the not unnatural, however deplorable,
+effect of making the bishop anxious to please the minister of the day,
+to whom alone he could look for translation, by parliamentary
+subservience; and the still more mischievous result (if possible) of
+rendering the whole Bench liable to the same degrading suspicion; while
+the canonries and prebends in the different chapters, whose revenues
+also varied greatly, were in every diocese so numerous that they had
+become nearly sinecures, the duties rarely exceeding residence for a
+month, or, at the outside, six weeks in a year.
+
+These abuses (for such they could not be denied to be) had attracted the
+attention of Sir Robert Peel, who had appointed a commission, of which
+many of the highest dignitaries of the Church were members, and who,
+after very careful investigation and deliberation, presented a series of
+reports on which the ministry framed its measure. They proposed, as has
+already been mentioned in connection with the labors of Sir Robert Peel,
+an amalgamation of four of the smaller bishoprics at their next vacancy,
+in order hereafter to provide for the addition of two new ones at
+Manchester, or Lancaster, and Ripon, without augmenting the number of
+bishops. Lord Melbourne apparently feared to provoke the hostility of
+some of the extreme Reformers, who had recently proposed to deprive the
+bishops of their seats in the House of Lords, if he should attempt to
+increase the number of the spiritual peers; though, as their number had
+been stationary ever since the Reformation, while that of the lay peers
+had been quadrupled, such an objection hardly seemed entitled to so much
+consideration. Another clause was directed toward the establishment of
+greater equality between the revenues of the different bishoprics, a
+step which, besides its inherent reasonableness and equity, would
+extinguish the desire of promotion by translation, except in a few
+specified instances. Various reasons, sufficiently obvious and
+notorious, rendered the two archbishoprics, and the bishoprics of
+London, Durham, and Winchester, more costly to the occupants than the
+other dioceses; and these were, therefore, left in possession of larger
+revenues than the rest, proportionate to their wider duties or heavier
+charges. But all the others were to be nearly equal, none exceeding
+£5500, and none falling below £4500; while the five richer sees were
+also the only ones to which a prelate could be translated from another
+diocese. It followed, almost as a matter of course, that the practice of
+allowing a bishop to hold any other preferment was to cease with the
+cessation of the cause that had led to such an abuse.
+
+Another part of the bill provided for the suppression of such canonries
+or prebends as might fairly be considered superfluous. Four were
+considered sufficient for the proper performance of the duties of each
+cathedral; and the extinction (after the lives of the present holders)
+of the rest was designed to form a large fund, to be at the disposal of
+the Ecclesiastical Commissioners,[243] and to be applied by them chiefly
+to meet the wants of the more populous parishes in different large
+towns, for which it had hitherto been difficult to make any
+provision,[244] by contributing to the erection of additional churches,
+by increasing the incomes of the incumbents in cases where it was
+insufficient, or in any other way which the practical experience of the
+members of the commission might suggest. One very important reform of a
+different kind was also provided for in the abolition of pluralities,
+the bill prohibiting the holding of two livings by the same person
+except they were within ten miles of each other. The measure was
+objected to by Sir Robert Inglis, who had represented Oxford as the
+peculiar champion of Protestant and Church principles ever since 1829,
+and by a party which shared his views, as one calculated to be "fatal to
+the best interests of the Church." They looked on the property of the
+Church and everything connected with it as invested with so peculiar a
+character, that they not only contested the right of Parliament to take
+any step to diminish its revenues or to change the employment of them,
+but they even "disputed its right to deprive one class of the clergy of
+any portion of their revenues for the purpose of distributing it among
+another." But the distinction thus made between Church property and that
+of any other public body seems one which can hardly be supported. The
+purposes for which ecclesiastical chapters or officials have been
+endowed with possessions and revenues are undoubtedly of a more sacred
+character than the duties imposed on lay corporations; but that
+consideration cannot be regarded as affecting the tenure of those
+possessions, or as inconsistent with the doctrine that they are national
+property, bestowed by the nation on the Church for the service and
+advantage of the people; deeply interested not only in the maintenance
+of an Established Church, but in that Church being in the highest
+possible degree efficient for its holy objects. Being so bestowed and
+appropriated, that property must, on every principle of the
+constitution, be subject to the control of the national Parliament. And
+surely that control could never be more legitimately exerted than in
+carrying out the recommendations of a commission which numbered among
+its members several of the prelates of the Church, whose profession and
+position were a guarantee for their anxiety to preserve all the rights
+of the Church which contributed to its credit or efficiency; while their
+matured experience enabled them better than any other men to judge how
+to reconcile the maintenance of its dignity with the extension of its
+usefulness.
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 226: The second resolution affirmed that "this House looks
+forward to a progressive improvement in the character of the slave
+population, such as may prepare them for a participation in those civil
+rights and privileges which are enjoyed by other classes of his
+Majesty's subjects." (Stapleton's "Life of Canning," iii., 98, where
+also large extracts from the minister's speech are given.)]
+
+[Footnote 227: Trinidad, St. Lucia, and Demerara were the only British
+islands which had not separate Legislatures.]
+
+[Footnote 228: Miss Martineau. "History of the Thirty Years' Peace,"
+book iv., c. viii.]
+
+[Footnote 229: Alison, "History of Europe," 2d series, c. xxxi., sec.
+74.]
+
+[Footnote 230: In the debate on the Registration Bill, in 1836, Lord
+John Russell stated that two hundred and twenty eight unions had already
+been formed in England and Wales, and that it might be calculated that
+when the whole country was divided into unions the entire number would
+amount to something more than eight hundred.]
+
+[Footnote 231: See Lord Althorp's speech, of parts of which an abstract
+is given in the text.--_Parliamentary Debates_, xxii., April 17.]
+
+[Footnote 232: Lord Althorp made the following frightful statement of
+the crimes committed in the province of Leinster alone in the last three
+months of 1832 and the first three of 1833: 207 murders, 271 cases of
+arson. The assaults attended with grievous personal injury were above
+1000; burglaries and robberies, above 3000.]
+
+[Footnote 233: It was often asserted that fourteen-fifteenths of the
+land in Ireland belonged to Protestants, but this estimate was,
+probably, an exaggeration.]
+
+[Footnote 234: "Memoirs of Sir Robert Peel," ii., 3, 19.]
+
+[Footnote 235: "Memoirs of Sir Robert Peel," pp. 31, 32.]
+
+[Footnote 236: "One important question I found practically, and perhaps
+unavoidably, decided before my arrival, namely, the dissolution of the
+existing Parliament. Every one seemed to have taken it for granted that
+the Parliament must be dissolved, and preparations had accordingly been
+made almost universally for the coming contest."--_Peel's Memoirs_, ii.,
+43.]
+
+[Footnote 237: "Middle Ages," ii., 31 _seq_. See also Stubbs,
+"Constitutional History," i., 82-92 _et seq._]
+
+[Footnote 238: See Hallam's "Constitutional History," ii., 155.]
+
+[Footnote 239: This was a matter of no small importance. The number of
+boroughs included in the bill was 183, having a population of about two
+millions. Their annual income was stated by Lord John Russell to be as
+nearly as possible £2000 a year for each, being £367,000; but their
+annual expenditure exceeded that amount by £10,000, being £377,000;
+"besides which there was a debt of £2,000,000 owing by these bodies."]
+
+[Footnote 240: See Hallam, "Middle Ages," ii., 205-207.]
+
+[Footnote 241: "Life of Pitt," ii., 131. Lord Stanhope imagines that the
+plan was relinquished in consequence of discouraging comments by the
+Archbishop (Dr. Moore).]
+
+[Footnote 242: These objections were founded on the following
+calculations, or something similar to them. The tithe was the tenth of
+the produce. In letting estates it was estimated that a farm ought to
+produce three rents; in other words, that a farm let at £1 an acre ought
+to produce yearly £3 an acre. One-tenth of three pounds, or 6s.,
+therefore, was what the clergyman was entitled to claim. Out of this,
+however, he had to defray the cost of collection, which might, perhaps,
+be one shilling, leaving him five shillings. But the average of
+compositions over the whole kingdom was under 2s. 9d., or
+eleven-twentieths of what he was entitled to; and if augmented by ten
+per cent., it would not exceed three shillings.]
+
+[Footnote 243: The fund so created was expected to amount to £130,000 a
+year.]
+
+[Footnote 244: As instances of the want of church-room in such towns,
+Lord John cited the dioceses of London, Chester, York, Lichfield, and
+Coventry, containing a population of 2,590,000 persons, with church
+accommodation for only 276,000, or one-ninth of the population; the
+Commissioners, from whose report he was quoting, reckoning that
+church-room ought to be provided for one-third.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+
+Death of William IV., and Accession of Queen Victoria.--Rise of the
+Chartists.--Resignation of Lord Melbourne in 1839, and his Resumption of
+Office.--Marriage of the Queen, and Consequent Arrangements.--The
+Precedence of the Prince, etc.--Post-office Reform.--War in
+Afghanistan.--Discontent in Jamaica.--Insurrection in Canada.--New
+Constitution for Canada and other Colonies.--Case of Stockdale and
+Hansard.
+
+
+The reforms mentioned in the preceding chapter were the last measures of
+the reign of William IV. In the summer of the next year, 1837, he died,
+and was succeeded in his British, though not in his Hanoverian,
+dominions by our present gracious sovereign, who had only just arrived
+at the age which entitled her to exercise the full authority of the
+crown. The change was calculated to strengthen the crown, by enlisting
+the chivalrous feelings of all that was best in the nation in the
+support of a youthful Queen, and in a lesser degree it for a time
+strengthened the ministry also; but, with respect to the latter, the
+feeling did not last long. For the next three years the summers were
+very unfavorable to the farmer; the harvests were bad; the inevitable
+accompaniment of a rise in prices had caused severe and general
+distress, and distress had produced clamorous discontent, and in some
+districts formidable riots. It had been greatly aggravated in the
+manufacturing counties by the operations of the trades-unions, which had
+gradually put forth pretensions to regulate the wages and other
+conditions of work, and had enforced them with such tyrannical violence,
+not flinching from the foulest crimes, that in many instances they had
+driven the masters to close their factories rather than submit to their
+mandates; and in others had compelled the workmen themselves to
+discontinue their labors, thus spreading destitution among thousands
+whose earnings, if they had been allowed to consult their own wishes,
+would have been amply sufficient for the support of their families;[245]
+and the evil had grown to such a height, that in 1838 a committee was
+appointed by the House of Commons to investigate the whole subject of
+trade combinations. But the turbulent spirit excited by this distress
+did not now confine itself to single outbreaks of violence, but, under
+the guidance of some demagogues of a more methodical turn of mind than
+usual, developed itself in a systematic organization having for its
+object what they called "the people's charter," which aimed at a total
+revolution of the existing parliamentary system, with the avowed design
+that, when adopted, it should eventually lead to an entire
+reconstruction of the government. The Chartists, as they called
+themselves, had advocates even in Parliament, who presented their
+petitions to the House of Commons, and tried, though unsuccessfully, to
+give them importance by the appointment of a committee to investigate
+the character of the reforms which they demanded. They were not,
+however, contented with peaceful modes of pressing their demands, but,
+in the course of the summer of 1839, broke out in formidable riots in
+different parts of the country. At Birmingham they set fire to different
+parts of the town, carrying on their work of pillage and destruction to
+such a pitch that the Duke of Wellington compared the condition of the
+town to one taken by storm in regular warfare; and at Newport, in
+Monmouthshire, they even planned and carried out an attack on the troops
+quartered in the district. But this violence led for a time to the
+suppression of the movement, the leaders in the Newport riots being
+convicted of high-treason; and, though the government forbore to put the
+extreme severities of the law in force against them, those who remained
+unconvicted had been taught by their example the danger which they
+incurred by such proceedings; and some years elapsed before a series of
+revolutionary troubles on the Continent again gave a momentary
+encouragement to those in this country who sympathized with the
+revolutionists, and prompted them to another attempt to force their
+views upon the government and the people.
+
+It had nearly, however, been another ministry on whom the task of
+quelling these riots had fallen. Though, as has been already said, Lord
+Melbourne's cabinet derived a momentary strength from the accession of a
+young Queen, the support it thus acquired did not last; and in May,
+1839, having been defeated on a measure of colonial policy, which will
+be mentioned hereafter, the cabinet resigned. The Queen intrusted the
+task of forming a new administration to Sir Robert Peel, who undertook
+it with a reasonable confidence that he should be able to hold his
+ground better than formerly, now that the retirement of his predecessors
+was their own act, and admitted by them to have been caused by a
+consciousness of the divisions among their supporters and their own
+consequent weakness. He had the greater reason for such confidence,
+since two of the colleagues of Lord Grey who had refused his offers in
+1834, Lord Stanley and Sir James Graham, were now willing to unite with
+him; and he had almost completed his arrangements, when he was stopped
+by an unexpected, though not altogether unprecedented, impediment. It
+will be recollected that, in 1812, some of the arrangements for the
+formation of a new administration on the death of Mr. Perceval were
+impeded by a doubt which was felt in some quarters whether the new
+ministers would be allowed to remove one or two officers of the
+household, to whom the Regent was generally understood to be greatly
+attached, but who were hostile to the party which hoped to come into
+power, though it was afterward known that these officers had felt
+themselves bound to retire as soon as the arrangements in contemplation
+should be completed.[246] Sir Robert Peel was now met by a difficulty of
+the same kind, but one which the retiring ministers had the address to
+convert into a real obstacle. The Queen, who had warm affections, but
+who could not possibly have yet acquired any great knowledge of
+business, had become attached to the ladies whom Lord Melbourne had
+appointed to the chief places in her household. It had never occurred to
+her to regard their offices in a political light; and, consequently,
+when she found that Sir Robert considered it indispensable that some
+changes should be made in those appointments, she at once refused her
+consent, terming his proposal one "contrary to usage and repugnant to
+her feelings." Sir Robert, however, felt bound to adhere to his request
+for the removal of some of the ladies in question; for, in fact, they
+were the wives and sisters of his predecessors, and a continuance of
+their daily intercourse with the Queen might reasonably be expected to
+have some influence over her Majesty's judgment of the measures which he
+might feel it his duty to propose. Such a difficulty could not have
+arisen under a male sovereign; but Lord Melbourne himself had departed
+from the ordinary practice when he surrounded his royal mistress with
+ladies so closely identified with his cabinet. It is very possible that
+he had originally made the appointments without any such design, from
+the careless indifference which was his most marked characteristic; but
+he cannot be so easily acquitted when, in reply to the Queen's
+application to him for advice on the subject, he, being joined in his
+assertion by Lord John Russell, assured her that Sir Robert Peel's
+demand was unjustifiable and unprecedented. Supported by the positive
+dictum of the ministers on whose judgment she had hitherto been bound to
+rely, the Queen naturally adhered to her decision of refusing to permit
+the removal of the ladies in question, and the result was that Sir
+Robert Peel declined to take office under circumstances of difficulty
+beyond those to which every new minister must of necessity be exposed,
+and Lord Melbourne and his colleagues resumed their posts. The
+transaction was, of course, canvassed in both Houses of Parliament. Sir
+Robert Peel and the Duke of Wellington, who was the spokesman of the
+party in the House of Lords, defended their refusal to undertake the
+government on any other condition than that for which they had
+stipulated, on the ground that the authority to make such changes in the
+household as they had proposed was indispensable, as a proof of their
+possession of her Majesty's confidence; while Lord Melbourne, with a
+strange exaggeration, defended the advice which he had given her Majesty
+by the assertion that to have complied with Sir Robert Peel's proposal
+would have been "inconsistent with her personal honor." Other arguments
+on the same side were based on the alleged cruelty of separating her
+Majesty "from the society of her earliest friends, her old and constant
+companions;" an argument which was disposed of by Lord Brougham's
+remark, that till she had become Queen (not yet two years before) she
+had had no acquaintance with them whatever.[247]
+
+But it is needless to dwell at any length on the case, in which all
+subsequent historians and political critics, however generally
+prepossessed in favor of the Liberal ministers, have given up their
+position as untenable. Her Majesty herself kept strictly on the path of
+the constitution in guiding herself by the counsels of those who, till
+their successors were appointed, were still her responsible advisers.
+But the course which they recommended was absolutely irreconcilable with
+one fundamental principle of the constitution--the universal
+responsibility of the ministers. In denying the right of the incoming
+ministers to remodel the household (or any other body of offices) in
+whatever degree they might consider requisite, they were clearly
+limiting the ministerial authority. To limit the ministerial authority
+is to limit the ministerial responsibility; to limit the ministerial
+responsibility is to impose some portion of responsibility (that portion
+from which it relieves the minister) on the sovereign himself, a
+dangerous consequence from which the constitution most carefully
+protects him. In fact, that the advice Lord Melbourne gave was
+indefensible was tacitly confessed by himself, when, on the recurrence
+of the same emergency two years later, he was compelled to recommend a
+different course;[248] and the ladies whom Sir Robert had considered it
+necessary to remove anticipated their dismissal by voluntary
+resignation. It may be added that, at the close of this same year, Lord
+Melbourne himself insisted on nominating the private secretary to the
+Prince whom the Queen was about to marry, though no one could pretend
+that offices in his household were as important as those in that of the
+sovereign; and though, if there was any post in which the Prince might
+have been supposed to have a right to an unfettered choice, that might
+have been supposed to have been the office of his private
+secretary.[249]
+
+Her Majesty's marriage with Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg, her first
+cousin--one tending as greatly to the happiness of herself and the
+advantage of the nation as any royal marriage recorded in history--took
+place in the beginning of 1840; and in the preparatory arrangements--
+matters of far greater consequence to the Queen's feelings than any
+appointments in the household--the ministry, by singular mismanagement,
+contrived to force the consideration of other constitutional questions
+on Parliament in such a way that the conclusions which were adopted,
+however inevitable, could hardly fail to be mortifying and vexatious to
+her Majesty, in whose cup of happiness at such a moment special care
+ought rather to have been taken to prevent the admixture of any such
+alloy. In the matter of the annuity to be settled on the young Prince,
+the Opposition must, indeed, share the blame with the minister. If it
+was unpardonable carelessness in the latter to omit the usual practice
+of previously consulting the leaders of the Opposition on the amount of
+the grant to be proposed, it was not the less impolitic and unworthy of
+such men as the Duke and Sir Robert Peel to show their disapproval of
+the inattention by a curtailment of the grant. The sum proposed, £50,000
+a year, was fairly justified by the fact of its being the same which
+twenty-four years before had been settled on the Prince's uncle,
+Leopold, on his marriage with the Princess Charlotte. Indeed, if there
+were to be any difference, the circumstances might have been regarded as
+warranting an increase rather than a diminution of it. Money was
+certainly more plentiful in 1840 than in 1816, and the husband of an
+actual Queen occupied, beyond all question, a higher position than the
+husband of the heiress-presumptive, who might never become Queen, and
+who, in fact, never did. We cannot think, therefore, that the reduction
+of £20,000, which Sir Robert Peel proposed and carried, was reasonable
+or becoming, but regard it as neither called for by the circumstances of
+the kingdom, nor as befitting its liberality, nor as in harmony with its
+practice.
+
+But on the two other questions--one immediately affecting the
+constitution, and the other not absolutely unconnected with it--no
+defence of the minister seems available. At the opening of Parliament in
+1840, her Majesty commenced her speech by the announcement of her
+intended marriage, describing the bridegroom simply as "the Prince of
+Saxe-Coburg and Gotha," the same expression which she had used in
+addressing the Privy Council a few weeks before. That description of him
+had at once struck her uncle, Leopold--who, since the death of his
+English wife, the Princess Charlotte, had become King of Belgium--as so
+imperfect and insufficient, that, on reading her address to the Privy
+Council, he at once wrote to her to point out that it would have been
+desirable to mention the fact of the Prince being a Protestant,[250] and
+that the omission would inevitably cause discontent. But, in spite of
+this warning, Lord Melbourne refused to advise the Queen to insert a
+statement of the Prince's religion in her speech, though it was by no
+means superfluous on such an occasion, since, if he were a Roman
+Catholic, a marriage with him would have incurred a forfeiture of the
+crown. The Duke of Wellington, on the other hand, regarded it as a
+positive duty to require that the fact of the Prince being a Protestant
+should be mentioned, so as to show the care of Parliament to prevent any
+constitutional precautions from being overlooked, such statement having,
+indeed, been usually made on similar occasions. When he, therefore,
+moved an amendment to insert the word "Protestant" in the description of
+the Prince, Lord Melbourne did not venture to divide the House against
+it; but still his management gave an ungracious appearance to the
+transaction, as if there had been in any quarter an unwillingness to
+recognize the fact of the Prince's Protestantism till the recognition
+was forced on the government by the action of the Parliament.
+
+The third question, as affecting the relative ranks and positions of the
+different members of the royal family, cannot be said to have been
+wholly unconnected with the provisions of the constitution; and the
+mismanagement of the minister was, perhaps, even more sure to attract
+notice in this case than in the other, since to introduce into a bill a
+clause which had no connection whatever with its title had something of
+the appearance of a deliberate slight to the two Houses. A bill to
+naturalize the Prince was, of course, indispensable. But into it the
+ministers, without any notice, had introduced a clause enabling him
+"during his life to take precedence in rank after her Majesty in
+Parliament and elsewhere as her Majesty might think fit and proper, any
+law, statute, or custom to the contrary notwithstanding." It was
+admitted that no such precedence had been given to Prince George of
+Denmark, nor to Prince Leopold. And there were obvious difficulties in
+the way of conferring such a life-long precedence, because, as Lord
+Brougham had pointed out, it was possible that the Queen might die
+without issue, in which case the King of Hanover would become King of
+England also, and his son the Prince of Wales; and it would have been an
+inconceivable anomaly that a foreign naturalized prince should take
+precedence of the Prince of Wales, whose special rank and importance was
+recognized in many acts of Parliament. This objection was so clearly
+insuperable, that Lord Melbourne consented to alter the clause so as to
+give the Prince precedence only "after the heir-apparent." But even this
+concession failed to satisfy the objectors, the King of Hanover, among
+others, positively refusing to waive his precedence over any foreign
+prince. And eventually the minister withdrew the clause altogether, and
+the bill, as it was passed, was confined to the naturalization of the
+Prince. Lord Melbourne had thus contrived to make the Queen and Prince
+appear as if they were desirous to induce the two Houses by a sort of
+trick to confer on the Prince a precedence and dignity to which he was
+not entitled, and to render the refusal of Parliament to be so cajoled a
+fresh cause of mortification to the royal pair. The course that was
+eventually adopted is understood to have been suggested by the Duke of
+Wellington--to withdraw the affair altogether from the cognizance of
+Parliament, and to leave it to the Queen to confer on the Prince
+whatever precedence she might choose, as it was certainly within her
+right to do. And so, a few days after the bill had passed, she did by
+letters-patent give him precedence next to herself "on all occasions and
+in all meetings, except when otherwise provided by act of Parliament,"
+as, seventeen years later, she, in the same way, with the cordial
+approval of the whole nation, conferred on him the title of Prince
+Consort. And apart from its convenience, as avoiding all unseemly
+discussions, this would seem to have been the most natural and proper
+mode of settling such a matter. The Queen is the fountain of honor in
+this kingdom, and at her own court she can certainly confer on any of
+her own subjects whatever precedence she may think fit, while it may be
+doubted whether any act of a British Parliament could give precedence at
+a foreign court. It was, probably, not in his character of Duke of
+Cumberland, but as an independent sovereign, that the King of Hanover
+maintained his claim to superior precedence; and it was plain that the
+most illustrious subject could not possibly at any court be allowed to
+rank above a king. With reference to its possible effect on the
+subsequent relations of Peel and his followers with the court, it was,
+perhaps, well that a few months later they had the opportunity of
+proving that no personal objection to the Prince himself had influenced
+their course in these transactions, by giving a cordial assent to the
+ministerial proposal of conferring the Regency on him in the event of
+the Queen giving an heir to the throne, and dying while he was still a
+minor. The principle was the same as that which had guided the
+arrangements for a Regency ten years before; but it was not
+inconceivable that Parliament might have hesitated to intrust so large
+an authority to so very young a man, and him a comparative stranger,
+such as the Prince still was, had the leaders of the Opposition given
+the slightest countenance to such an objection.
+
+Lord Melbourne's ministry was hardly strengthened by the circumstances
+under which it resumed office. Yet the close of the same year witnessed
+a reform of which it is hardly too much to say that no single measure of
+this century has contributed more to the comfort of the whole mass of
+the people, with which it has also combined solid commercial benefits.
+Hitherto the Post-office had been managed in a singular manner, and the
+profit derived from it had been treated as something distinct from the
+ordinary revenue of the kingdom. In the reign of Charles II. it had been
+given to the Duke of York, and the grant was regarded as conferring on
+him such extensive rights, that when, some years afterward, an
+enterprising citizen set up a penny post for the delivery of letters in
+the City and its precincts, the Duke complained of the scheme as an
+infraction of his monopoly, and the courts of law decided in his favor.
+That grant ceased, as a matter of course, on the Duke's accession to the
+throne; and in the reign of Queen Anne a portion of the Post-office
+proceeds was appropriated, with the general consent of a grateful
+country, to reward the great achievements of the Duke of Malborough, a
+perpetual charge on it of £5000 a year being annexed to the dukedom. In
+those days the postage of a letter was twopence for short distances, and
+threepence for any distance beyond eighty miles.[251] But those charges
+had been gradually increased; about the middle of the century the lowest
+charge was fixed at fourpence, rising in proportion to the distance,
+till the conveyance of a single letter from one extremity of the kingdom
+to the other cost eighteen-pence. Such a rate could not fail to be very
+profitable; and by the beginning of the present reign the yearly profit
+exceeded a million and a half of money. The heaviness of the charge,
+however, had latterly attracted attention, and had been the cause of
+many complaints, as being a great discouragement, and, in the case of
+the poorer classes, a complete obstacle to communication. However,
+neither the ministers nor the Parliament had succeeded in devising any
+remedy, since a system affording so large a return was not a thing
+lightly to tamper with, when those who complained suddenly found a
+practical leader in Mr. Rowland Hill, who published a pamphlet on the
+subject, in which he affirmed the cost of the conveyance of each letter
+even for such a distance as from London to Edinburgh to be infinitely
+less than a farthing; and that, consequently, all the rest of the
+postage was a tax for the purposes of revenue. When this fact was once
+established, it needed no argument to prove that to increase the tax
+paid by each recipient of a letter in proportion to the distance at
+which he lived from the writer was an indefensible unfairness; and,
+after much investigation and discussion, Mr. Hill succeeded in
+converting the ministers to his view. Accordingly, the Budget for 1839,
+introduced by Mr. Spring Rice, then Chancellor of the Exchequer,
+contained a clause which reduced the postage for every letter weighing
+less than an ounce to a uniform charge of a penny, to be prepaid by
+means of a stamp to be affixed to each letter by the sender. It was not
+without plainly-expressed reluctance that the scheme was consented to by
+the Opposition; nor can their hesitation be considered as unreasonable,
+in the very unsatisfactory condition of the finances of the kingdom at
+the time. The balance-sheet of the preceding year showed a considerable
+deficiency. There was a large unfunded debt; and even Mr. Hill's most
+sanguine calculations admitted a probable loss to the Post-office of
+£1,200,000 for the first year or two; though he expressed his confidence
+that eventually the correspondence of the kingdom would be found to
+increase so largely as to make up for the greater part, if not the
+whole, of the deficiency. His anticipations were far outran by the
+reality.
+
+In 1839 the Postmaster-general estimated the number of letters sent
+yearly by the post at less than twenty-five millions. They are now
+upward of a thousand millions, a number the conveyance of which (with
+the addition of newspapers, whose circulation had also been greatly
+augmented by a recent reduction of the tax to a penny) would have
+severely taxed the whole carrying power of the kingdom before the
+introduction of railroads. Nor have the benefits of the new system been
+confined to ourselves. Foreign nations have followed our example, though
+not quite in the same degree, till an international postage is at length
+established throughout the whole of the civilized world. And it has not
+been only the happiness of private individuals that has been augmented
+by this facility of communication. In its gradual development it has
+largely promoted the extension of trade of every kind, and, by
+facilitating a commercial intercourse between nations, it cannot but
+contribute to the maintenance of friendship and peace.
+
+The full advantages of this reform could not be seen at first; but, even
+had it been appreciated as fully as we appreciate it now, no approval of
+it could have counterbalanced the general dissatisfaction with which the
+ministry was regarded. At home the finances were falling into great
+disorder, the expenditure of the year greatly exceeding the income;
+while the feeling that their Irish policy was dictated by a wish to
+purchase at any price the support of O'Connell, was still more injurious
+to them, for he was already beginning to renew agitation in Ireland,
+inaugurating a new association, which, though its purposes were faintly
+veiled for a time under the title of the Precursor Association, was
+understood to point at a repeal of the Union; while the ministers,
+though they denounced such a measure as ruinous to every part of the
+kingdom, seemed willing to give it practical encouragement by a bill
+which they introduced, which bore the name of a Registration Act for
+Ireland, but which was not confined to that object. On the contrary, it
+contained a provision for lowering the qualification for the franchise
+by one-half; so that it was, in fact, a new Reform Bill for
+Ireland,[252] calculated greatly to increase his influence by the number
+of voters of the poorer classes whom it would create. The bill was
+defeated, but the odium of having proposed it remained.
+
+But, besides these home difficulties, there were troubles abroad, both
+in the East and in the West. In the East, the complications inseparable
+from a dominion like that of ours in India, where constant expansion
+seemed to have become a law of its existence, had involved us in a war
+with a new enemy, the warlike Afghan nation; in the West, both Jamaica
+and Canada were in a state threatening insurrection. Indeed, the
+troubles in Jamaica had been the immediate cause of that resignation of
+the ministry in 1839 which has already been mentioned. Measures adopted
+in the English Parliament with reference to the termination of that
+apprenticeship system which, as we have seen, formed a part of the bill
+for the abolition of slavery, and another for the regulation of the
+prisons in the island, had given such offence to the colonial Assembly,
+never very manageable, that the members passed a resolution that their
+legislative rights had been violated, and that they would abstain from
+all exercise of their legislative functions, except such as might be
+necessary "to preserve inviolate the faith of the island with the public
+creditor, until" (by the rescinding of the resolutions, etc., of which
+they complained) "they should be left to the free exercise of their
+inherent rights as British subjects." And this resolution was seconded
+by an insulting protest, in which they drew an offensive comparison
+between the state of crime in the island and that which prevailed in
+Great Britain, taunting the British Parliament with the murders and acts
+of incendiarism which terrified Ireland night and day, with the murders
+of Burke and Hare in Scotland, with the law of divorce and _crim. con._
+trials in England, and "a Poor-law which has taken millions from the
+necessities of the destitute to add to the luxuries of the wealthy." The
+Governor dissolved the Assembly, but that which succeeded re-adopted the
+resolutions of its predecessor, and the ministers, in consequence,
+brought in a bill "to suspend the existing constitution of the island
+for a limited number of years, and to provide that during that interval
+its legislative functions should not be exercised by a Governor, a
+Council, and a House of Assembly, but should reside in the Governor and
+Council alone." The emergency was too great and undeniable, the remedy
+proposed was also too unprecedented in its stringency, to be dealt with
+without the gravest deliberation; and the House of Commons accordingly
+gave the matter the patient consideration which became both it and
+themselves. They allowed the island to appear by counsel against the
+bill, and listened for many hours to an elaborate defence of the conduct
+of the Assembly, which if it failed to change the intention of the
+ministers, convinced Sir Robert Peel and his party that their measure
+was doubtful in its justification and impolitic in its severity. He
+pointed out that "the bill was neither more nor less than one for the
+establishment of a complete despotism--one which would establish the
+most unqualified, unchecked, unmitigated power that was ever yet applied
+to the government of any community, in place of that liberal system
+which had prevailed for upward of one hundred and fifty years." And,
+though he did not for a moment question the power of Parliament to pass
+such a measure, he greatly doubted the policy of such an exertion of it.
+A somewhat similar measure affecting Canada they had been compelled to
+enact in the preceding year, and he feared lest "it might seem to be
+coming to be a practice of Parliament to suspend a constitution every
+session." And he quoted a speech of Canning, delivered fifteen years
+before, in which that eloquent statesman, a man by no means inclined to
+a timorous policy, had declared that "no feeling of wounded pride, no
+motive of questionable expediency, nothing short of real and
+demonstrable necessity, should ever induce him to moot the awful
+question of the transcendental power of Parliament over every dependency
+of the British crown. That transcendental power was an ordinance of
+empire, which ought to be kept back within the penetralia of the
+constitution. It exists, but it should be veiled. It should not be
+produced on trifling occasions, or in cases of petty refractoriness or
+temporary misconduct."
+
+And Sir Robert, "looking at all the papers before the House, could not
+say that there was here any vindication for bringing forward this
+transcendental power." He asked whether "they had ever treated with so
+much severity a conquered colony amid the first heat of animosity after
+the contest." And he traced the history of our government of the island
+back to the time of Charles II., pointing out (as Burke had formerly
+argued with respect to our Colonies in North America) that "Jamaica owed
+its colonization by British subjects to the conquest that was made of it
+by the arms of Cromwell; that its first English population was composed
+of those who, disgusted with the excesses of the civil wars, there found
+a refuge," and who had carried with them that attachment to liberty
+which, as early as 1678, had led them successfully to repel the attacks
+made on the privileges of their House of Assembly by the ministers of
+Charles II. He warned the House, also, that if this measure were passed,
+"a sympathy for the people of Jamaica would be excited throughout the
+other West Indian possessions of the crown." And, while fully admitting
+that the conduct of the Assembly had been "foolish and unjustifiable,"
+he still recommended that it should be treated in a conciliatory spirit,
+which as yet had not been shown toward it.
+
+The government carried their proposal by a majority of no more than five
+in a very full house, a success which they regarded as a defeat, and, as
+has been already mentioned, resigned. But as the state of the question
+and of the island did not admit of delay, on their resumption of their
+offices they introduced a fresh measure, which the Conservatives again
+curtailed of its most severe clauses, and which, in the form in which it
+was eventually passed, gave the Assembly time to reconsider its conduct,
+and, without the humiliation of confessing itself guilty, to give a
+practical recantation of their offensive resolutions, by resuming its
+work of legislation, any farther delay of which would on many subjects
+be very mischievous to the island itself. The distinct assertion by both
+parties of the power of the Parliament to inflict even the severest
+penalty enabled the Houses to take this conciliatory course without loss
+of dignity; while the stern disapproval of the conduct of the Assembly
+which the Conservative leader had expressed, even when pleading for a
+milder treatment of it, convinced the colonists that any protracted
+contumacy would be dangerous, and would deprive them for the future of
+all title to even the modified protection which on this occasion had
+saved them.
+
+In the discussion of these transactions, Peel, as we have seen, had
+alluded to the affairs of Canada, which had been of a still more serious
+complexion; since there the discontent of the colonists in the Lower
+Province had developed into armed insurrection. We have seen that, from
+the first moment after the country had passed into our possession, there
+had been almost constant dissensions between the old French colonists
+and the English immigrants who crossed over both from England and from
+the colonies on the southern side of the St. Lawrence in the early part
+of the reign of George III. The desire of terminating these divisions,
+which had their root in a difference of religion as well as of race, the
+French settlers being Roman Catholics, had been one of the chief motives
+which had led Pitt in 1791 to divide the country into two
+provinces.[253] And for many years the scheme was fairly successful;
+but, toward the end of the reign of George IV., the political excitement
+caused by the agitation in England of the question of Catholic
+Emancipation, and subsequently of Reform, spread across the Atlantic to
+the Canadas; and the French portion of the colonists, who almost
+monopolized the representation in Lower Canada, began to urge the
+adoption of changes utterly inconsistent with the existing constitution
+of the colony. In the hope of compelling the compliance of the home
+government with their demands, in 1832 and the following years they
+refused to vote the necessary supplies; and, gaining courage, as it
+were, from the contemplation of their own violence, and under the
+guidance of a leader of French extraction, a M. Papineau, who scarcely
+concealed his hope of effecting the complete severance of the Lower
+Province from the British dominion, they proceeded to put forth farther
+demands, which they regarded as plausible from the apparent resemblance
+of the changes which they required to the system of the English
+constitution, but which, to use the words in which Sir Robert Peel
+described them, would have established "a French republic." The most
+important of them were that the Upper or Legislative Council should,
+like the Assembly, be rendered elective, instead of, as had hitherto
+been the case, being nominated by the crown. And another asked that the
+Executive Council should be made responsible to the Assembly, in the
+same manner as in England the ministers of the crown were responsible to
+Parliament. As it was at once shown that the ministry at home had no
+intention of granting these demands, Papineau collected a band of
+malcontents in arms, with whom he took possession of one or two small
+towns, and ventured even to measure his strength with the
+Commander-in-chief of the province, Sir John Colborne, one of the most
+distinguished of Wellington's comrades and pupils. His force was utterly
+routed, and he himself fled across the frontier to New York. A similar
+outbreak, excited in the Upper Province by a newspaper editor, was
+crushed with equal ease and rapidity.[254] And the next year, 1838, Lord
+John Russell brought forward a bill to suspend the constitution of the
+colony, and to confer on a new Governor, who was at once to proceed
+thither, very ample powers for remodelling the government of the
+province, subject, of course, to the sanction of the home government. In
+the previous year he had succeeded in carrying some resolutions
+announcing the determination of Parliament not to concede the demands of
+the Assembly of the Lower Province, which have been already mentioned.
+And the reasons which he gave for this course are worth preserving, as
+expressing the view recognized by Parliament of the relations properly
+existing between the mother country and a colony. It was on a proper
+understanding of them that he based his refusal to make the Executive
+Council in Canada responsible to the Assembly. He held such a step to be
+"entirely incompatible with those relations. Those relations require
+that his Majesty should be represented, not by a person removable by the
+House of Assembly, but by a Governor sent out by the King, responsible
+to the King, and responsible to the Parliament of Great Britain. This is
+the necessary constitution of a colony; and if we have not these
+relations existing between the mother country and the colony, we shall
+soon have an end of these relations altogether." And he pointed out the
+practical difficulties which might reasonably be apprehended if such a
+change as was asked were conceded. "The person sent out by the King as
+Governor, and those ministers in whom the Assembly confided, might
+differ in opinion, and there would be at once a collision between the
+measures of the King and the conduct of the representatives of the
+colony."
+
+The plan of sending out a new Governor free from any previous
+association with either of the parties, or any of the recent
+transactions in the colony, was, probably, the wisest that could have
+been adopted. Unfortunately, it was in some degree marred by the choice
+of the statesman sent out, Lord Durham, a man of unquestioned ability,
+but of an extraordinarily self-willed and overbearing temper. He drew up
+a most able report of the state of the provinces, combined with
+recommendations of the course to be pursued toward them in future, so
+judicious that subsequent ministers, though widely differing from his
+views of general politics, saw no better plan than that which he had
+suggested; but, unhappily, the measures which he himself adopted,
+especially with respect to the treatment of those who had been leaders
+in the late rebellion, were such manifest violations of law, that the
+government at home had no alternative but that of disallowing some of
+them, and carrying a bill of indemnity for others. He took such offence
+at their treatment of him, though it was quite inevitable, that he at
+once resigned his appointment and returned home. But the next year the
+Queen sent down a message to the Houses recommending a union of the two
+provinces (a measure which had been the most important, and the very
+foundation, of his suggestions), and Lord John Russell introduced a bill
+which, as he described its object, he hoped would "lay the foundation of
+a permanent settlement of the affairs of the entire colony." The main
+feature of the government policy was the formation of "a legislative
+union of the two provinces on the principles of a free and
+representative government," and the establishment of such a system of
+local government as amounted to a practical recognition of the principle
+so earnestly repudiated, as we have seen, by Lord John Russell a year or
+two before. It was not, perhaps, fully carried out at first. Lord
+Sydenham, who had succeeded Lord Durham, reported to the home
+government, as the result of a tour which he had taken through a great
+part of the country, that in the whole of the Upper Province, and among
+the British settlers of the Lower Province, "an excellent spirit
+prevailed, and that he had found everywhere a determination to forget
+past differences, and to unite in an endeavor to obtain under the union
+those practical measures for the improvement of the country which had
+been too long neglected in the struggle for party and personal objects."
+But of the French Canadians he could not give so favorable a report.
+Efforts were still made by some of the old Papineau party to mislead the
+people; but he was satisfied they would not again be able to induce the
+peasantry to support any attempt at disturbance. It was natural that
+that party should still feel some soreness at the utter failure of their
+recent attempts and the disappointment of their hopes; and affairs took
+the longer time in being brought into perfect order and harmony through
+a strange mortality which took place among the first Governors-general.
+Lord Sydenham died the next year of lockjaw, brought on by a fall from
+his horse; Sir Charles Bagot was forced to retire in a state of hopeless
+bad health after an administration equally brief; two years later, Sir
+Charles Metcalfe, who succeeded him, returned home only to die; and it
+was not till a fourth Governor, Lord Elgin, succeeded to the government
+that it could be said that the new system, though established five years
+before, had a fair trial.
+
+Fortunately, he was a man admirably qualified by largeness of
+statesman-like views and a most conciliatory disposition for such a post
+at such a time; and he strictly carried out the scheme which was implied
+by the bill of Lord John Russell, and to a certain extent inaugurated by
+Lord Sydenham, selecting his advisers from the party which had the
+confidence of the Legislative Assembly, and generally directing his
+policy in harmony with their counsels; so that under his government the
+working of the colonial constitution was a nearly faithful reproduction
+of the parliamentary constitution at home. Such a policy was in reality
+only a development of the principle laid down by Pitt half a century
+before, and warmly approved by his great rival, that "the only method of
+retaining distant colonies with advantage is to enable them to govern
+themselves."[255] And since that day similar constitutions have been
+established in our other distant dependencies as they have become ripe
+for them--in New Zealand, the Cape, and the Australian colonies--almost
+the only powers reserved to the home government in those colonies in
+which such constitutions have been established being that of appointing
+the governors; that of ratifying or, if necessary, disallowing measures
+adopted by the colonial government; and, in cases of necessity, that of
+prescribing measures for the adoption of the local Legislatures, and
+even of compelling such adoption, in the event of any persevering
+opposition. The act of 1850, which established a constitution in
+Victoria, went even farther in the privileges it conferred on the
+colonists, inasmuch as it gave power to the Legislative Council to alter
+some of its provisions, and even to remodel the Legislative Council and
+Assembly. It may be doubted whether this last concession did not go too
+far, since in more than one important instance the government of that
+great colony has availed itself of it so liberally as to render it
+necessary to pass a fresh act of Parliament to enable her Majesty to
+give her royal assent to some of the changes which the Assembly had
+enacted.[256] Indeed, it cannot be said that the system has worked in
+every part or on every occasion quite as well as might have been hoped;
+nor can it be denied that the colonies have occasionally claimed a power
+of independent action in opposition to the home Parliament in a way to
+try severely the patience of the home government. After the British
+Parliament had adopted the policy and system of free-trade, the Canadian
+Assembly adhered to the doctrine of protection so obstinately that it
+actually established a tariff of import duties injurious to the commerce
+of the mother country, and apparently intended as a condemnation of its
+principles. But its contumacy showed how wholly different was the spirit
+of the British government from that which had prevailed in the last
+century; for though the home government had unquestionably the right of
+disallowing the offensive tariff, it forbore to exercise it; and,
+probably, by this striking proof that it considered a complete
+recognition of the principle of local self-government more important
+than any trifling financial or commercial advantage, contributed greatly
+to implant in Canada and all the colonies that confidence in the
+affectionate moderation of the home government which must be the
+strongest, if not the only indissoluble, bond of union.
+
+On the whole, it is hardly too much to say that no more statesman-like,
+and (if sentiment may be allowed a share in influencing the conduct of
+governments) no more amiable spirit animates any act of our modern
+legislation than is displayed in these arrangements for the management
+of our colonies. They are a practical exemplification of the idea
+embodied in the expression, "the mother country." A hundred years ago,
+Burke sought to impress on the existing ministers and Parliament the
+conviction that, "so long as our Colonies kept the idea of their civil
+rights associated with our government, they would cling and grapple to
+us, and no force under heaven would be of power to tear them from their
+allegiance." In the case of which he was speaking his warning, as we
+have seen, fell on deaf ears; but the policy of the present reign is a
+willing and full adoption of them, on a far larger scale than even his
+farseeing vision could then contemplate. Within the century which has
+elapsed since his time the enterprise of Britain has sent forth her sons
+to people another hemisphere; and they, her children still, cling to the
+parent state with filial affection, because they feel that, though
+parted from her by thousands of miles and more than one ocean, they are
+still indissolubly united to her by their participation in all the
+blessings of her constitution, her generous toleration, her equal laws,
+her universal freedom.
+
+On one transaction of these years the leaders of the Opposition were
+found acting in close agreement with the ministers. We have seen how, in
+the early part of the reign of George III., the House of Commons threw
+the sheriffs of London into prison, on account of their performance of
+what they conceived to be their duty as magistrates; and in 1840 it
+subjected the same officials to the same treatment on a question of the
+same character--the extent of the privilege of the House of Commons to
+overrule the authority of the courts of law. The question was in
+appearance complicated by the institution of several suits at law, and
+by the fact that the House was not consistent in its conduct, but
+allowed its servants to plead to the first action, and refused the same
+permission in the second, when the result of the first trial had proved
+adverse to them. The case was this: some inspectors of prisons has
+presented a report to Parliament, in which they alleged that they had
+found in Newgate a book of disgusting and obscene character, published
+by a London publisher named Stockdale. The House of Commons had ordered
+the report to be printed and sold by Messrs. Hansard, the Parliamentary
+publishers, and Stockdale brought an action against Messrs. Hansard for
+libel. Chief-justice Denman charged the jury that "the fact of the House
+of Commons having directed Messrs. Hansard to publish their reports was
+no justification to them for publishing a Parliamentary report
+containing a libel;" and Stockdale obtained damages, which were duly
+paid. Stockdale, encouraged by this success, when, in spite of the
+result of the late trial, Hansard continued to sell the report, brought
+a fresh action; but now the House forbade the publishers to plead to it;
+and, as they obeyed the prohibition, and forbore to plead, the case
+eventually came before the Sheriff's Court; fresh damages were given,
+and, in obedience to the writ of the Queen's Bench, the sheriffs seized
+Hansard's goods, and sold them to satisfy the judgment. Lord John
+Russell, as leader of the House, moved to bring to the Bar of the House
+all the parties concerned in the action--the plaintiff, his attorney,
+the sheriffs, and the under-sheriffs. He was opposed by nearly all the
+legal members of the House except the crown lawyers, Sir Edward Sugden
+especially warning the House that "a resolution of the House was of no
+avail in a court of justice;" while others taunted the House with want
+of courage in not proceeding against the judges themselves, rather than
+against their officers, which in this case the sheriffs were.
+
+There could be no doubt of the importance of the question, since it was
+no less, as the Attorney-general, Sir J. Campbell, put it, than a
+question whether Parliament or the courts of law had the superiority;
+and now Sir Robert Peel, as leader of the Opposition, came to the
+support of Lord John Russell, declaring his opinion to be, first, that
+"the House possessed every privilege necessary for the proper and
+effectual discharge of its functions;" secondly, that "the publication
+of evidence which had led the House to adopt any course was frequently
+essential to justify that course to the nation;" and thirdly, that "to
+judge of the extent of their privileges, and to vindicate them by their
+own laws, belonged to the House alone." And he pressed strongly on the
+House that it was "the duty of the House to fight the battle to the
+last," though he confessed that "it was with pain that he had come to
+the determination of entering into a contest with the courts of law." On
+one point the judges agreed with the House of Commons. The House
+committed the sheriffs; but, when they sued out their _habeas corpus_,
+the judges decided that the return of the Sergeant-at-arms that they
+were committed by the House for breach of privilege was a sufficient
+return. Stockdale brought fresh actions. But meantime the case was
+arousing a strong excitement in the country.[257] The singular hardship
+of the position of the sheriffs excited general sympathy: if they obeyed
+the House of Commons, which prohibited them from paying over to
+Stockdale the damages which they had received for him, the Court of
+Queen's Bench would be bound to attach them for disobedience to its
+order. If they obeyed the Queen's Bench, the House would imprison them
+for breach of privilege. And the national feeling is always in favor of
+the strictly defined authority of the courts of law, rather than of the
+somewhat indefinite claims of Parliament to interpret, and even to make,
+privilege. Another consideration, probably, weighed a little with the
+champions of the House--that their power of imprisonment ended with the
+session. As matters went on, it was found that even the Attorney and
+Solicitor-general differed as to the course to be pursued; and
+eventually Lord John Russell consented to adopt the advice which had
+been given by a former Attorney-general, Sir F. Pollock, and to bring in
+a bill to legalize all similar proceedings of Parliament in future, by
+enacting that a certificate that the publication of any document had
+been ordered by either House should be a sufficient defence against any
+action. The introduction of such a bill was in some degree an
+acknowledgment of defeat; but it can hardly be denied to have been not
+only a judicious step, but the only one practicable, if the contest
+between Parliament and the courts of law were not to be everlasting; and
+it met with general approval. If it was a compromise, it was one that
+satisfied both parties and both ends. It upheld the authority of the
+courts of law, and at the same time it practically asserted the
+reasonableness of the claim advanced by the House of Commons, by giving
+it for the future the power which it had claimed. Nor were people in
+this day inclined to be jealous of the privileges of Parliament, so long
+as they were accurately defined. They felt that it was for the advantage
+and dignity of the nation that its powers and privileges should be
+large; what they regarded with distrust was, a claim of power of which
+no one knew the precise bounds, and which might, therefore, be expanded
+as the occasion served.
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 245: Fifty-two mills and 30,000 persons were thrown out of
+employment for ten weeks at Ashton in 1830 by the turning out of 3000
+"coarse spinners," who could clear at the time from 28s. to 31s. per
+week. The following passage is extracted from an oath said to have been
+administered by the combined spinners in Scotland in 1823: "I, A B, do
+voluntarily swear, in the awful presence of God Almighty, and before
+these witnesses, that I will execute with zeal and alacrity, as far as
+in me lies, every task or injunction which the majority of my brethren
+shall impose upon me in furtherance of our common welfare, as the
+chastisement of _knobs_, the assassination of oppressive and tyrannical
+masters, or the demolition of shops that shall be deemed
+incorrigible."--_Annual Register_, 1838, pp. 204-207.]
+
+[Footnote 246: See page 221.]
+
+[Footnote 247: The question was examined with great minuteness by Lord
+Brougham a fortnight after the ministerial explanation. See
+"Parliamentary Debates," 3d series, xlvii., 1164.]
+
+[Footnote 248: It is stated on good authority that Lord Melbourne, in
+private conversation, justified or explained the line he had taken by
+his consideration for his friends, scores of whom would have had their
+hopes blighted by his retirement.]
+
+[Footnote 249: See "Life of the Prince Consort," i., 55.]
+
+[Footnote 250: "Life of the Prince Consort," i., 57.]
+
+[Footnote 251: Macaulay's "History of England," i., 386.]
+
+[Footnote 252: This is the name which the Liberal historian of the time,
+Miss Martineau, gives it. "The so-called Registration Bill was, in fact,
+an unannounced new Reform Bill for Ireland."--_History of the Peace_,
+book v., c. vi.]
+
+[Footnote 253: See _ante_, p. 127.]
+
+[Footnote 254: In one instance the rebels were aided by a party of
+citizens of the United States, who, without any sanction from their own
+government, seized an island on the St. Lawrence belonging to us, and
+attacked some of the Canadian villages. And this led to the discussion
+of a question of international combined with constitutional law, which
+Lord Campbell thus describes: "'Whether, if the subjects or citizens of
+a foreign state with which we are at peace, without commission or
+authority from their own or any other government, invade the English
+territory in a hostile manner, and levy war against the Queen in her
+realm, we are entitled to treat them as traitors?' The Canadian courts
+held that we could not, as they had never acknowledged even a temporary
+allegiance to our sovereign. And of this opinion was Sir William
+Follett. But, after reading all that is to be found on the subject, I
+come to the conclusion that they owed allegiance when, as private
+individuals, they voluntarily crossed the English frontier; that it was
+no defence for them to say that they then had arms in their hands and
+intended to murder the Queen's subjects."--_Life of Lord Campbell_,
+ii.,119. It certainly would have been no _defence_; but would it not
+have taken their conduct from under the definition of _treason_, and
+made it an act of _piracy_?]
+
+[Footnote 255: See Fox's words, quoted by Lord Stanhope.--_Life of
+Pitt_, ii., 90.]
+
+[Footnote 256: A couple of years after the period which is the boundary
+of the present work, this Canadian constitution of 1841 was superseded
+by a measure uniting Canada, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick in one
+federal government, with, as the act recites, "a constitution similar in
+principle to that of the United Kingdom." The act farther provided for
+the admission of other dependencies of the crown in North America,
+Newfoundland, Prince Edward Island, British Columbia, and Rupert's Land
+into the union, and established as the constitution of the whole one
+scarcely differing from that of 1841, with the exception that both the
+Houses of the Legislature--called in the act the Senate and the House of
+Commons--were to be representative bodies, and that powers were
+conferred on them so absolutely free and independent, that it was
+thought necessary to add a clause providing that their "privileges,
+immunities, and powers were never to exceed those at the passing of the
+act held, enjoyed, and exercised by the Commons House of Parliament of
+the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, and by the members
+thereof."]
+
+[Footnote 257: Lord Campbell, in his autobiography, puts the
+transaction, in the phase at which it had now arrived, in a very serious
+light: "Next came a proceeding which placed me in a most difficult
+position; and the public never knew the danger which then existed of a
+convulsion unexampled in our history. The sheriffs sued out a writ of
+_habeas corpus_, directed to the Sergeant-at-arms, commanding him to
+produce before the Court of Queen's Bench the sheriffs of Middlesex,
+alleged to be illegally in custody, with the cause of their detention.
+Wilde, the Solicitor-general, was strong for refusing to make any return
+to the writ, and for setting the Court of Queen's Bench at defiance. Had
+I concurred in this opinion it would certainty have been acted on. The
+consequences would have been that the Sergeant-at-arms, even with the
+mace in his hand, would have been sent to Newgate by the Court of
+Queen's Bench. The House must have retaliated by committing the judges.
+The crown would then have had to determine on which side the army should
+be employed, and for a time we must have lived under a military
+government" (ii., 129). The noble and learned autobiographer does not
+explain why it should have been indispensable to employ the army on
+either side.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+
+Sir Robert Peel becomes Prime-minister.--Commercial Reforms.--
+Free-trade.--Religious Toleration.--Maynooth.--The Queen's
+University.--Post-office Regulations.--The Opening of Letters.--
+Naturalization of Aliens.--Recall of Lord Ellenborough.--Reversal of the
+Vote on the Sugar Duties.--Refusal of the Crown to Sanction a Bill.--The
+Question of Increase in the Number of Spiritual Peers.--Repeal of the
+Corn-laws.--Revolution in France, and Agitation on the Continent.--Death
+of Sir Robert Peel.--Indifference of the Country to Reform.--Repeal of
+the Navigation Laws.--Resolutions in Favor of Free-trade.--The Great
+Exhibition of 1851.
+
+
+The transactions mentioned in the last chapter were among the last
+events of Lord Melbourne's ministry. He had for some time been aware of
+his impending defeat in the House of Commons, and, greatly to his
+credit, had endeavored to make the return to office easier to his
+successors by the friendly counsels he had given to the Queen on the
+subject.[258] A dissolution of Parliament in the summer of 1841 only
+weakened his party, and in September he resigned, and was succeeded by
+Sir Robert Peel, who, comparatively short as was his tenure of
+office,[259] found it long enough to establish for himself a reputation
+as the greatest financier of Europe since the days of Pitt. It may be
+worth remarking that, in the "Memoirs of the Prince Consort," it is
+mentioned that in the course of his administration Peel found reason to
+change his judgment on the question of which House of Parliament it was
+the more desirable for the Prime-minister to be a member. Canning had
+more than once asserted his conviction that the public business would be
+more satisfactorily conducted when the Prime-minister was a commoner,
+founding his opinion chiefly on the paramount importance of financial
+questions, the discussion of which is almost confined to the House of
+Commons, and conceiving it to be supported by the history of the
+administration of Pitt, from whom, indeed, he had imbibed the idea; and
+in former years Peel had more than once expressed his concurrence with
+that view of the subject. But, from papers which were intrusted to him
+for the execution of his great work, Sir Theodore Martin learned that
+Peel had subsequently found reason to come to the opposite conclusion,
+not from any change in his view of the relative importance of the
+different departments of administration, but solely because "the amount
+of work imposed upon the first minister in the House of Commons, in
+addition to what he had to go through elsewhere, was too great for any
+human strength. In the House of Lords the Prime-minister would escape
+the necessity for being in a position to vindicate all the details of
+administration, and to answer the multiplicity of questions on all sorts
+of subjects, the putting of which has almost degenerated into a vice. He
+had, therefore, come to the conclusion that it was there he ought to
+be."[260] And, indeed, the subjects which demanded the care of the
+minister, and attracted the attention of Parliament, were constantly
+increasing in number, variety, and importance to the very end of his
+administration. Not only were the financial difficulties of the country,
+the depressed state of agriculture and commerce (the result of a
+succession of bad harvests), sufficient causes for grave anxiety, but
+the terrible war, of which mention has already been made, which we had
+now been carrying on for nearly three years in Afghanistan, and which,
+before the end of this very year, was about to be signalized by a
+disaster such as had never before befallen a British army, threatened to
+kindle the flames of war in Europe also, from the share which the
+intrigues of Russia had had in fomenting the quarrel; and the same
+danger was more than once in the course of the next five years imminent,
+from the irritation with which France regarded us, and which, commencing
+in Syria, while Lord Melbourne was still at the helm, lost no
+opportunity of displaying itself, whether in transactions in the remote
+Pacific Ocean or the old battle-field of the two nations, the Spanish
+peninsula; and finally, these embarrassing perplexities were crowned by
+the appalling visitation of famine, which, at the end of the fourth year
+of the administration, fell upon Ireland with a severity surpassing any
+similar event in modern history.
+
+With all these multiform difficulties the new minister grappled with
+unflinching courage, and with conspicuous success. Peace was preserved
+abroad, and financial prosperity was restored at home. Into the details
+of his measures devised for this last-mentioned object, though the
+leading features of his administration, and those on which his fame
+chiefly rests, it would be beside the purpose of the present work to
+enter. It is sufficient to say here that, in the spirit of Pitt's great
+financial reform of 1787, he revised the whole of the import duties of
+our commercial tariff, especially reducing the duties on raw
+material;[261] making up the deficiency so caused by an income tax,
+which he described as a temporary imposition, since he doubted not that
+the great increase of lawful trade, which would be the consequence of
+the reduction of duties, would soon enable the revenue to dispense with
+a tax to the objections of which he was not blind. In recommending this
+great change to the House, he laid down as the soundest maxim of
+financial legislation, in which "all were now agreed, the principle that
+we should buy in the cheapest market and sell in the dearest," a
+doctrine which, when more fully carried out, as it was sure to be, led
+almost inevitably to the great measure for which his administration is
+most celebrated, the repeal of the Corn-laws. There could be no doubt
+that, in the most modified application of it, it struck at the root of
+the principle of protection, which had hitherto been the fundamental
+principle of our finance, and made a farther extension of it inevitable.
+
+And, as he had been one of the leading members of the ministry which
+carried Catholic Emancipation, so he now proceeded on the same path of
+religious toleration; and, in the session of 1844, successfully
+recommended to the House of Commons a bill which had already been passed
+by the Lords, repealing a number of penal acts affecting the Roman
+Catholics, which, though they had long been practically obsolete, still
+encumbered, and it may be said disgraced, the statute book, and were, so
+to say, a standing degradation of and insult to the Roman Catholic body.
+One of them, passed in the reign of William and Mary, still forbade any
+Roman Catholic to come within ten miles of London, to have either sword
+or pistol in his house, or to possess a horse worth more than five
+pounds. Another, enacted under Elizabeth, still made every Roman
+Catholic who omitted to take certain oaths guilty of high-treason,
+though no attempt to administer those oaths had been made since the
+Revolution. Another, of the time of Charles I., deprived any Roman
+Catholic who should send his son to a foreign school of all protection
+of the law; he could neither sue nor defend an action. It may fairly be
+said that the credit of Parliament and of the nation was concerned in
+the abrogation of laws so ridiculously oppressive, and not the less
+obnoxious for being practically invalid. And in the same spirit another
+measure was framed and carried by the Lord Chancellor, whose object was
+the confirmation of religious endowments belonging to different sects of
+Protestant Dissenters, and their protection from vexatious and unjust
+litigation, by making a continued possession of any kind of endowment or
+property for twenty years a valid title.
+
+These enactments may be regarded as indispensable supplements to the
+repeal of the Test Act and Catholic Emancipation. They were the
+coping-stone of the great edifice of religious toleration, of which the
+former acts had laid the foundation. And the next year Peel carried out
+still farther the same principle, by a measure which could not fail to
+be regarded as an especial boon in Ireland, since the great majority of
+the population of that kingdom were of the Roman Catholic persuasion. It
+has been seen that when the troubled state into which the Continent was
+thrown by the French Revolution threw hinderances in the way of the
+Irish students designed for the Roman Catholic priesthood going to one
+of the great Continental colleges, such as St. Omer or Salamanca, for
+their education, Pitt established for them a college at Maynooth, for
+the endowment of which Parliament was annually asked for a grant of
+about £9000. The sum had long been felt to be altogether inadequate to
+the requirements of the foundation. As early as the year 1807, Lord
+Liverpool, then Home-secretary, had contemplated a large increase of the
+grant, though the weakness of the government, then presided over by the
+Duke of Portland, prevented him from carrying out that and other
+measures which he had conceived in a kindred spirit. Moreover, the grant
+was rarely proposed without giving rise to a warm debate raised by a
+party whose too tender consciences forbade them to sanction any measure
+appearing to foster a religion from which they dissented. And to remedy
+the two evils (the one arising from the want of a sufficient provision,
+the other from the spirit of religious controversy, for which the House
+of Commons was certainly very ill-calculated), Peel, in 1845, proposed
+to treble the grant, so as to put the college on a more satisfactory
+footing, by providing sufficient incomes for the professors, and a
+revenue adequate to the respectable maintenance of an increased number
+of pupils; and also to place the charge for the future on the
+Consolidated Fund, by which step its yearly discussion in Parliament
+would be altogether avoided. The measure was vigorously resisted, partly
+on the religious ground already mentioned, and partly by an argument,
+urged with some plausibility, that the design with which the college had
+originally been founded had not been realized; that, in fact, it had not
+proved a benefit to the country, but rather the reverse, by tempting
+into the service of the Roman Catholic Church a humbler and poorer class
+of students than could devote themselves to it when the preliminary
+education involved the expense of a protracted residence in a foreign
+country. But the obvious advantages of the change prevailed over these
+considerations, and the bill was carried by large majorities.[262]
+
+And now that the long cessation of controversy on the subject--which,
+indeed, has been not the least beneficial fruit of this bill of
+1845--permits a candid consideration of it in all its bearings, it will
+probably be thought that Parliament had not often come to a wiser
+decision, one more dictated by judicious liberality of sentiment, and
+more imperatively required on every ground of statesman-like policy. If
+the countervailing objections and advantages be calmly weighed, it may
+almost be said that there was no alternative between enlarging the
+endowment and putting it on a new footing, or suppressing the college
+altogether. In its existing condition it was notoriously inadequate to
+fulfil the design of its founder; and any establishment visibly
+inadequate to its design tends to bring the design itself into some
+degree of contempt. Yet even if it should be granted that there might
+have been no fair ground of complaint if the college had never been
+founded, to close it after its benefits, however scanty, had been
+enjoyed for half a century, could not fail to have been regarded as an
+unpardonable injustice and injury. The other alternative, therefore, was
+practically the only one that remained; and in embracing it Peel was but
+carrying out the original principle on which the college was founded. It
+had been intended to be efficient; through lack of means it had proved
+inefficient. The obvious and just remedy was to supply such increased
+means as to create or bestow the efficiency originally aimed at. And it
+was a felicitous idea to place the charge for the future on such a
+footing as to combine with such an increase an avoidance of the
+irritation which its yearly discussion had never failed to excite.
+
+And at the same time, to carry still farther the principle of religious
+toleration, or rather of religious equality, he induced the Parliament
+to found a new university, consisting of three colleges, one in each of
+the three provinces of Ulster, Munster and Connaught (Leinster, as
+having Trinity College and Maynooth, being regarded as already
+sufficiently provided with university education), which should be open
+to students of every religious denomination, and at which, while every
+kind of secular education, both literary and scientific, should be
+given, the stirring up of religious controversy and animosity should be
+guarded against, by the absence of any theological professorships. He
+did not, indeed, design that the still greater benefits of religious
+education should be withheld from the pupils, but he proposed to provide
+for that object by confiding their religious education to the care of
+the clergy of each persuasion, some of whom in each town which was the
+seat of a college--Belfast, Cork, and Galway--might be trusted for
+willingness to superintend it. It was hoped that one fruit of this
+scheme, and that by no means its least valuable result, would be that
+the association of pupils of various creeds in their studies and
+amusements from an early age would lead them to maintain, in their more
+mature years, the harmony of which the foundation had thus been laid in
+their youth; and that thus the religious animosities which were the
+principal obstacle to the prosperity of the country would be softened,
+and in time extinguished. And this object has been achieved to a great
+extent, though the disfavor with which the Roman Catholic Church regards
+any educational system which is not under the superintendence of its
+priesthood has prevented the scheme from attaining the full development
+which was hoped for. The number of students of each of the principal
+sects--the Church of Ireland, the Roman Catholics, and the
+Presbyterians--steadily increases.[263] Members of each religious body
+are among the professors in each college, and all accounts represent the
+most perfect harmony and cordiality as existing throughout the whole
+body.
+
+Yet, important as was the principle contained in these measures, none of
+them, perhaps, caused such excitement at the moment as an exercise by
+the government of what was, in point of fact, one of its most ancient,
+as well as most essential, powers: the occasional opening of letters
+which passed through the post, in compliance with a warrant of the
+Secretary of State. England had at all times been the refuge of those
+unquiet spirits who, in pursuit of their schemes of rebellion and
+revolution, had incurred the displeasure of their own governments, and
+had too easily found accomplices here. And in the course of the summer
+some notorious offenders of this class found a member of the House of
+Commons to present a petition, in which they complained that some
+letters which they had posted had been stopped and opened by the
+officers of the Post-office. The member who presented the petition
+appears to have fancied it an unprecedented and wholly unlawful exercise
+of authority; but Sir James Graham, the Home-secretary, not only at once
+avowed that the statement was true, and that he had issued his warrant
+for the opening of the letters mentioned, but also showed that the power
+to issue such an order was reserved to the Secretary of State in all the
+statutes which regulated the proceedings of the Post-office. The clause
+in the act which conferred the power had been originally framed by Lord
+Somers, a statesman certainly as little open as any of his time to the
+suspicion of desiring to encroach on the rightful liberty of the
+subject; and it had been exercised from time to time in every reign
+since the Revolution. It was a power intrusted to the Secretaries of
+State for the public safety, and exercised by them on their own
+responsibility. The practice and its justification were assailed in both
+Houses of Parliament by members of the extreme Liberal party; but,
+though no distinct motion on the subject was made, the general feeling
+of both Houses was plainly evinced, that it was a power which might at
+times be highly useful for the prevention of crime, or for the
+hinderance of conspiracies which might be dangerous to the general
+welfare and tranquillity, and that the constitutional responsibility
+attaching to every minister for every official act was a sufficient
+security against its being improperly used.[264]
+
+And it will, probably, be generally admitted that this was the
+statesman-like view of the subject. There is no doubt that the practice
+in question does infringe the great constitutional right of every
+individual in these kingdoms to absolute freedom of communication with
+his friends. But the most important and the most cherished
+constitutional rights must possess something of elasticity. It must be
+necessary at times to go back to the original object for which those
+rights have been conferred and secured. That original object is the
+safety and welfare of the whole body corporate--of the entire nation.
+And if that safety and welfare at times require the sacrifice, a wise
+ruler will not hesitate to demand it of the people, or to impose it on
+them for their own good. So another principle of the constitution is the
+absolute freedom of action for all the subjects of the sovereign; yet
+that principle is infringed by more than one statute: Factory Acts,
+which limit the hours of even voluntary labor; Education Acts, which
+compel the parent to a certain line of conduct toward his children; each
+in their way substitute another rule for that entire freedom of action
+which, as has been said before, is the fundamental principle of the
+constitution; but they make the substitution on the reasonable ground
+that the course of action which they compel is for the benefit, not only
+of the individual constrained, but of the whole community of which he is
+a member, and for whose welfare all laws and constitutions exist.
+
+One of the grounds of complaint against the exercise of this power,
+which had been alleged by some of the opponents of the government, had
+been that Sir James Graham's conduct had been dictated by an unworthy
+subservience to some of the despotic sovereigns of the Continent. The
+fact was indignantly denied in the House of Lords by the Duke of
+Wellington; and in the course of the session a remarkable proof was
+afforded how little influence such motives had on the decisions of our
+government, when they acquiesced in the passing of a bill which was a
+virtual repeal of the Alien Act, which had existed for more than half a
+century, and of which more than one Continental sovereign would
+certainly have desired the retention. Of late, indeed, it had been so
+modified, that practically it had become little more than a dead letter;
+and now, in 1844, without being formally repealed, it was virtually
+abrogated by an act which enabled all foreigners to obtain letters of
+naturalization, which conferred on them every right of British subjects,
+except those of becoming members of Parliament,[265] or of the Privy
+Council.
+
+Generally speaking, few governments had enjoyed more of the confidence
+of the nation than Peel's did in 1844; yet in this year it was exposed
+to two remarkable mortifications. The charter of the East India Company,
+as framed by Pitt in subsequent events, which has led to the entire
+extinction of the political power of the Company, makes anything beyond
+this brief mention of the transaction superfluous at the present time.
+
+The other mortification of the ministry to which allusion has been made
+fell upon it at home in the Parliamentary discussion of the
+Prime-minister's financial measures, on which his judgment was usually
+regarded as pre-eminent, and on which a large majority of the House was
+generally disposed implicitly to follow his guidance. Sir Robert was
+not, indeed, himself Chancellor of the Exchequer, that office being
+filled by Mr. Goulburn, but it was certain that the Budget was inspired
+by a deference to the Prime-minister's views. And, among the
+arrangements which it proposed, one consisted of a relaxation of the
+sugar-duties, which was regarded with dread by those interested in the
+West Indies, as a farther step in the direction of free-trade, and as
+depriving them of the modified protection which they were as yet
+enjoying. To preserve that protection to them, Mr. Miles, the member for
+Bristol, proposed an amendment which, after an animated debate, was
+carried by a majority of twenty. Three months before, on the Factory
+Bill and the question whether the hours of labor should be limited to
+ten or to twelve, the minister had also found himself defeated, though
+by a much smaller majority; but in that case the defeat had been the
+less pronounced from the inconsistency of the votes on the different
+limits.[266] And he extricated himself from that difficulty by
+abandoning the bill altogether, and introducing a new one, not without
+angry resistance on the part of Lord John Russell and other members of
+the Opposition. They denounced such a manoeuvre as alike
+unconstitutional and unparliamentary; while he, on the contrary,
+insisted that the House had always jealously retained the right of
+reconsidering its own decisions. In that instance, however, the
+introduction of a new bill might have been regarded as the simplest mode
+of harmonizing the variety of views which had been represented by the
+discussion of and votes on the ministerial proposal and the amendments;
+but no such expedient was practicable in this case, that of the
+sugar-duties. A defeat on an important clause in the Budget by a
+majority of twenty was a far more serious matter; it was such a blow as
+had generally been reckoned sufficient to require a resignation of a
+ministry. But on this occasion Peel did not feel himself called on to
+take that step; nor was he inclined to dissolve Parliament, which some
+regarded as his only legitimate alternative, though he had little doubt
+that, if he did so, he should be supported by the confidence of the
+country. After careful reflection, the course on which he eventually
+decided was to adhere to the principle of a relaxation of duties, but to
+consent to a moderate variation from his original proposal as to the
+amount. And in pursuit of this plan, on the next discussion of the
+Budget, he proposed an amendment to that effect, making the adoption of
+it by the House a test of its confidence in the administration. Lord
+John Russell opposed the amendment with great vehemence, pronouncing the
+acceptance of it, if it should be accepted, and the House should thus
+consent "to retract its previous vote, a lamentable proof of
+subserviency, which would disgrace it with the country." What Sir Robert
+now asked was, substantially, that they should now declare that to be
+expedient which they had declared to be inexpedient only three nights
+ago; and Lord Palmerston insisted that the proper course to be taken by
+the government was to resign; while Mr. Labouchere, who had also been a
+member of Lord Melbourne's cabinet,[267] though he admitted that there
+might be "circumstances under which a minister might without impropriety
+ask the House to reconsider a vote," denied that the present was such a
+case, and especially denounced the importation of the question of
+confidence or no confidence in the ministry into the discussion as
+"dangerous and unconstitutional." Another section of the Opposition
+agreed in taking the same line; Mr. Disraeli (then beginning to lay the
+foundations of his reputation and influence) strongly denouncing the
+conduct of the minister, as degrading both to his own supporters and
+still more to the whole House, and recommending him to say frankly to
+both, "We have gauged your independence, and you may have a semblance of
+parliamentary freedom as far as this point, but the moment you go
+farther, you must either submit to public disgrace, or we must submit to
+private life." The end of the discussion was, that the minister
+prevailed by a majority a trifle larger than that which had defeated him
+before. This is not the place to discuss the difference between one
+principle of taxation and another; but the question whether a minister
+when defeated is justified in asking either House of Parliament to
+reconsider its vote, seems one that could only have been raised in a
+House under the influence of unusual excitement of some kind. The charge
+that such a request was unconstitutional only serves to show how loosely
+the words "constitution" and "unconstitutional" are often used even by
+those from whom precision of language might most be expected; for Sir
+Robert Peel's proposal that the House should retract its vote was not
+unprecedented, the very same demand having been made in 1833 by Lord
+Althorp, then Chancellor of the Exchequer of Lord Grey's ministry, of
+which those very men were members who were now loudest in denouncing the
+conduct of the present government. And on that occasion it is worth
+remarking that, though Lord Althorp's demand was resisted in one or two
+quarters, he was vigorously supported by Sir Robert Peel, on the ground
+that, though to rescind one night a vote passed on a former one might be
+not altogether free from objection, it would be a far greater evil that
+questions of importance should be held to be in all cases finally
+decided by a single vote, passed, it might be, in a thin House, or in
+obedience to some sudden impulse.
+
+And this seems to be the view of the case commended not only by
+constitutional and parliamentary practice, but by common-sense. It would
+be strange, indeed, when the questions submitted to the British
+Parliament and the decisions of that Parliament on them are so often of
+paramount importance to the whole world, if the Parliament should be the
+only body in the world denied the right of revising its own judgments,
+the only one whose first resolution is so irrevocable that even itself
+may not change or modify it. To rescind a recent vote is, no doubt, as
+Sir Robert Peel said, a step not wholly free from objection. It should
+be an exceptional act, as one which, if often repeated, would give an
+appearance of capricious fickleness and instability to the opinions of
+Parliament, calculated to impair that respect for it which the whole
+state and nation are deeply concerned in upholding; but to refuse, under
+any circumstances, to confess a change of judgment, would lay the
+Parliament open to an imputation at least equally dangerous to that
+respect--that of an obstinacy which refuses to confess the possibility
+of being mistaken, or to hear reason. It would not be well, therefore,
+that the abrogation of a previous vote should become an ordinary
+practice; but it would be equally undesirable that any fixed or
+unchangeable rule should be interposed to prevent a second discussion of
+an important question, with the possibility of its leading to a reversal
+of the opinion first expressed.
+
+In the same year (1844) the ministers felt compelled to raise a
+constitutional point of singular refinement, which had the effect of
+arresting the progress of a bill, in which one part of the kingdom took
+a lively interest, which a division in its favor proved to be fully
+shared by the House of Lords.[268] It has been already mentioned that in
+the last year of the preceding reign a bill had passed for creating,
+when opportunity offered by the sees affected becoming vacant, two new
+bishoprics at Ripon and Manchester, the incomes of which were to be
+provided by the union of some of the smaller existing bishoprics,
+Gloucester with Bristol, St. Asaph with Bangor. But the Welsh regarded
+with great disapproval any reduction of the number of bishoprics in the
+principality, and Lord Powis now brought in a bill to repeal so much of
+the act as provided for the union of two Welsh sees, urging not only
+their great extent, which he stated at 3000 square miles of very
+mountainous country, but the fact that the population of North Wales was
+steadily and largely increasing. The bill, as has been intimated, was
+favorably received by the Lords, who passed the second reading by a
+majority of twelve; but, before it could be read a third time, the Duke
+of Wellington, as leader of the ministry in that House, announced that
+the bill was one which touched the prerogative of the crown, and
+therefore could not be proceeded with without the consent of her
+Majesty, which he was not authorized to express.
+
+As the matter was explained by the Chancellor, Lord Lyndhurst, the
+manner in which the bill touched the royal prerogative was this: as,
+during the vacancy of any see, its temporalities belonged to the crown,
+any alterations in a see affected the direct pecuniary interests of the
+crown, and he, as Speaker of the House, doubted whether he should be
+justified in putting a question which so touched the royal prerogative
+without the sovereign's consent. A committee which was appointed to
+investigate the case fully confirmed the view thus taken by the
+ministers, and the bill was dropped.
+
+It was, however, an exercise of the royal prerogative which was received
+by the House in general with great dissatisfaction. Certainly, since the
+Civil List and royal income had been placed on their present footing, it
+was only by a very forced construction that the pecuniary interests of
+the sovereign could be said to be affected. And it seemed a very
+insufficient plea for evoking the exercise of a power which, as it was
+said, had certainly never been exerted before since the accession of the
+Hanoverian dynasty. Nor was it made more acceptable by the explanation
+of Lord Brougham, who on this occasion came to the support of the
+minister, that the refusal of the crown's consent at this stage was "a
+warning, as it were, a polite and courteous communication between the
+sovereign, as guardian of the privileges of the crown, and the two
+Houses of Parliament, that if they passed a certain bill it would not
+receive the royal assent;" for, though the right to refuse the royal
+assent to any bill was incontestable, it had not been exercised since
+the time of William III., and to put it in force for the protection of
+an imaginary interest of the crown itself would have been so unpopular
+an exercise of it that no administration could have ventured to advise
+it.
+
+One of the arguments which the Duke of Wellington brought forward in the
+discussion, and which, probably, contributed to induce him thus to
+strangle Lord Powis's bill, has had an influence on subsequent
+legislation. He urged that its adoption--since the resolution to
+establish bishoprics at Manchester and Ripon was one which every one
+desired to carry out--would increase the number of bishops, "and thus
+make an organic change in the constitution of the House of Lords." It is
+not very clear how the addition of a single spiritual peer could have
+that effect. But the Duke had dwelt upon the same argument before in the
+debate on the proposed union of the sees affected, urging that there was
+such a jealousy of the Church in many quarters, and especially in some
+of the large towns, that it would be very undesirable to pass any
+measure the effect of which would be to increase the number of Episcopal
+peers. Even if there was any general reluctance at that time to see such
+an increase (a fact which was by no means ascertained), it may be
+doubted whether it was founded on any sufficient reason. It is not easy
+to see why, when there is no limit to the augmentation of the number of
+lay peers, it should be judged impolitic or unjust to make even so small
+an addition to the number of spiritual peers. At the Restoration the
+spiritual peers were, probably, more than a fifth of the entire House.
+From the great number of subsequent creations of lay peers they were now
+less than a sixteenth, so that there could be no ground for apprehending
+that a slight re-enforcement of the Episcopal bench would disturb the
+balance, or give the Church an undue preponderating weight in the
+decisions of the House. The difficulty, however, such as it appeared to
+the Duke then, has had such weight with subsequent administrations, that
+a new principle has been established of creating bishoprics which shall
+not at first confer seats in the Upper House till their holders become
+entitled to them by seniority. As they are peers from the moment of
+their consecration, it may be doubted whether this creation of peers,
+without seats in Parliament, does not deserve the name of "an organic
+change in the constitution," far more than the addition of one or two
+ecclesiastical peers to the Episcopal bench; and also whether it has not
+established a dangerous principle and precedent; the disconnection of
+bishoprics from seats in Parliament, in even a single instance, seeming
+to furnish an argument in favor of the exclusion of the whole order, a
+measure which, if unjust and injurious to the Church, would be at least
+equally injurious to Parliament itself, and to the whole state.
+
+But all questions of this kind were presently lost sight of in the
+excitement produced by the measure which more than any other has stamped
+Sir Robert Peel's administration with a lasting character, the repeal of
+the Corn-laws. Many statesmen, even of those who were most in favor of
+free-trade in other articles of commerce, made an exception in the case
+of corn, partly from a feeling of the necessity of encouraging
+agriculture, and partly from a conviction of the danger of in any way
+contributing to create or increase a dependence on foreign countries for
+the food of the people. Both Whigs and Tories were generally thus agreed
+on the necessity of maintaining the principle of protection; the dispute
+between the two parties being whether it were best achieved by a fixed
+duty on imported corn, or by what was commonly known as a sliding scale:
+a scale, that is, which varied inversely with the price of the grain
+itself, rising as the price in the home market fell, and falling as it
+rose. In the manufacturing districts a different feeling had prevailed
+for some years. In the first years of the present reign severe distress
+in Manchester and others of the chief manufacturing towns had led to the
+formation of an association whose chief object was sufficiently
+indicated by its title of the Anti-Corn-law League. At first Mr.
+Villiers, the member for Wolverhampton, was its principal spokesman in
+the House of Commons, but at subsequent elections two manufacturers of
+great eloquence obtained seats, and year after year urged the entire
+repeal of all duties on corn with great earnestness, though for some
+time their arguments made but little impression on the House. Their
+motions were rejected in 1842 by a majority of 300; in 1843 by one
+exceeding 250; in 1844 by above 200; and in 1845 by one of more than 130
+in a much smaller House. But this last division had scarcely been taken
+when an unprecedented calamity--the almost entire failure of the potato
+crop, which was attacked in nearly every part of both islands by a new
+disease, the cause of which is not to this day fully ascertained--
+suddenly changed the aspect of the subject. To the English farmer and
+laborer it was a severe loss; to the Irish farmer it was ruin; to the
+Irish peasant famine. The grain harvest, too, was generally deficient.
+And it was evident that rigorous measures, promptly taken, were
+indispensable, if a large portion of the peasantry in the southern and
+western provinces of Ireland were not to be left to perish of actual
+starvation. In the face of so terrible an emergency Peel acted with
+great decision. On his own responsibility he authorized the purchase of
+a large supply of Indian corn from the United States, hoping, among
+other indirect effects of such a step, to accustom the Irish to the use
+of other kinds of food besides the root on which hitherto they had too
+exclusively relied.[269] And he laid before his colleagues in the
+cabinet a proposal to suspend the existing Corn-law "for a limited
+period," a measure which all saw must lead to its eventual repeal. It
+would be superfluous now to recapitulate the discussions which took
+place, the various alternative proposals which were suggested, or the
+dissensions in the cabinet to which his proposal gave birth; the
+resignation of the ministry, and its subsequent resumption of office,
+when Lord Stanley and Lord John Russell had found it impossible to form
+an administration. It is sufficient to say that, as soon as Parliament
+met, Sir Robert brought forward a bill to reduce the duty on corn to
+four shillings, a price only half of the lowest fixed duty that had ever
+been proposed before, that reduction, too, being a stepping-stone to the
+abolition of all duties, at the end of three years, beyond a shilling a
+quarter, which was to be retained, in order to acquire an accurate
+knowledge of the quantity of grain imported. The diminution, however, of
+this duty was not the whole object of his new measure. It included other
+arrangements which would serve as a compensation to the agriculturists,
+by relieving them from some of the peculiar burdens to which the land
+was subjected; and it contained, farther, a reduction or abolition of
+import duties hitherto levied on many other articles, especially on such
+as "formed the clothing of the country," on the fair ground that if the
+removal of protection from the agriculturist were "a sacrifice for the
+common good," the commercial and manufacturing interests might justly be
+required to make a similar sacrifice for the same patriotic object.
+
+Though opposed in both Houses with unusual bitterness, the ministry
+carried their measure, which, indeed, in all probability, even if the
+destruction of the potato crop had not come to accelerate the movement,
+could not have been long delayed, the continual and rapid increase of
+the population adding yearly strength to the arguments of those who
+denounced the imposition of any tax which had the effect of increasing
+the price of the people's food. But, however inevitable it may have
+been, we are not the less compelled to regard it as indirectly bringing
+about a great constitutional change, or rather as consummating that
+which had been commenced by the Reform Bill. Till the year 1832 the
+territorial aristocracy had exerted a predominating influence in the
+government of the state. The Reform Bill, which deprived the wealthier
+land-owners of the greater part of their power at elections, struck the
+first blow at that influence. The abolition of the Corn-laws inflicted
+on it a still more decisive wound, by its extinction of the doctrine
+that there was any such peculiar sacredness about the land and its
+produce as entitled them to protection beyond that enjoyed by other
+kinds of property. Placing in that respect the commercial and
+manufacturing interest on a level with the landed interest, it made us,
+in a farther and a somewhat different sense from that in which Napoleon
+had used the phrase, a nation of shopkeepers.[270]
+
+The repeal of the Corn-laws had another result: it divided the
+Conservative party, and, as a necessary consequence, led to the downfall
+of the ministry. The same session which witnessed its success in
+carrying that repeal witnessed also its defeat on a coercion bill, which
+they regarded as indispensable for the "protection of life in Ireland,"
+where actual murders had reached the appalling amount of nearly three
+hundred in two years. The ministry at once resigned, and Lord John
+Russell had no difficulty in forming an administration, now that the
+question of the Corn-laws was finally settled. It was, however, no bed
+of roses to which the new ministry succeeded; the famine in Ireland
+exceeded the worst anticipations; and, though prodigious efforts were
+made by the government and Parliament to relieve it, though large sums
+were placed at the disposal of the Lord-lieutenant, aided by
+contributions from private sources in England to an enormous amount;
+though the small remnant of the import duty on corn which had been left
+on it by the measure of the preceding year was taken off, and the
+navigation laws suspended, in order that no obstacle interposed to the
+acquisition of food from every available quarter, it was estimated that
+more than half a million of people perished through actual famine or the
+diseases which scarcity brought in its train.[271] A severe monetary
+crisis was one not unnatural result of this distress, so severe that the
+Funds fell to a price below any that had been quoted for many years, and
+the reserve in the Bank of England to an amount lower than it had been
+at any period since 1828. And these difficulties had hardly been
+surmounted when a new revolution in France overturned the dynasty of
+Louis Philippe and established a republic. The revolutionary contagion
+spread to Italy, where, indeed, the movement had begun. The Pope--Pius
+IX.--who had but lately succeeded to the tiara, was forced to flee from
+Rome in the disguise of a foreign courier, after his Prime-minister had
+been murdered by the mob. Germany was scarcely less disturbed. The
+administration of Metternich, who had governed Austria with authority
+little less than absolute for nearly forty years, was overthrown in a
+tumult in which he himself escaped with difficulty from the violence of
+the populace; dangerous riots took place at Munich, at Berlin, and at
+the capitals of most of the smaller principalities, and for some time
+everything seemed to portend the outbreak of a general war, likely to be
+the more formidable as being a war of the revolutionary and republican
+against the monarchical principle. Happily, that danger was averted. The
+only war which broke out between different nations was a brief contest
+in the north of Italy, which the superior numbers of the Austrian armies
+and the skill of Marshal Radetsky, a veteran who had learned the art of
+war under Suvarof nearly sixty years before, decided in favor of
+Austria, and which in the spring of 1849 was terminated by a peace on
+less unfavorable terms to Sardinia than she could well have expected.
+And in the same season tranquillity was re-established even at Rome,
+which, from the peculiar character of the Papal power, contained special
+elements of provocation and danger.
+
+But, though peace was thus generally maintained, these various events
+had produced a ferment of spirits which required some time to calm down,
+and so greatly embarrassed the government, that in the spring of 1852
+Lord John Russell's administration was dissolved, and a new ministry was
+formed by Lord Derby[272]. But the causes which had overthrown his
+predecessor remained to weaken him; so that for some time it seemed
+impossible to form a ministry which afforded any promise of stability.
+Such a rapid succession of changes as ensued had had no parallel since
+the first years of George III. Between February, 1852, and February,
+1855, the country had no fewer than four different Prime-ministers, a
+fact which was at once both the proof and the parent of weakness in
+every administration. Lord John Russell had attempted to procure a
+factitious support in the country by stimulating a fresh demand for
+parliamentary reform. A year or two before, he had provoked the
+dissatisfaction of the "Advanced Liberals," as they called themselves,
+by insisting on the finality of the Reform Bill of 1832, and by advising
+his followers "to rest and be thankful" for what had been then obtained.
+But now he began to advance an opinion that that act required "some
+amendments to carry into more complete effect the principles on which it
+was founded." He inserted an intimation of that doctrine in the Queen's
+speech; and endeavored to give effect to it by bringing in a bill to
+lower the franchise, having, it seems, persuaded himself that a
+five-pound franchise would create a more Conservative class of
+voters.[273] He had scarcely introduced it when the fall of his ministry
+led to its abandonment; but, though it was coldly received by the House
+of Commons, the idea was taken up by the other political parties, who
+can hardly be acquitted of having used the question merely as an
+instrument of party warfare, trying, with an unstatesmanlike
+indifference to the danger of re-awakening the old frenzy on the
+subject, to rouse the nation to take an interest in it; but trying in
+vain. The nation was no longer in the same temper as it had displayed
+twenty years before. The Reform Bill of 1832 had been demanded and
+carried with a frantic vehemence of enthusiasm such as could only have
+been excited by real defects and grievances. But those grievances had
+been removed and redressed. And the bulk of the people could take no
+interest in schemes whose sole end seemed to be either to satisfy the
+theories of some political doctrinaires or to embarrass an adversary;
+till at last, as Reform Bill after Reform Bill was framed, brought in,
+and defeated, or dropped, it became plain, "as the Prince Consort noted
+in a private memorandum at the end of 1859, that what the country
+wanted, in fact, was not reform, but a bill to stop the question of
+Reform."[274] And, at last, the prevalence of this feeling Lord John
+Russell could not conceal even from himself, but confessed to Lord
+Palmerston, then Prime-minister, who had always silently discouraged the
+movement, that "the apathy of the country was undeniable; nor was it a
+transient humor. It seemed rather a confirmed habit of mind. Four Reform
+Bills had been introduced of late years by four different governments,
+and for not one of them had there been the least enthusiasm. The
+conclusion to which he had come was, that the advisers of the crown of
+all parties having offered to the country various measures of reform,
+and the country having shown itself indifferent to them all, the best
+course which could now be taken was to wait till the country should show
+a manifest desire for an amendment of the representation."[275]
+
+There was, however, in these years one subject in which the country did
+take a real interest; that was the development and extension of the
+principles of free-trade. On that the national view had become so
+decided that in 1848 the Parliament even abolished the navigation laws,
+which had subsisted so long, the first act on the subject dating from
+the reign of Richard II., that the adherence to the principle contained
+in them of confining both the export and the import trade of the
+kingdom, with but few exceptions, to British shipping, seemed almost an
+essential article of the constitution. It was the dearer, too, to the
+national prejudices, from the sense universally entertained of the
+paramount importance of maintaining the pre-eminence of our navy, and
+from the belief that the commercial marine was a nursery for the royal
+fleets, with which they could not dispense. But latterly the laws had
+become unpopular even with some of those who had formerly been supposed
+to derive the greatest benefit from them. Many of our colonies had
+complained of their operation, and several of the ablest of our colonial
+governors had recommended their repeal. They had been found, too, to
+present frequent and considerable difficulties in our commercial
+negotiations with other countries, and many naval officers of large
+experience and sound judgment expressed a decided belief that they were
+of no practical use to the naval service. The result of a long and able
+debate was that the laws were repealed, with the exception of that
+portion of them which preserved the monopoly of the coasting trade to
+our own seamen and vessels, that exception being chiefly dictated by
+considerations connected with the prevention of smuggling.
+
+The ground on which the ministers relied in proposing this repeal of
+laws so ancient was that, when protection had been removed from every
+other trade, those concerned in these different trades had an
+irresistible claim for its removal from the shipping. And on general
+principles, both of commerce and statesmanship, the claim was, as they
+urged, irresistible, unless some object of greater importance still than
+uniformity of legislation--namely, the national safety, bound up as it
+unquestionably was in the perpetual pre-eminence of the national
+navy--required an exception to be made. But for the maintenance of our
+maritime supremacy it was, as Burke had preached three-quarters of a
+century before, better to trust to the spirit of the people, to their
+attachment to their government, and to their innate aptitude for
+seamanship, which they seem to have inherited from the hardy rovers of
+the dark ages, and which no other nation shares with them in an equal
+degree. And if that may safely be trusted, as undoubtedly it may, to
+maintain the supremacy of our warlike fleets, the preponderance of
+argument seemed greatly on the side of those who contended that our
+commercial fleets needed no such protection; to which it may be added
+that exceptions to a general rule and principle are in themselves so
+questionable, that the burden of proof seems to lie upon those who would
+establish or maintain them. But the advocates of free-trade were not
+content even with this triumph, though it might have been thought a
+crowning one, and in the course of the next year they succeeded in
+carrying a resolution which (though Lord Derby and the opponents of the
+act of 1846 were now in office) was not resisted even by the ministry,
+being, in fact, the result of a compromise between the different
+parties; and which asserted that "the improved condition of the country,
+and especially of the industrious classes, was mainly the result of
+recent legislation, which had established the principle of unrestricted
+competition, ... and that it was the opinion of the House that this
+policy, firmly maintained and prudently extended, would, without
+inflicting injury on any important interest, best enable the industry of
+the country to bear its own burdens, and would thereby most surely
+promote the welfare and contentment of the people." Such a resolution
+was, in fact, the adoption of free-trade as the permanent ruling
+principle of all future commercial legislation. And even before the
+adoption of this resolution, the feeling in favor of free-trade had been
+greatly strengthened by the Great Exhibition, which not only delighted
+the world for six months with a spectacle of such varied and surpassing
+beauty as even its original projector, the Prince Consort, had not
+pictured to himself, but which had also the farther and more important
+effect of instructing the British workman in every branch of
+manufacture, by bringing before his eyes the workmanship of other
+nations; and, as we may well believe (though such a result is not so
+easily tested), of improving the mutual good-will between rival nations,
+from the respect for each which the experience of their skill and
+usefulness could not fail to excite.
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 258: On the 20th of February, 1840, Baron Stockmar writes:
+"Melbourne told me that he had already expressed his opinion to the
+Prince that the Court ought to take advantage of the present movement to
+treat all parties, especially the Tories, in the spirit of a general
+amnesty." To the Queen his language was the same: "You should now hold
+out the olive-branch a little."--_Life of the Prince Consort_, i., 83.]
+
+[Footnote 259: He became Prime-minister in September, 1841, and retired
+in June, 1846--four years and three-quarters afterward.]
+
+[Footnote 260: "Life of the Prince Consort," i., 266. It may be remarked
+that, in spite of the opinion thus expressed by Sir Robert Peel, of
+those who, since his retirement in 1846, have held the same office, the
+majority have been members of the House of Commons. The peers who have
+since been Prime-ministers have been Lord Aberdeen and Lord Derby; the
+members of the House of Commons have been Lord John Russell, Lord
+Palmerston, Mr. Disraeli, and Mr. Gladstone; though it may be thought
+that in his second ministry Mr. Disraeli showed his concurrence in Sir
+Robert Peel's latest view, by becoming a peer in the third year of his
+administration.]
+
+[Footnote 261: Lord Stanhope tells us "the remedial resolutions moved by
+Pitt in the House of Commons, as abolishing the old duties and
+substituting new ones in a simpler form, amounted in number to no less
+than 2537."--_Life of Pitt_, i., 330. Peel, in his speech, March 21,
+1842, states that he reduces or takes off altogether (wherever the duty
+is trifling, but is practicable) the duty on 750 articles of import.]
+
+[Footnote 262: In the Commons by 307 to 184; in the Lords by 226 to 69.]
+
+[Footnote 263: The following statements of the members of colleges and
+of the three denominations for 1879, 1874, and 1869 appear in the last
+_Queen's University Calendar_:
+
+                         1879. 1874. 1869.
+Church of Ireland ....... 201   189   211
+Roman Catholics   ....... 223   188   161
+Presbyterians  .......... 388   249   227
+Other denominations......  88    87    83
+                          ---   ---   ---
+                          900   713   682]
+
+[Footnote 264: In the course of the session, in order to tranquillize
+the public mind on the subject, secret committees were appointed by both
+Houses of Parliament to investigate the subject, from whose inquiries it
+appeared that, since the days when the government was endangered by the
+plots of the Jacobites, the power had been very sparingly used. The most
+conspicuous instance of its employment had been in the case of Bishop
+Atterbury, several of whose letters had been opened, and were produced
+in Parliament to justify the bill of "pains and penalties" which was
+passed against him. The power had been confined to Great Britain till
+the latter part of the last century, when it was judged desirable to
+extend it also to the Lord-lieutenant of Ireland. But, since the Peace
+of Amiens, the number of letters opened in a year had not, on an
+average, exceeded eight; nor was there the least ground for suspecting
+that a single one had been opened except on such information as fully
+warranted suspicion.
+
+The practice, however, was not confined to our own government. In the
+second volume of the "Life of Bishop Wilberforce" a page is given of his
+diary, dated July 18, 1854, which records a conversation in which the
+Duke of Newcastle and Lord John Russell took part, and in which it is
+mentioned that the French government, under the administration of M.
+Guizot, opened letters, and that the practice was not confined to
+monarchical or absolute governments, for "the American government opens
+most freely all letters." And, with reference to this particular case,
+the Duke of Newcastle said that "Sir James Graham really opened
+Mazzini's letters on information which led to a belief that a great act
+of violence and bloodshed might be prevented by it."--_Life of Bishop
+Wilberforce_, ii., 247.]
+
+[Footnote 265: A subsequent act, passed since the date at which the
+present history closes, has repealed even this exception. By the 33d
+Victoria, c. 14 ("Law Reports," p. 169), it is enacted that "an alien,
+to whom a certificate of naturalization is granted, shall in the United
+Kingdom be entitled to all political and other rights, powers, and
+privileges, and be subject to all obligations to which a natural born
+British subject is entitled as subject in the United Kingdom," etc.; and
+at the general election of 1880 the Baron de Ferrieres, a Belgian
+nobleman, who had been naturalized in 1867, was elected M.P. for
+Cheltenham.]
+
+[Footnote 266: In one instance--on the question whether twelve should be
+the number of hours, as proposed by the Government--the majority against
+that number was 186 to 183. But immediately afterward a majority of 188
+to 184 decided against Lord Ashley's alternative proposal of ten hours.]
+
+[Footnote 267: As President of the Board of Trade. He afterward was
+raised to the Peerage as Lord Taunton.]
+
+[Footnote 268: The second reading was carried in the House of Lords by
+49 to 37.]
+
+[Footnote 269: See "Peel's Memoirs," ii., 173.]
+
+[Footnote 270: It has been observed that till the Corn-laws were
+repealed there had been no instance whatever of any person who had been
+engaged in trade becoming a cabinet minister. Since that time there have
+been several, some of whom only relinquished their share in houses of
+business on receiving their appointments, and some who are generally
+understood to have continued to participate in the profits of trade
+while members of an administration.]
+
+[Footnote 271: Alison, quoting the General Report of the Census
+Commissioners, estimates the deaths caused by famine and the diseases
+engendered by it at the appalling number of 590,000, and states the sums
+advanced under different acts of Parliament to meet the emergency at
+£7,132,268.--_History of Europe_, vii., 274, 276, 2d series.]
+
+[Footnote 272: The same statesman who has previously been mentioned as
+Lord Stanley, and whom the death of his father had recently raised to
+the House of Peers.]
+
+[Footnote 273: In 1853 he said to Lord Clarendon, speaking of a new bill
+which he was pressing on Lord Aberdeen, then Prime-minister, "I am for
+making it as Conservative as possible, and that by a large extension of
+the suffrage. The Radicals are the ten-pound holders. The five-pound
+holders will be Conservative, as they are more easily acted
+upon."--_Life of the Prince Consort_, ii., 503. It was the same idea
+that inspired some of the details of the Reform Bill subsequently passed
+by Lord Derby's third ministry.]
+
+[Footnote 274: "Life of the Prince Consort," iv., 395.]
+
+[Footnote 275: "Life of the Prince Consort," v., 56.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+
+Dismissal of Lord Palmerston.--Theory of the Relation between the
+Sovereign and the Cabinet.--Correspondence of the Sovereign with French
+Princes.--Russian War.--Abolition of the Tax on Newspapers.--Life
+Peerages.--Resignation of two Bishops.--Indian Mutiny.--Abolition of the
+Sovereign Power of the Company.--Visit of the Prince of Wales to
+India.--Conspiracy Bill.--Rise of the Volunteers.--National
+Fortifications.--The Lords Reject the Measure for the Repeal of the
+Paper-duties.--Lord Palmerston's Resolutions.--Character of the Changes
+during the last Century.
+
+
+The frequency of ministerial changes at this time has already been
+mentioned, and the first of them took place at the beginning of 1852,
+under circumstances which throw some light on a question which has never
+been exactly defined--the duty of the different members of a cabinet to
+one another, to the Prime-minister, and to the sovereign.
+
+Queen Victoria had a high idea of her duties and responsibilities. From
+any legal responsibility she was aware that she was exempt; but she did
+not the less consider that a moral responsibility rested on her not to
+be content to give her royal sanction as a mere matter of form to every
+scheme or measure which might be submitted to her, but to examine every
+case for herself, to form her own opinion, and, if it differed from that
+of her ministers, to lay her objections and views fairly before them,
+though prepared, as the constitution required, to act on their decision
+rather than on her own, if, in spite of her arguments, they adhered to
+their judgment. And in carrying out this notion of her duty she was
+singularly aided by the Prince, her husband, a man of perfectly upright
+character, of great general ability, and who, from the first moment of
+his married life, regulated his views of every question, domestic and
+foreign, by its bearing on English interests and English feelings, to
+which he early acclimatized himself with a remarkable readiness of
+appreciation.
+
+In the administration of Lord John Russell, Lord Palmerston was Foreign
+Secretary, and during its latter years foreign affairs occupied more of
+the attention of the country than matters of domestic policy.
+
+The revolution of 1848, which overthrew the Orleans dynasty, had
+produced in France a state of affairs but little removed from anarchy,
+which was scarcely mitigated by the election of Prince Louis Napoleon to
+the Presidency of the new republic for four years, so constant was the
+opposition which the Republican party in the Assembly offered to every
+part of his policy. They even carried their opposition so far as to form
+a deliberate plan for the impeachment of his minister and himself, and
+for his arrest and imprisonment at Vincennes. But he was well-informed
+of all these dangers, and on the morning of the 2d of December, 1851
+(the day, as was commonly believed, having been selected by him as being
+the anniversary of his uncle's great victory of Austerlitz), he
+anticipated them by the arrest of all the leading malcontents in their
+beds; which he followed up by an appeal to the people to adopt a new
+constitution which he set before them, the chief article of which was
+the appointment of a President for ten years.
+
+No one could avoid seeing that what was aimed at was the
+re-establishment of the Empire in his own person. And so arbitrary a
+deed, as was inevitable, produced great excitement in England and
+anxious deliberations in the cabinet. Their decision, in strict
+uniformity with the principle that rules our conduct toward foreign
+nations, was to instruct our ambassador in Paris, Lord Normanby, to
+avoid any act or word which could wear the appearance of an act of
+interference of any kind in the internal affairs of France. But, on Lord
+Normanby reporting these instructions to the French Foreign Secretary,
+M. Guizot, he learned, to his surprise and perplexity, that Lord
+Palmerston had interfered already by expressing to the French ambassador
+in London, M. de Walewski, his warm approval of the President's
+conduct;[276] and Lord Normanby, greatly annoyed at being directed to
+hold one language in Paris, while the head of his department was taking
+a widely different tone in Downing Street--a complication which
+inevitably "subjected him to misrepresentation and suspicion"--naturally
+complained to the Prime-minister of being placed in so embarrassing a
+situation.
+
+Both the Queen and the Prime-minister had for some time been
+discontented at the independent manner in which Lord Palmerston
+apparently considered himself entitled to transact the business of his
+department, carrying it so far as even to claim a right to send out
+despatches without giving them any intimation of either their contents
+or their objects. And the Queen, in consequence, above a year
+before,[277] had drawn up a memorandum, in which she expressed with
+great distinctness her desire to have every step which the Foreign
+Secretary might recommend to be taken laid clearly before her, with
+sufficient time for consideration, "that she might know distinctly to
+what she had given her royal sanction;" and "to be kept informed of what
+passed between him and the Foreign Ministers before important decisions
+are taken," etc., etc. And, after such an intimation of her wish, she
+not unnaturally felt great annoyance at learning that in a transaction
+so important as this coup d'etat (to give it the name by which from the
+first it was described in every country) Lord Palmerston had taken upon
+himself to hold language to the French Ambassador "in complete
+contradiction to the line of strict neutrality and passiveness which she
+had expressed her desire to see followed with regard to the late
+convulsions at Paris, and which was approved by the cabinet."[278] The
+Prime-minister seems to have taken the same view of the act, and
+remonstrated with Lord Palmerston, who treated the matter very lightly,
+and justified his right to hold such a conversation, which he
+characterized as "unofficial," in such a tone and on such grounds that
+Lord John considered he left him no alternative "but to advise the Queen
+to place the Foreign Office in other hands."
+
+A careful and generally impartial political critic has recently
+expressed an opinion "that Lord Palmerston made good his case;"[279] but
+his argument on the transaction seems to overlook the most material
+point in it. Lord Palmerston's own defence of his conduct was, that "his
+conversation with Walewski was of an unofficial description; that he had
+said nothing to him which would in any degree or way fetter the action
+of the government; and that, if it was to be held that a Secretary of
+State could never express any opinion to a foreign minister on passing
+events except as the organ of a previously consulted cabinet, there
+would be an end of that easy and familiar intercourse which tends
+essentially to promote good understanding between ministers and
+government;" and he even added, as a personal justification of himself
+as against the Prime-minister, that three days afterward Lord John
+Russell himself, Lord Lansdowne (the President of the Council), and Sir
+Charles Wood (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) had all discussed the
+transaction with M. de Walewski at a dinner-party, "and their opinions
+were, if anything, rather more strongly favorable than his had been."
+
+This personal aspect of the case it is impossible to discuss, since
+there are no means of knowing whether the ministers mentioned would have
+admitted the correctness of this report of their language. If it were
+confessed to be accurate, it would only show them to have been guilty of
+equal impropriety, and to a great extent justify him as against the
+Prime-minister, whose condemnation of his language, if he were conscious
+that he had held the same himself, would be inexplicable. But it
+certainly does not justify him in respect of her Majesty or the cabinet
+collectively, since the Queen's complaint was, not that he held
+unofficial conversations as a private individual, and not as "the organ
+of a previously consulted cabinet," but that the tenor of the
+conversation which he had held was in direct contradiction to the tone
+which the cabinet had decided should be taken on the subject; that his
+language was calculated to draw the government into a course of action
+which it had been deliberately resolved to avoid. And, in spite of the
+deference due to Lord Palmerston's great experience, it is hard to see
+how a conversation between our Foreign Secretary and the French
+Ambassador on an action, the result of which is as yet undecided, can be
+wholly unofficial, in the sense of having no influence on the conduct of
+affairs, or, as he expressed it, "in no degree or way fettering the
+action of the government."
+
+The result was, as has been mentioned before, that the Prime-minister
+recommended the removal of Lord Palmerston from his office, and that he
+was removed accordingly. And this conclusion of the case seems to show
+that the statement of the position of the Prime-minister in the cabinet
+is rather understated by Mr. Gladstone in one of his essays,[280] where
+he says: "The head of the British government is not a Grand Vizier. He
+has no powers, properly so called, over his colleagues; on the rare
+occasions when a cabinet determines its course by the votes of its
+members, his vote only counts as one of theirs." He admits at the same
+time that "they are appointed and dismissed by the sovereign on his
+advice." And surely to have the right of giving this advice is to have
+the greatest possible power over his colleagues; not power, perhaps, to
+change their opinions (though it possibly at times has had power to
+prevent the expression of them), but power to compass their immediate
+removal from the administration, as was exercised in this instance, and
+as had been exercised by Pitt with regard to Lord Thurlow. That a
+difference of opinion, even on an important subject, is not always
+regarded as a sufficient cause for such a dismissal; that a
+Prime-minister, especially if conscious of his strength, occasionally
+consents to retain colleagues who differ from him on some one subject,
+the same work to which we are partly indebted for our knowledge of the
+details of this affair--the "Life of the Prince Consort"--furnishes two
+remarkable instances in which the Prime-minister, then Lord Palmerston
+himself, submitted to be overruled. We read there that on one occasion,
+when "Count Persigny sought the active intervention of England by the
+way of 'moral support' to a demand" which France proposed to address to
+Austria, "Lord Palmerston and Lord John Russell (then Foreign Secretary)
+were disposed to accede; but a different view was taken both by her
+Majesty and by the cabinet, and Count Persigny's request was accordingly
+declined."[281] On this occasion, it is true, he was yielding to an
+overwhelming majority of his colleagues (her Majesty's approval must, of
+course, have been expressed subsequently to their decision). But in
+another instance we find the same Prime-minister consenting to the
+introduction of a bill by one of his colleagues, Mr. Gladstone, then
+Chancellor of the Exchequer, of which he disapproved so highly that,
+after it had been passed by a very slender majority of the House of
+Commons,[282] he expressed to the Queen a hope that the closeness of the
+division "might encourage the House of Lords to throw out the bill when
+it should come to their House, and that he was bound in duty to say
+that, if they should do so, they would perform a good public service;"
+and after they had rejected it by a majority of eighty-nine, he
+pronounced that "they had done a right and useful thing," reporting to
+her Majesty, as a corroboration of this opinion, and as a proof that it
+was largely shared by the public out-of-doors, that "the people in the
+gallery of the House of Lords are said to have joined in the cheers
+which broke out when the numbers of the division were announced."[283]
+And on a third occasion also he bore with the same colleague's
+opposition to a measure which he and all the rest of the cabinet justly
+thought of vital importance to the best interests of the country, the
+fortification of our great seaports, allowing him to object for a time
+in private, and even to threaten public opposition to it the next year,
+since he felt assured that his opposition, if carried out, which he
+doubted, would be wholly ineffectual.[284]
+
+The personal interest in politics which this laudable habit of judging
+of everything for herself naturally engendered in the Queen's mind led,
+however, to the adoption by her Majesty, in more than one instance, of a
+course at variance not only with all historical precedent, but, with
+deference be it said, with constitutional principle, sanctioned though
+it was by more than one ministry. When the First Napoleon, after his
+elevation to the head of the French government as First Consul,
+proposed, by an autograph letter to George III., to treat with that
+sovereign for the conclusion of peace between the two nations, Pitt, to
+whom his Majesty communicated the letter, had no difficulty in deciding
+that it would be unseasonable for the King "to depart from the forms
+long established in Europe for transacting business with foreign
+states,"[285] and, under his guidance, the cabinet instructed Lord
+Grenville, as Foreign Secretary, to address the reply to the First
+Consul's letter to the French Foreign Secretary, M. de Talleyrand.
+
+But this reign has witnessed several departures from the old and
+convenient rule. Its violation was not begun by her Majesty, but by the
+Emperor Nicholas of Russia in the year preceding the Crimean war. He
+wrote to the Queen herself to discuss some of the points in dispute, and
+she answered his letter with her own hand.[286] The outbreak of war
+which soon ensued prevented any continuation of that correspondence; but
+the close alliance which that war for a time produced between England
+and France, strengthened as it was by an interchange of visits between
+the royal and imperial families, which led to the establishment of a
+strong mutual friendliness and regard, led also to an occasional
+interchange of letters on some of the gravest questions affecting the
+policy of the two nations. The correspondence was sanctioned by
+successive English cabinets, every letter which the Queen either
+received from, or sent to, any foreign prince on political affairs being
+invariably communicated by her either to the Prime-minister or to the
+Foreign Secretary; and they, in one instance, even suggesting to her
+Majesty to write to Louis Napoleon[287] with an object so delicate as
+that of influencing the language with which he was about to open his
+Chambers.
+
+But we must think the line recommended by Pitt to George III. both more
+constitutional and more safe. A letter from one sovereign to another on
+political subjects cannot be divested of the character of a state-paper,
+and for every state-paper some one must be responsible. The sovereign
+cannot be, but for every one of his actions the ministers are. And it
+follows, therefore, that they are thus made responsible for documents of
+which they have not been the original authors; of which, were it not for
+the courtesy of the sovereign, they might by possibility be wholly
+ignorant; and with parts of which, even with the knowledge which that
+courtesy has afforded them, they may not fully coincide, since they
+could hardly venture to subject a composition of their royal mistress to
+a vigorous criticism. Such a correspondence, therefore, places them so
+far in a false position, and it runs the risk of placing the sovereign
+himself in one equally false and unpleasant, since, if the opinions
+expressed or the advice given fail of their effect, the adviser is so
+far lowered in the eyes of his correspondent and of the world.
+
+As has been incidentally mentioned, in the spring of 1854 war broke out
+with Russia, nominally on account of the Sultan's refusal to concede
+some of the Czar's demands concerning the condition of the Greek Church
+in Palestine, but more really because, believing the Turkish empire to
+be in the last stage of decay, he hoped by hastening its destruction to
+obtain the lion's share of its spoils. And for the first time for two
+centuries an English and French army stood together in a field of battle
+as allies. In the field our armies were invariably victorious,
+inflicting severe defeats on the enemy at Alma and Inkerman, and
+wresting from them the mighty fortress of Sebastopol, in the Crimea,
+which hitherto they had believed to be absolutely impregnable. Our fleet
+was, if possible, still more triumphant, destroying Bomarsund and
+Sweaborg, in the Baltic, without the Russian ships daring to fire a
+single gun in their defence, while their Black Sea fleet was even sunk
+by its own admiral, as the only expedient to save it from capture. And
+in the spring of 1856 the war was terminated by a treaty of peace, in
+which, for the first time since the days of Peter the Great, Russia was
+compelled to submit to a cession of territory. But (it may almost be
+said) to the credit of the nation these successes, glorious and
+substantial as they were, made at the time scarcely so great an
+impression on the people as the hardships which, in the first winter of
+the war, our troops suffered from the defective organization of our
+commissariat. Want of shelter and want of food proved more destructive
+than the Russian cannon; presently our gallant soldiers were reported to
+be perishing by hundreds for lack of common necessaries; and the news
+awakened so clamorous a discontent throughout the whole of the United
+Kingdom as led to another change of ministry, and Lord Aberdeen was
+succeeded by Lord Palmerston. While a war on so large a scale was being
+waged there was but little time to spare for the work of the legislator,
+though it is not foreign to our subject to relate that in 1855 the last
+of those taxes which the political economists denounced as taxes on
+knowledge, the tax on newspapers, was abolished. Originally it had been
+fourpence; in 1836 Mr. Spring Rice, Chancellor of the Exchequer in Lord
+Melbourne's ministry, had reduced it to a penny; and now, with a very
+general acquiescence, it was abolished altogether.
+
+The entire abolition of a tax is not properly to be called a financial
+measure, that epithet belonging rather to those which aim at an
+augmentation of revenue by an increase in the number of contributors to
+a tax, while lessening the amount paid by each. But the abandonment of
+the tax in question should rather be regarded as a sacrifice of revenue
+for the instruction of the people in political knowledge; a price paid
+to enable and induce the poorer classes to take a well-instructed
+interest in the affairs of the state and the general condition of the
+country. And, viewed in this light, the abolition of this tax must be
+allowed to have been a political measure of great importance, and to
+have contributed greatly to the end which was aimed at. Till 1836 a
+daily paper, costing sevenpence, was the luxury of the few; and the sale
+even of those which had the largest circulation was necessarily limited.
+But the removal of the tax at once gave birth to a host of penny
+newspapers, conducted for the most part with great ability, and soon
+attaining a circulation which reached down to all but the very poorest
+class; so that the working-man has now an opportunity of seeing the most
+important questions of the day discussed from every point of view, and
+of thus acquiring information and forming a judgment on them which the
+subsequent extension of the franchise makes it more than ever desirable
+that he should be able to form for himself. Every movement in that
+direction renders it the more necessary to raise the intelligence of the
+great mass of the people to a level which may enable them to make a safe
+and salutary use of the power placed in their hands. And no mode of
+implanting a wholesome political feeling in the masses can equal candid
+political discussion: discussion one ruling principle of which shall be
+to teach that the greatest differences of opinion may be honestly
+entertained; that, with scarcely an exception, the leading men of each
+party, those who have any title to the name of statesman, are animated
+with an honest, patriotic desire to promote the best interests of the
+nation; and that the elucidation of truth is not aided by unreasoning
+invective and the undeserved imputation of base motives.
+
+One of the last topics discussed by Mr. Hallam was the introduction of a
+bill to limit for the future the prerogative of the crown in a field in
+which its exercise had previously been unrestrained, the creation of
+peers;[288] and among the last which we shall have to examine was one of
+an exactly opposite character, though relating to the same subject, the
+creation of a life peerage. In the winter of 1855 Sir James Parke, one
+of the Barons of the Exchequer, was created Lord Wenslydale, by
+letters-patent which conferred the title limiting it also to the new
+peer's own life. The professed object of the measure was to strengthen
+the judicial power of the House of Lords. But it was not denied that the
+limitation of the peerage conferred on him for his own life (a
+limitation which made no practical difference to Sir James himself,
+since he had no children) was intended to raise the question whether the
+crown could or could not create a life peerage with a seat in the House
+of Lords. A creation so limited was so novel, or at all events so long
+disused a proceeding, that it inevitably provoked examination and
+discussion. And, as it was found that the lawyers in general regarded it
+as indefensible, at the beginning of the session of 1856 Lord Lyndhurst
+brought the matter before the House of Lords by a motion for the
+appointment of a committee of privileges to investigate and report upon
+it. There were two aspects of the case which naturally came to be
+considered in the debates on it which ensued: the advantages or
+disadvantages, in other words, the political expediency, of such a form
+of letters-patent, and their legal or constitutional propriety. It was,
+of course, with the latter alone that the committee of privileges had to
+deal. And this part of the question was examined with great legal and
+antiquarian learning, though, as was almost inevitable, it was argued as
+a party question, except, indeed, by the lawyers. They, with the
+exception of the Chancellor, Lord Cranworth, who had advised the
+measure, were unanimous in their condemnation of it; the Whig peers,
+Lord Brougham and Lord Campbell, then Chief-justice, being as positive
+in their denial of the right so to exercise the prerogative as those on
+the Opposition side of the House, Lord Lyndhurst or Lord St.
+Leonards.[289]
+
+The arguments against the measure were chiefly these: The objectors drew
+a distinction between what was legal according to the strict letter of
+the law, and what was constitutional; contending that there might be
+exercises of the prerogative which could not be affirmed to be illegal,
+but which no one would deny to be altogether inconsistent with the
+principles and practice of the constitution, since a great part of the
+constitution rested on unwritten law, on long-continued usage, _Lex et
+consuetudo Parliamenti_. And they affirmed that this measure was so
+opposed to that usage, that "no instance had occurred within a period of
+four hundred years in which a commoner had been raised to a seat in the
+House of Lords by a patent of peerage containing only an estate for
+life;"[290] one most essential, if not the most essential character of
+the peerage being that it was an hereditary dignity, and one which
+combined with its rank an hereditary seat in the House of Lords. That
+one or two instances of life peerages were to be found in the annals of
+the Plantagenet kings was not denied, though none exactly similar in
+character.[291] But Lord Lyndhurst argued that precedents which had
+occurred "at a time when the constitution of the country was neither
+understood nor fully formed" were entitled to but little respect; and
+Lord Derby, limiting the age of valid precedents a little more strictly,
+"said frankly that he had no respect for any precedent affecting the
+prerogatives of the crown that dated farther back than the year 1688."
+And since that time, or indeed since the time of Henry VIII., it was
+certain that no life peerage had ever been granted, except by Charles
+II., James II., and George I. and II., to some of their mistresses,
+instances wholly beside the present case, since, of course, none of
+those ladies could claim seats in the House of Lords. Indeed, it was
+believed that both Mr. Pitt, at the time of the Union, and Lord Grey, in
+1832, had considered the question, and had both decided against the
+propriety of advising a creation of life peerages.
+
+In defence of the measure Lord Granville refused to admit the
+distinction between what was legal and what was constitutional; if a
+measure were both legal, that is, warranted by the letter of the law,
+and also expedient, these two concurrent qualities, he contended, made
+it constitutional. He denied, also, that any legal prerogatives of the
+crown could be held to have lapsed through disuse; _nullum tempus
+occurrit Regi_; and he challenged any peer to assert that the sovereign
+had lost the right of refusing his royal assent to a measure passed by
+the two Houses, merely because no sovereign since William III. had so
+exercised his royal prerogative. And against the authority of Mr. Pitt
+and Lord Grey he quoted that of Lord John Russell, who, in 1851, had
+offered a life peerage to an eminent judge, who, though he had declined
+the offer, had been influenced in his refusal by no doubt of the right
+of the crown to make it.
+
+On the expediency of the measure its opponents had urged that it would
+effect a remodelling of the House of Peers, a total change of its
+constitution, by the introduction of a second and distinct class of
+peerages; and Lord Campbell, with a not unbecoming jealousy for what he
+regarded as the interests of his brother lawyers, argued that it would
+"henceforth prevent any lawyer, however eminent he might have been as an
+advocate, whatever services he might have rendered to the state in the
+House of Commons, whatever fame or fortune he might have acquired, from
+aspiring to an hereditary peerage, or to becoming the founder of a
+family, since, to make a distinction between the Chancellor and the
+Chief-justice, between one Chancellor or Chief-justice and another, when
+coming into the Upper House, as to the tenure of their honors, would be
+intolerable; all must be under the same rule, 'no son of theirs
+succeeding.'" And Lord Lyndhurst closed his argument by drawing a
+comparison between the House of Lords and the French Senate: "It was but
+a few weeks since he had read an official comment in the _Moniteur_,
+coming from the highest source, on the inefficiency, the want of
+patriotism, energy, and the backwardness to fulfil the high destinies to
+which they were called, that characterized that illustrious body, the
+Senate of France. He had no disposition to cut down our tribunal to that
+life interest on which the Senate of France is based, as he believed the
+hereditary character of the House of Lords to be one from which great
+and important advantages are derived.... The hereditary principle," he
+added, "is intwined in every part of our constitution; we in this House
+enjoy our hereditary rights in common with the crown; we mutually
+support and assist each other, and we form a barrier and defence to
+protect both those branches of the constitution against any by whom they
+may be assailed."
+
+As Lord Granville had made the expediency of any measure the quality
+which, combined with legality, was sufficient to establish its
+constitutional character, he naturally labored this point with especial
+diligence. He dwelt upon the great importance of strengthening the
+judicial element in the House, since it was the great ultimate court of
+appeal. He produced a letter of the great Chancellor, Lord Eldon, which
+quoted instances in which various administrations had found difficulties
+in the way of introducing eminent lawyers into the House, because their
+want of adequate fortune to support the rank had disinclined them to
+encumber their descendants with an hereditary peerage. He showed also
+that that difficulty had made so great an impression on their own
+Chairman of Committees, Lord Redesdale, that on one occasion he had
+intimated a feeling in favor of allowing "the Law, in the same way as
+the Church, to be, to a certain extent, represented in the House by the
+holders of certain offices, who should be admitted to that House as
+Peers of Parliament during the continuance of holding such office" (to
+which argument Earl Grey added another, that the instance of bishops,
+who were but life peers, proved that the holders of life peerages were
+not considered inferior to hereditary peers).
+
+He dwelt, too, on the evil consequence of the Lords "placing themselves
+before the country as seeking to limit the prerogative of the crown,
+when that prerogative was exercised with a view to remedy something that
+was weak, and to remove a certain imminent danger." What the danger was
+he certainly did not explain. But Lord Grey, in supporting him, took
+wider ground, and, applying the argument derived from Lord Eldon's
+letter to other professions, extolled the idea of instituting life
+peerages as one whose effect would be "more easily to open the doors of
+the House to men whom it was desirable should be admitted--to
+distinguished officers; to eminent writers; to members of the House of
+Commons, who in their different lines might have rendered good service
+to the state, but who, though possessing means amply sufficient to
+support their rank during their own life, yet, from having only a life
+income, or a numerous family to be provided for, might be unable to
+accept an hereditary peerage without injury to their family. In such
+instances," he contended, "it would be most desirable to grant peerages
+for life only. Such a proceeding would, he was convinced, by no means
+disincline others in different circumstances to accept hereditary
+titles, nor indispose the ministry to confer them. Nor did he see any
+reason for fearing that the practice of creating life peerages would be
+more likely to be abused for the purpose of increasing the power of the
+minister than the creation of hereditary peerages."
+
+The committee of privileges was appointed, and reported it as the
+opinion of the members that "neither the letters-patent by themselves,
+or with, the addition of the usual writ of summons, could entitle the
+grantee to sit and vote in Parliament." And the House, by a majority of
+ninety-two to fifty-seven, adopted their report. The ministers yielded
+to its judgment, and ennobled Lord Wenslydale by a new patent in the
+usual form, as Lord Derby had suggested. But Lord Derby desired to show
+that his objection had been founded on principle only; and, as he was
+willing to admit that, apart from the principle involved, "some
+advantages in certain cases, and under certain modifications, might
+arise from peerages for life," he proposed the appointment of a select
+committee "to consider the expediency of making provision for the more
+efficient discharge of the duties of the House as a court of appeal."
+The committee was appointed, and, after careful consideration,
+recommended the creation of two new offices, to be held by two law
+lords, as "Deputy Speakers of the House of Lords," who should be judges
+of at least five years' standing, and should be enabled "by authority of
+Parliament to sit and vote in the House, and enjoy all the rights and
+privileges of a peer of Parliament under a patent conferring a peerage
+for life only, if the crown may have granted or shall grant the same to
+such persons in preference to an hereditary peerage, provided always
+that not more than four persons shall have seats in the House at one
+time as peers for life." Such an arrangement would have introduced a new
+practice, but not a new principle, since the annexation of a seat in the
+House of Lords to certain offices had existed from time immemorial in
+the case of the bishops. And the bill was carried in the House of Lords,
+but defeated in the Commons by a motion to refer it to a committee,
+which was adopted by a small majority, in a not very full House,[292]
+toward the end of the session.
+
+Those who look at the question apart from all preference of one minister
+or one party to another will, probably, be of opinion that the decision
+of the committee, that a life peerage thus created by the crown could
+not confer a seat in Parliament, was conformable to the most legitimate
+view of the constitution. It was, indeed, matter of history that in the
+Middle Ages the crown had exercised its prerogative in many ways which
+it had since abandoned. Boroughs had been enfranchised, and again
+disfranchised, apparently from no motive but pure caprice; writs of
+summons had been withheld from peers.[293] But no one would have
+justified the repetition of such acts now. And common-sense, as well as
+recognized usage, favored the doctrine that long disuse was a sufficient
+and lawful barrier against their revival. That the power of conferring
+life peerages with a seat in Parliament--of which, perhaps, the only
+undeniable instances were the cases of the brothers of Henry V., whose
+royal blood would in those days, probably, have been held to warrant an
+exception in their favor--had not been exercised for full four hundred
+years, was admitted; and the assumption that so long a disuse of a power
+was tantamount to a tacit renunciation of it, is quite compatible with a
+loyal and due zeal for the maintenance of other parts of the prerogative
+which have suffered no such abatement.
+
+If, however, we consider the expediency of the measure, or, in other
+words, the possible advantage that might ensue from the existence of a
+power to create life peerages with a seat in Parliament, opinions will
+probably be more divided. We have seen that Lord Derby allowed that
+there might be advantages in such an exercise of power under certain
+limitations; and the existing system does, undoubtedly, appear open to
+improvement in certain cases. At present the only mode of rewarding
+naval or military commanders who have performed brilliant and useful
+service, or a Speaker of the House of Commons, whose public career,
+though less showy and glorious, may at times have been scarcely less
+valuable, and has certainly been by far more irksome, is the grant of a
+peerage with a pension for lives. Without the peerage they cannot have
+the pension.[294] And, consequently, many most distinguished officers,
+whose conspicuous merits well deserved conspicuous honors, have gone
+unrewarded except by some promotion of knighthood, which carries with it
+no substantial benefit; while the descendants of some of those who have
+been ennobled have openly lamented that the only mode which could be
+found of honoring their fathers proves a punishment to their heirs, by
+encumbering them with an empty title, which they are unable adequately
+to support, and practically closing against them avenues to possible
+wealth and distinction which custom pronounces derogatory to their rank.
+So, not to mention the names of living worthies, no reward could be
+found for Sir W. Parker, that brave and skilful seaman who conducted a
+British fleet two hundred miles up a Chinese river, and crowned his
+exploits by the capture of a mighty city, which had never before beheld
+a European flag; nor for Inglis, who, when the safety of our Indian
+Empire hung upon his gallantry, successfully sustained a siege whose
+hardships and dangers are surpassed by none in ancient or modern
+history. Many will, probably, be of opinion that it is not for the honor
+of England that such services should want due recognition; and that for
+men like those life peerages with liberal pensions would be an
+appropriate recompense. It would, of course, be impossible to limit the
+number of them beforehand, but it would also be needless, since the
+nature of the services by which alone they could be deserved would act
+of itself as a sufficient limitation.
+
+One of the expedients which had been mentioned in this discussion had
+been the annexation of peerages to certain offices, to which it had been
+regarded as an unanswerable objection that this would be the creation of
+an absolutely unheard-of tenure, the peer thus created being able at
+pleasure to lay down his peerage, or even, it might be, being removable.
+But before the end of the session an emergency arose which induced
+Parliament to sanction the principle, novel though it was, that an
+official peerage, if a bishopric may be so called, might be laid down
+with the sanction of Parliament when the holder was no longer able to
+discharge its duties. Two of the most eminent members of the Episcopal
+bench, Dr. Blomfield, Bishop of London, and Dr. Maltby, Bishop of
+Durham, had become wholly incapable of discharging their duties, the one
+having been struck down by paralysis, and the other being almost blind.
+And they now proposed to the Prime-minister that he should make some
+arrangement by which they might be allowed to relinquish their offices,
+retaining a certain portion of the income of their sees as a retiring
+pension. There was no precedent for such an arrangement, but the
+necessity of the two cases was so manifest, the injury which the Church
+must suffer if the superintendence of two such important dioceses were
+to be neglected, was so palpable, and the conditions of the retiring
+pensions asked were so moderate and equitable, that Lord Palmerston had
+no hesitation in sanctioning the introduction of a bill to give effect
+to the arrangement proposed.
+
+It did not pass without vigorous resistance from more than one quarter.
+The Bishop of Exeter complained of it as incompatible with the great
+Church principle, that a bishop could only resign his office to the
+archbishop of his province; others opposed it as a violation of the
+common law, which forbids any bargain being made for the resignation of
+an office; while some, referring to the prohibition of simony (a word,
+perhaps, as much misunderstood and as often misapplied as any in the
+language), denounced the arrangement that the retiring prelates were to
+have pensions as simoniacal.[295] The most reasonable objection made to
+the proceeding was, that such exceptional legislation to meet an
+isolated case tended to establish a dangerous precedent, and that, as
+there were other men of great age on the bench, it would be better to
+effect the end now aimed at by a large general measure providing means
+for the retirement of all clergymen, those of inferior rank as well as
+bishops, whom age or infirmity might incapacitate. But the general
+feeling was against delay. The bill passed, and served in some degree as
+a model for that general measure which was soon afterward introduced,
+and which, as was suggested on this occasion, provided for an
+arrangement similar in principle being carried out whenever a priest
+holding any kind of ecclesiastical preferment should become disabled for
+the performance of its duties.
+
+There can be no doubt that such legislation was absolutely necessary in
+the interests of the Church, taking that expression to include, not the
+clergy alone, but the whole congregation of Churchmen. But it introduced
+a remarkable change into the system of ecclesiastical peerages, and, so
+far, into the constitution of the House of Lords. What was resigned by
+the two prelates was not the peerage (they had still the right to be
+styled "my lord"), but the seat in the House of Lords, which was a part,
+and which had hitherto been regarded as an inseparable part of it, or,
+at least (as it should, perhaps, rather be said, since the recent
+regulation that the junior bishop should not have a seat was a clear
+violation of that principle), which hitherto no one had been able to
+dissociate from the peerage after it had been once enjoyed.
+
+The treaties which terminated the war with Russia were not concluded
+till the spring of 1856; and it was well, indeed, that the country had
+no longer a foreign war on her hands, for a twelvemonth had scarcely
+elapsed when the very continuation of her existence as a great Eastern
+power was suddenly imperilled by what, regarded in one aspect, was a
+mutiny of her troops on a most extensive scale; in another, a civil war,
+waged by a combination of native princes, Hindoo as well as
+Mohammedan,[296] for the total extinction of our power, and the
+expulsion of the British race from Bengal. As early as the first week of
+February several commanders of regiments and other authorities received
+warnings of the organization of a wide conspiracy against our power; and
+in the second week of May the troops at Meerut broke into open mutiny,
+set fire to the public buildings, murdered their officers, and even
+their wives and children, and then marched off to Delhi, where the
+garrison was prepared to receive them with open arms, and to imitate
+their atrocities. The contagion spread, and in a few weeks nearly all
+Bengal was in arms. In one or two instances the native chiefs stood by
+us, but the greater number joined the insurgents, some from the desire
+to throw off our yoke, but others, probably, from constraint and through
+fear. Whatever were their motives, before the end of June nearly all the
+principal cities and fortresses of Bengal, up to the very gates of
+Calcutta, were in the hands of the insurgents, the chief exception being
+at the great city of Lucknow, where, though the mutineers got possession
+of the city, a British garrison held the Residency, in the centre; and,
+maintaining themselves with heroic fortitude, unsurpassed in all the
+history of war, for nearly nine months, contributed more than any other
+body of men to the final suppression of the revolt. It would be beside
+our purpose here to dwell upon the great deeds by which in that terrible
+year our army, in all its branches, maintained its old renown; upon the
+recapture of Delhi; the deliverance of the incomparable defenders and
+preservers of Lucknow; the exploits of Lawrence, and Inglis, and
+Havelock, and Outram, and Peel, and Campbell; and, if we are forced to
+deny ourselves the proud gratification of dwelling on their combined
+heroism and wisdom, we may for the same reason be spared the pain of
+recounting the horrid cruelties wreaked in too many instances not only
+on the officers who fell into the rebels' hands, and on the civil
+magistrates, but on the helpless women and children. In the first
+excitement of fear and horror those cruelties were, no doubt, greatly
+exaggerated, but still enough remains proved to stamp the insurrection
+as one branding with the foulest disgrace the race which perpetrated and
+exulted in them.
+
+It was not till the last week of 1858 that the last sparks of rebellion
+were finally extinguished by the defeat in Oude of the last body of
+rebels who remained in arms, and the flight of the remnant of their
+force across the frontier of Nepaul; but, even before that day came, the
+ministry at home had been led to see the necessity of putting the
+government of the country for the future on a different footing. It
+could hardly be doubted that the prompt suppression of a revolt of so
+unprecedented a magnitude, and the proof given in the course of our
+operations that the British soldier still maintained the same
+superiority over the native trooper as in the days of Clive, had
+heightened our reputation and the belief of our power among the native
+tribes. But, speedily and decisively crushed though it had been, the
+revolt had given too terrible a proof of the inconstancy and treachery
+of the native tribes not to act as a warning to our statesmen; and the
+reflection that was thus forced upon them showed that a company of
+merchants, however distinguished by general courage and sagacity they
+had shown themselves, was no longer qualified to exercise imperial
+dominion over a territory which now extended over more than a million of
+square miles, and more than a hundred and fifty millions of native
+subjects.
+
+Accordingly, in the first week of the session of 1858, Lord Palmerston,
+as Prime-minister, introduced a bill to transfer the government of
+British India from the East India Company to the crown. It was natural
+that the principle of such a measure should be opposed by the Directors
+of the Company, though it was supported by more than one person who had
+held high civil office in India; and equally natural that the
+arrangement of its details should call forth a minute and rigorous
+examination, and on many points a very determined opposition. We need
+not, however, say more about this bill, since circumstances prevented
+its being proceeded with; and the history of those which succeeded it is
+now only worth referring to as showing the extreme difficulty of the
+task of framing a government on new principles for a dependency of such
+vast magnitude and importance.[297]
+
+Lord Palmerston's bill was dropped, in consequence of the fall of his
+ministry, before the time came for its second reading; but the
+discussion on it had to some extent smoothed the way for that of his
+successor, Lord Derby. A great impression on the Parliament, and on the
+country in general, had been made by a very able speech of Sir G.C.
+Lewis, Chancellor of the Exchequer. He traced the whole history of the
+Indian government from the day of Plassy, and substantiated the right of
+the home government and Parliament to remodel it as they might judge
+best, by proving that ever since the passing of Pitt's first bill, in
+1784, the Company had been constantly subject to Parliamentary control.
+He showed, too, most convincingly, that a petition which the Company had
+presented to the House of Commons, deprecating any change in the
+existing system which should tend to diminish the authority of the
+Directors, was based on one great fallacy--speaking, as it did, of the
+Company as one and indivisible, and unchanged in character, functions,
+and influence, down to the date of the last renewal of its charter, only
+five years previously; whereas the truth was, that in the one hundred
+years since Plassy the system had undergone as many changes as the
+English constitution between the Heptarchy and the reign of Queen
+Victoria.
+
+He had thus removed some of the obstacles out of the way of the measure
+of the new government, though Lord Derby would have preferred postponing
+it till tranquillity should have been restored to the country by the
+complete suppression of the revolt, had not the large majority[298]
+which had sanctioned the introduction of Lord Palmerston's bill, in his
+opinion, "placed the Company in such a situation that they could no
+longer command the same amount of public confidence and public support
+as they were entitled to receive previously to that vote of the House of
+Commons." It may be added that the first bill on the subject which was
+introduced by his government bore evident marks of the difficulties
+under which it was framed--difficulties existing from the unexpected
+suddenness of his accession to office; so that, after a not very short
+discussion, it was eventually withdrawn, and it was not till the end of
+June that the measure which was finally adopted was introduced.
+
+The leading enactments of the measure[299] provided that for the future
+the government of India, described as having been hitherto vested in, or
+exercised by, the Company in trust for her Majesty, should be vested in
+her Majesty, and exercised in her name; that one of her Majesty's
+principal Secretaries of State should have and perform all such powers
+and duties relating to the government or revenues of India as had
+formerly belonged to the Court of Directors, as the Court of Proprietors
+of the Company; that a Council of the Governor-general should be
+established, consisting of fifteen members, seven of whom should be
+appointed by the Court of Directors, being persons who were, or had
+formerly been, Directors of the Company, and eight should be nominated
+by the crown. And as to both classes, it was provided that the majority
+should consist of persons who had served or resided in India for ten
+years at the least, and should not have left India more than ten years
+when appointed. They were to hold their offices during good behavior, to
+receive salaries, and to be entitled to retiring pensions, but to be
+incapable of sitting in Parliament. The appointment of Governor-general
+and Governor of each Presidency was to belong to the crown. The
+expenditure of the revenues of India, both in India and elsewhere, was
+to be subject to the control of the Secretary of State in Council; other
+clauses provided for the dividends of the Company, for the admission of
+persons into the civil service; and, with reference to existing
+establishments, one clause provided that "the Indian military and naval
+forces should remain under existing conditions of service."
+
+This last clause was strongly objected to by the Queen,[300] as
+"inconsistent with her constitutional position as head of the army,
+which required that the Commander-in-chief should be put in
+communication with the new Secretary of State for India, in the same
+manner in which he is placed with regard to the troops at home or in the
+colonies toward the Secretary of State for War.... With regard to the
+whole army, whether English or Indian, there could, with due regard to
+the public interest, be only one head and one general command." She
+yielded her opinion, however, to the resolute objections of the
+Prime-minister, with whom on this point his predecessor,[301] Lord
+Palmerston, agreed; but the result proved the superior soundness of her
+Majesty's view. It was not only a most anomalous arrangement, since the
+supreme control of all the warlike forces was one of the most
+inalienable prerogatives of the crown, but it had the strange fault of
+preserving the double government in the case in which, above all others,
+unity of system and unity of command were most indispensable. And, what
+weighed more than either consideration with the generally practical
+views of English statesmen, it was from the beginning found to work
+badly, creating, as it did, great and mischievous jealousies between the
+two divisions, the Royal and the Indian army. It was found that all the
+generals then in the highest commands in India--Lord Clyde (Sir Colin
+Campbell having been ennobled by that title), Sir Hugh Rose, and Sir
+William Mansfield--strongly disapproved of it, and recommended a change;
+and consequently, in the summer of 1860, Lord Palmerston, who in the
+mean while had returned to the Treasury, came round to the Queen's view
+of the subject, and a new act was passed which amalgamated the two
+armies into one Imperial army, taking its turn of duty throughout all
+parts of the British empire.[302]
+
+A letter addressed by Lord Palmerston to the Queen in the autumn of
+1857, which appears to have been his first statement to her Majesty of
+the opinion which he had formed of the necessity of abolishing the
+governing authority of the Company, states the principal arguments in
+favor of such a measure with great clearness, as arising from "the
+inconvenience and difficulty of administering the government of a vast
+country on the other side of the globe by means of two cabinets, the one
+responsible to the crown and Parliament, the other only responsible to
+the holders of Indian stock, meeting for a few hours three or four times
+a year, which had been shown by the events of the year to be no longer
+tolerable." His disapproval of parts of Lord Ellenborough's policy
+probably prevented him from alluding to his recall from India by the
+Directors, in direct defiance of the opinion of the government,[303]
+though that strange step can hardly have been absent from his mind. But,
+in fact, the case for taking the whole rule of so vast a dominion wholly
+into the hands of the Queen's government at home was so irresistible,
+that it did not require to be strengthened by reference to any
+individual instances of inconvenience. When the double government was
+originally established, the English in India were still but a small
+mercantile community, with very little territory beyond that in the
+immediate neighborhood of its three chief cities. Of the conduct of the
+affairs of such a body, still almost confined to commerce, the chief
+share might not unreasonably be left to the merchants themselves,
+subject to such supervision on the part of the government at home as was
+implied in the very name of the department invested with that
+supervision, the Board of Control, which, as Pitt explained the name,
+was meant to show that it was not to be, like the measure proposed by
+the Coalition Ministry, a board of political influence.[304] But the
+case was wholly altered when British India reached from Point de Galle
+to the Himalayas, and spread beyond the Ganges on the east, to beyond
+the Indus on the west; when the policy adopted in India often influenced
+our dealings with European states, and when the force required for the
+protection of those vast interests exceeded the numbers of the royal
+army. India, too, is a country the climate of which prevents our
+countrymen from emigrating to it as settlers, as they do to Canada or
+Australia, and where, consequently, the English residents are, and
+always must be, a mere handful in comparison with the millions of
+natives. In such a case their government must at all times rest mainly
+on opinion, on the belief in the pre-eminent power of the ruler; and it
+was obvious that that belief would be greatly fortified by the sovereign
+of Britain becoming that ruler.[305] The great rajahs cordially
+recognized the value of the transfer of power considered in this light,
+and felt their own dignity enhanced by becoming the vassals of the
+sovereign herself.
+
+Turning to French affairs, a brilliant French writer has remarked, that
+his countrymen are, of all peoples, the least suited to be conspirators,
+since none of them can ever keep a secret. But it was the ill-fortune of
+Louis Napoleon that he had provoked enmities, not only among his own
+countrymen, but among the republican fanatics of other nations also, who
+saw in his zeal for absolute authority the greatest obstacle to their
+designs, which aimed at the overthrow of every established government on
+the Continent, and shrunk from no crimes which they conceived to be
+calculated to promote their object. To free themselves from such an
+antagonist, the most wholesale murders seemed by no means too large a
+price. And in the middle of January, as the Emperor and Empress were
+going to the Opera, a prodigious explosion took place almost beneath the
+wheels of their carriage, from the effect of which they themselves had a
+most narrow escape, both being struck in the face by splinters, the
+aide-de-camp in their carriage also being severely wounded on the head;
+while their escort and attendants were struck down on all sides, ten
+being killed and above one hundred and fifty wounded.[306] It was soon
+found out that the authors of this atrocious crime were four Italians,
+of whom a man named Orsini was the chief, and that he, who had but
+recently escaped from a prison in Mantua, had fled from that town to
+England, and had there concocted all the details of his plot, and had
+procured the shells which had been his instruments.
+
+It was not unnatural that so atrocious a crime, causing such wide-spread
+destruction, should awaken great excitement in France, and in many
+quarters violent reclamations against England and her laws, which
+enabled foreign plotters to make her a starting-place for their
+nefarious schemes. Even in the French Chambers very bitter language was
+used on the subject by some of the most influential Deputies, for which
+our ministers were disposed to make allowance, Lord Clarendon, the
+Foreign Secretary, writing to the Prince Consort that "it was not to be
+expected that foreigners, who see that assassins go and come here as
+they please, and that conspiracies may be hatched in England with
+impunity, should think our laws and policy friendly to other countries,
+or appreciate the extreme difficulty of making any change in our
+system."[307]
+
+But a different feeling was roused by a despatch of the French Secretary
+of State to the ambassador here, which seemed to impute to this country
+that it deliberately sheltered and countenanced men by whose writings
+"assassination was elevated into a doctrine openly preached, and carried
+into practice by reiterated attacks" upon the person of the French
+sovereign, and asked, in language which had rather an imperious tone,
+"Ought the English Legislature to contribute to the designs of men who
+were not mere fugitives, but assassins, and continue to shelter persons
+who place themselves beyond the pale of common right, and under the ban
+of humanity? Her Britannic Majesty's Government can assist us in
+averting a repetition of such guilty enterprises, by affording us a
+guarantee of security which no state can refuse to a neighboring state,
+and which we are justified in expecting from an ally. Fully relying,
+moreover, on the profound sagacity of the English Cabinet, we refrain
+from indicating in any way the measures which it may seem fit to take in
+order to comply with this wish. We confidently leave it to decide on the
+course which it shall deem best fitted to the end in view." Still,
+though the charge that our Legislature contributed to the designs of
+assassins was some departure from the measured language more usual in
+diplomatic communications between friendly powers, under the
+circumstances this remonstrance might have been borne with. Unluckily,
+it was not all, nor the worst, that we were called upon to bear. A few
+days afterward some addresses to the Emperor from different military
+corps were published in the _Moniteur_, which not only poured forth
+bitter reproaches against the whole English nation, but demanded to be
+led to an invasion of the country, "as an infamous haunt for the
+carrying out of infernal machinations." Political addresses seem to our
+ideas inconsistent with military discipline; but the army had been
+permitted, and even encouraged, to make them ever since the days of the
+Consulate, though such addresses never received the recognition of a
+publication in the official journal till they had been subjected to
+careful revision, and, if necessary, expurgation. On this occasion,
+however, that supervision had been carelessly performed, and the
+offensive passages were left standing, though, when the Emperor learned
+the indignation which they had excited even among his well-wishers in
+England, he instructed his ambassador to apologize for their retention
+and publication, as an act of inadvertence on the part of the officials
+whose duty it had been to revise such documents. So far all was well.
+And had the English ministers replied to the despatch of M. de Persigny
+in firm and temperate language, they would have escaped the difficulties
+which eventually overthrew them. There was no doubt that, according to
+diplomatic usage, a written despatch formally communicated to the
+Secretary of State required a written reply.
+
+Unfortunately, a written reply was not given. Lord Clarendon was too
+apprehensive of the mischief which might possibly arise from a
+protracted discussion, leading, perhaps, to an angry controversy; and
+under the influence of this feeling contented himself, when the despatch
+was presented, with giving the ambassador a verbal answer, that "no
+consideration on earth would induce Parliament to pass a measure for the
+extradition of foreign political refugees; that our asylum could not be
+infringed, and that we adhered to certain principles on that subject
+which were so old and so sacred that they could not be touched;"[308]
+adding, however, at the same time an assurance that the Attorney-general
+was already, at his request, examining our law of conspiracy, to see
+whether it was sufficiently comprehensive or stringent. The purport of
+this answer was all that could have been desired; but there was a very
+general impression that the omission to reply by a written despatch was
+a sacrifice of the national dignity, if not an unworthy submission to
+scarcely disguised menace; though at the same time there was also a
+feeling among both parties in Parliament that our laws with respect to
+the conduct of foreigners residing among us were, perhaps, susceptible
+of improvement. On the very first night of the session, in allusion to
+the attack on the French Emperor, Lord Derby had said that "he could
+wish to hear the opinion of the ministers whether the existing laws of
+this country were adequate to afford security for the lives of foreign
+princes against plots contrived in this country; and, if they were not,
+whether they might not be amended, so as to meet the case of such crimes
+as had recently been perpetrated, which were so heinous and revolting to
+every feeling of humanity." And even before that speech the ministers
+had applied themselves to frame a measure to amend the law, which in the
+second week of February the Prime-minister himself introduced to the
+House of Commons.
+
+It was read a first time, though not without some opposition; but before
+it arrived at the second reading, though only a week afterward, the
+feeling of the country, reflected in this instance by the House, had
+become so inflamed, that the measure was not discussed on its own
+merits, but on the point whether, since no other answer had been given
+to the French despatch, this must not be regarded as the ministerial
+answer, and therefore whether it were such an answer as it befitted
+England to send. Had it been examined on its own merits solely, it could
+hardly have provoked much adverse criticism. It was entitled, "A bill to
+amend the law with relation to the crime of conspiracy to commit
+murder," and it merely proposed to establish in England a law which had
+long existed in Ireland. Hitherto, as Lord Palmerston explained the
+matter, England had treated conspiracy to murder as a misdemeanor,
+punishable with fine and imprisonment. In Ireland it had long been a
+capital crime; and, though he did not propose to assimilate the English
+to the Irish statute in all its severity, he proposed to enact that
+conspiracy to murder should be a felony, punishable with penal
+servitude, by whomsoever the conspiracy might be concocted, or wherever
+the crime might be designed to be committed.
+
+The principle of such a law, supported as it was by the precedent of
+Ireland, could hardly be resisted. And Mr. Walpole, who had been
+Home-secretary in Lord Derby's ministry, avowed his determination to
+support the bill, "as being right in principle." But even he limited his
+promise of support by a condition "that the honor of England should be
+previously vindicated;" arguing that the French despatch bore the
+character of a demand, based upon allegations which were contrary to
+truth, and which, therefore, the ministers were bound to repudiate; and
+that to pass such a bill without putting on record a formal denial of
+those allegations would, in the general view of Europe, imply a
+confession that to them we had no answer to give. And it was this
+consideration which eventually determined the decision of the House, Mr.
+Disraeli, who closed the debate on his side, condemning the conduct of
+the ministers as "perplexed, timid, confused, wanting in dignity and
+self-respect. In not replying to the despatch, they had lost a great
+opportunity of asserting the principles of public law." The House,
+taking his view of their conduct, threw out the bill by a majority of
+nineteen;[309] and the ministry resigned, and was succeeded by one under
+the presidency of Lord Derby.
+
+Many of those who on this occasion combined to form the majority had
+denounced the bill, as an infringement of the principles of our
+constitution. It is, however, evident that, had it passed, it would not
+have deserved such a description. It would in no degree whatever have
+deprived a foreign resident of safety and the protection of English law,
+so long as he should obey that law; and that is all the indulgence that
+the constitution ever gave or ought to give. Foreigners had always been
+amenable to our courts of justice for any violation of the law. And Lord
+Palmerston's bill not only went no farther than removing a certain class
+of offences from the category of misdemeanors to that of felonies, but
+it also imposed no liability in that respect on foreigners which it did
+not at the same time impose on all the Queen's subjects. Indeed, the
+bill was so moderate, and the improvement it proposed so desirable,
+that, in a subsequent discussion in the House of Lords, Lord Campbell,
+the Chief-justice, expressed a hope that Lord Derby's government would
+take it up; though Lord Derby, in view of the existing feeling of the
+country on the subject, prudently forbore to act on that suggestion.
+But, as one of Orsini's most guilty accomplices, a man named Bernard,
+was still in London, he caused him to be indicted for murder, as having
+incurred that guilt as accessary to the death of some whom the explosion
+had killed. The excitement on the question had, however, not died away
+when the trial came on; and, though it will, probably, be generally
+admitted that the evidence was sufficiently clear, Bernard was
+acquitted.
+
+Lord Derby, however, did not long retain his office. Indeed, the Earl
+was so conscious that, on questions of general policy, the House of
+Commons was inclined to views differing from his own, that he would have
+preferred declining the task of forming a ministry, had he not conceived
+that, in the difficulty in which the Queen was placed by recent
+circumstances, he was bound by his duty to make the attempt, even if the
+result of it were merely to obtain a kind of respite for his sovereign
+and the country, which might give time for the present excitement of
+feeling to calm down. He was not deceived in his forebodings of his
+inability to maintain his position. In the course of the next spring he
+was twice defeated in the House of Commons--once by the House which he
+found in existence, and a second time in one which was the fruit of a
+general election. And in the summer of 1859 Lord Palmerston returned to
+office, with power increased by the junction of many of those who had
+helped to overthrow him in 1858, but who now combined with him to strike
+a similar blow at his Conservative successor.
+
+Yet, brief as was Lord Derby's tenure of power, it was made memorable by
+the commencement of a movement which cannot be regarded as devoid of
+constitutional importance, since, though originally it was only designed
+to supply a temporary re-enforcement to our ancient constitutional
+forces, the regular army and the militia, it has eventually created a
+force which, to the great honor of those who constitute it, has become a
+permanent addition to them. In the great war against Revolutionary
+France, when it was generally believed that those who held rule in Paris
+were contemplating an invasion of these islands, Pitt, as we have seen,
+had encouraged the formation of corps of volunteers, which continued to
+be of great use till the very end of the war, by performing, in
+conjunction with the militia, a great portion of the home duties which
+must otherwise have fallen on the line regiments, and thus disengaging
+the regular army for service on the Continent. There was now no such
+formidable enemy to be dreaded as the first Napoleon, but in every part
+of Europe affairs were in a state so unquiet that every kingdom seemed
+at times on the very brink of war; and since, if it should once break
+out, no one could feel confident that we should not be involved in it,
+or, if we should be, who would be our allies or our enemies, measures of
+precaution and self-defence seemed as needful now as they had been sixty
+years before. Our boldest statesmen were disquieted and anxious; and the
+nation at large, sharing their uneasiness, kindled with the feeling that
+it was a time to show that the present generation inherited the
+self-denying patriotism of their fathers. Leaders were not wanting again
+to prompt the formation of a volunteer force. The government at once saw
+the value of the scheme. Fortunately, the Secretary for War, Colonel
+Peel, happened to be an old soldier, a veteran who had learned the art
+of war under Wellington himself; and he, having great talents for
+organization, placed the force from its infancy on a sound footing. How
+thoroughly the movement harmonized with the martial spirit of the
+nation--to which, indeed, it owed its birth--is shown by the history of
+the force, which now, above twenty years after its original formation,
+maintains its full numbers and yearly improves its efficiency. Though
+there has not for many years been any apprehension of war, above one
+hundred and twenty thousand men still annually devote no small portion
+of their time to the acquisition of military discipline and science, and
+that so successfully, that, by the testimony of the most experienced
+judges, they have attained a degree of efficiency which, if the
+necessity for their services should ever arise, would render them
+valuable and worthy comrades to the more regularly trained army. Lord
+Derby retired from office while the force was still in its infancy; but
+Lord Palmerston was equally sensible of its value, and gave a farther
+proof of his appreciation of the vast importance of measures of national
+defence by the vigor with which he carried out the recommendations of a
+royal commission which had been appointed by the preceding ministry to
+investigate the condition of our national defences. Its report had
+pointed out the absolute necessity of an improved system of protection
+for our great dockyards and arsenals, which, from their position on the
+coast, were more liable to attack than inland fortresses would have
+been, had we had such. And, in accordance with that warning, in the
+summer of 1860, Lord Palmerston proposed the grant of a large sum of
+money for the fortification of our chief dockyards. It was opposed on a
+strange variety of grounds; some arguing that the proposed
+fortifications were superfluous, because our navy was the defence to
+which the nation was wont deservedly to trust; some that they were
+needless, because no other nation was in a condition to attack us;
+others that they were disgraceful, because it was un-English and mean to
+skulk behind stone walls, and because Lycurgus had refused to trust to
+stone walls for the safety of Sparta; and one member, the chief
+spokesman of a new and small party, commonly known as the
+"peace-at-any-price party," boldly denounced the members of the
+commission as a set of "lunatics" for framing such a report, and the
+ministers as guilty of "contemptible cowardice" for suggesting to the
+nation that there was any danger in being undefended. But the ministry
+prevailed by a large majority;[310] the money was voted, and the nation
+in general warmly approved of the measure. As Lord Palmerston
+subsequently expressed it, "the government, the Parliament, and the
+nation acted in harmonious concert"[311] on the subject.
+
+One of the arguments against it which the objectors had brought forward
+was, that the ministry was not unanimous in the conviction of the
+necessity; and we learn from the "Life of the Prince Consort"[312] that
+Mr. Gladstone, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, was vehement in his
+resistance to it, threatening even to carry his opposition so far as to
+resign his office, if it were persevered in. And, as has been intimated
+on a previous page, this was not the only question on which in the
+course of this year the Prime-minister did in his heart differ from his
+Chancellor of the Exchequer, though he did not think it expedient to
+refuse his sanction to his proposals on a matter belonging to his own
+department, the Exchequer. The subject on which he secretly doubted his
+colleague's judgment was one of the proposals made in the Budget of the
+year. As has already been mentioned, the transaction throws a rather
+curious light on the occasional working of our ministerial system; and
+the fate of the measure in the two Houses of Parliament is also
+deserving of remark and recollection, as re-opening the question, which
+had not been agitated for nearly a century, as to the extent of the
+power of the House of Lords with respect to votes of money. In a former
+chapter[313] we have had occasion to mention the angry feeling on the
+part of the House of Commons which, in the year 1772, had been evoked by
+the act of the House of Lords, in making some amendments on a bill
+relating to the exportation of corn which had come up to them from the
+Commons. A somewhat similar act had, as we have also seen, revived the
+discussion a few years later, when the minister of the day had shown a
+more temperate feeling on the subject. On neither occasion, however, had
+the question of the privileges of the Lords been definitively settled;
+and no occasion had since arisen for any consideration of the subject.
+But the Budget of 1860 contained a clause which, in spite of the
+deserved reputation of the Chancellor of the Exchequer as a skilful
+financier, was not regarded with general favor. There was a large
+deficiency in the revenue for the year; but while, among his expedients
+for meeting it, Mr. Gladstone proposed an augmentation of the
+income-tax, he proposed also to repeal the excise duty on paper, which
+produced about a million and a quarter. It is now known that the
+Prime-minister himself highly disapproved of the sacrifice at such a
+time of so productive a tax.[314] And, if that had been suspected at the
+time, the House of Commons would certainly not have consented to it;
+even when the ministry was supposed to be unanimous in its approval of
+it, it was only carried by a majority of nine; and, when the bill
+embodying it came before the House of Lords, a Whig peer, who had
+himself been formerly Chancellor of the Exchequer in Lord Melbourne's
+administration, moved its rejection, and it was rejected by a majority
+of eighty-nine.
+
+The rejection of a measure relating to taxation caused great excitement
+among a large party in the House of Commons--so violent, indeed, that
+the only expedient that presented itself to the Prime-minister, if he
+would prevent the proposal of some step of an extreme and mischievous
+character, was to take the matter into his own hands. Had he been able
+to act entirely on his own judgment, it may, perhaps, be thought that,
+with his sentiments on the inexpediency of the measure which had been
+rejected, he would have preferred a silent acquiescence in the vote of
+the Lords; but he would have been quite unable to induce the majority of
+his own supporters, and even some of his own colleagues, to adopt so
+moderate a course; and accordingly he moved the appointment of a
+committee to examine and report on the practice of Parliament in regard
+to bills for imposing or repealing taxes. And when it had made its
+report, which was purely of an historical character, setting forth the
+precedents bearing on the subject, he proposed three resolutions,
+asserting "that the right of granting aids and supplies to the crown is
+in the Commons alone, as an essential part of their constitution, etc.;
+that, although the Lords had exercised the power of rejecting bills of
+several descriptions relating to taxation by negativing the whole, yet
+the exercise of that power by them had not been frequent, and was justly
+regarded by the Commons with peculiar jealousy, as affecting their
+rights, etc.; and that, to guard for the future against an undue
+exercise of that power by the Lords, and to secure to the Commons their
+rightful control over taxation and supply, the Commons had it in their
+power so to impose and remit taxes, and to frame bills of supply, that
+their right, etc., might be maintained inviolate."
+
+In the debate which ensued his chief opponents came from his own party,
+and even his own colleague, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, displayed a
+fundamental difference of feeling from his on the subject, a difference
+which was expressed by one of the most eloquent supporters of the
+resolutions, Mr. Horsman, M.P. for Stroud, saying that "Lord Palmerston
+wished to make the independence of the House of Lords a reality, while
+Mr. Gladstone seemed to desire that it should be a fiction." Lord
+Palmerston, indeed, showed the feeling thus attributed to him in a
+statesman-like declaration that, if "this nation had enjoyed a greater
+amount of civil, political, social, and religious liberty than, as he
+believed, any other people in the world, that result had been
+accomplished, not by vesting in either of the three estates, the Crown,
+the Lords, or the Commons, exclusive or overruling power over the
+others, but by maintaining for each its own separate and independent
+authority, and also by the three powers combining together to bear and
+forbear, endeavoring by harmonious concert with each other to avoid
+those conflicts and clashings which must have arisen if independent
+authority and independent action had been exerted by each or by all." He
+entered into the history of the question, explaining that, though "each
+branch of the Legislature retained its respective power of rejecting any
+measure, the Commons had claimed from time immemorial particular
+privileges in regard to particular measures, and especially the
+exclusive right of determining matters connected with the taxation of
+the people. They claimed for themselves, and denied to the Lords, the
+right of originating, altering, or amending such measures; but, as long
+ago as 1671, the Attorney-general, in a memorable conference between the
+two Houses, had admitted that the Lords, though they could not originate
+or amend, had, nevertheless, power to reject money-bills;" and this
+admission he regarded as consistent with common-sense, for "it was well
+known that, though the Commons contended for the right of originating
+measures for the grant of supply, and of framing bills with that object,
+according to their belief of what was best for the public interest, yet
+such bills could not pass into law without the assent of the Lords; and
+it was clear that an authority whose assent was necessary to give a
+proposal the force of law, must, by the very nature of things, be at
+liberty to dissent and refuse its sanction."
+
+The committee had enumerated a large number of precedents (above thirty)
+in which, since that conference, the Lords had rejected such bills; but
+the cases were not in general exactly similar to that now under
+consideration, since the bills which they had rejected had commonly, if
+not in every case, been for the imposition and not for the repeal of a
+tax; and in most cases some question of national policy had been
+involved which had influenced their vote. But the view which Lord
+Palmerston pressed on the House was that the present was "a case in
+which party feelings ought to be cast aside. It was one in which higher
+and larger interests than those of party were concerned, and in which
+the course that the House now took would be a precedent to guide future
+Parliaments." He pointed out, moreover, that the smallness of the
+majority in the House of Commons had been to the Lords "some
+encouragement to take this particular step," and that "he was himself
+led to think that they had taken it, not from any intention to step out
+of their province, and to depart from the line of constitutional right
+which the history of the country has assigned them, but from motives of
+policy dependent on the circumstances of the moment; and therefore he
+thought it would be wise if the Commons forbore to enter into a conflict
+with the Lords on a ground which might really not exist, but satisfied
+themselves with a declaration of what were their own constitutional
+powers and privileges. It was of the utmost importance in a constitution
+like ours, where there are different branches, independent of each
+other, each with powers of its own, and where cordial and harmonious
+action is necessary, that care should be taken to avoid the commencement
+of an unnecessary quarrel, and the party that acted otherwise would
+incur a grave responsibility."
+
+Mr. Gladstone, however, though he ended by expressing his concurrence in
+the resolution proposed by his chief, used very different language
+respecting the vote of the House of Lords, characterizing it as "a
+gigantic innovation, the most gigantic and the most dangerous that had
+been attempted in our time," since "the origination of a bill for the
+imposition of a tax, or the amendment of a money-bill, was a slight
+thing compared with the claim to prevent the repeal of a tax;" and,
+dealing with assertions which he had heard, that in this instance "the
+House of Commons had been very foolish and the House of Lords very
+wise," he asked whether that really described the constitution under
+which we live. The House of Commons could not be infallible in matters
+of finance more than in other matters. It might make errors, but he
+demanded to know whether those errors in finance were or were not liable
+to correction by the House of Lords. If they were, "what became of the
+privileges of the Commons?" On the other hand, Mr. Disraeli, as leader
+of the Opposition or Conservative party, supported the resolutions, and
+applauded the speech of the Prime-minister, as "a wise, calm, and ample
+declaration of a cabinet that had carefully and deliberately considered
+this important subject. It had acknowledged that the conduct of the
+Lords was justified by law and precedent, and sanctioned by policy," and
+he maintained that it showed that "the charge made by the Chancellor of
+the Exchequer was utterly untenable, and had no foundation." And Mr.
+Horsman, taking a large general view of the legitimate working of the
+parliamentary constitution, argued that, while it was an undoubted rule
+that "all taxes should originate with the Commons, as that elective and
+more immediately responsible assembly that is constantly referred back
+to the constituencies, the reviewing power of a permanent and
+independent chamber was no less essential;" and that, considering that
+"the Reform Bill of 1832 had given a preponderance of powers to the
+Commons, and that the tendency of any farther Reform Act must be in the
+same direction, so far from narrowing the field of action for the peers,
+the wiser alternative might be to adopt a generous construction of their
+powers, with a view to preserving the equilibrium that is held to be
+essential to the safety and well-working of the constitution. The House
+of Commons," he concluded, "is perpetually assuming fresh powers and
+establishing new precedents. Virtually all bills now originate with the
+Commons; but this is not the consequence of any aggressive spirit in
+them, but is the necessary and inevitable result of the historic working
+of the constitution; and so this act of the Lords was but the natural
+working of the constitution to meet a definite emergency." The
+resolutions were passed, the first and third without a division; the
+second, to which an amendment had been proposed, designed to limit the
+force of the precedents alleged as justifying the act of the Lords, by a
+majority of nearly four hundred.[315] In their form and language the
+resolutions cannot be said to have greatly affected the power claimed by
+the Lords, and exercised by them in this instance. The first two were
+simply declaratory of acknowledged principles or facts, and the third
+intimated no desire to guard against anything but an undue exertion by
+the Lords of the right which they were admitted to possess. But it can
+hardly be doubted that the intention even of Lord Palmerston, dictated
+by the strong feeling which he perceived to prevail in the House of
+Commons on the subject, was to deter the Lords from any future exercise
+of their powers of review and rejection of measures relating to
+taxation, when, perhaps, the Commons might be under less prudent
+guidance; nor that the effect of the resolutions will correspond with
+the design rather than with the language of the mover, and will prevent
+the Lords, unless under the pressure of some overpowering necessity,
+from again interfering to control the Commons in such matters. At the
+same time it seems superfluous to point out that one claim advanced by
+the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who was apparently carried beyond his
+usual discretion by his parental fondness for the rejected bill, is
+utterly unreconcileable with the maintenance of any constitution at all
+that can deserve the name. When there are three bodies so concerned in
+the legislation that the united consent of all is indispensable to give
+validity to any act, to claim for any one of them so paramount an
+authority that, even if it should adopt a manifestly mischievous course,
+neither of the others should have the right to control or check or
+correct the error, would be to make that body the irresponsible master
+of the whole government and nation; to invest it with that "overruling
+power" which Lord Palmerston with such force of reasoning had
+deprecated; and to substitute for that harmonious concert of all to
+which, in his view, the perfection of our liberties was owing, a
+submission to one, and that the one most liable to be acted upon by the
+violence or caprice of the populace. He was a wise man who said that he
+looked on the tyranny of one man as an evil, but on the tyranny of a
+thousand as a thousand times worse. And for this reason also the
+resolutions which were now adopted seem to have been conceived in a
+spirit of judicious moderation, since, while rendering it highly
+improbable that the Lords would again reject a measure relating to
+taxation, it avoided absolutely to extinguish their power to do so. Lord
+Palmerston, it may be thought, foresaw the possibility of an occasion
+arising when the notoriety that such a power still existed might serve
+as a check to prevent its exercise from being required. In the very case
+which had given rise to this discussion he regarded it as certain that
+the feeling of the majority of the nation approved of the action of the
+peers; and, as what had occurred once might occur again, it was
+certainly within the region of possibility that another such emergency
+might arise, when the Lords might interfere with salutary effect to save
+the country from the evil result of ill-considered legislation; finance
+being, above all others, the subject on which a rash or unscrupulous
+minister may find the greatest facility for exciting the people by
+plausible delusions. There is, moreover, another reason why it would not
+only be impolitic, but absolutely unfair, to deprive the Lords
+altogether of their power of rejection even in cases of taxation;
+namely, that the Commons, when imposing taxes, are taxing the Lords
+themselves, as well as the other classes of the community; while the
+Lords alone of the whole nation are absolutely unrepresented in the
+House of Commons. There is a frequent cry for a graduated income-tax;
+and surely if an unscrupulous demagogue in office were to contrive such
+a graduation as would subject a peer to three times the income-tax borne
+by a commoner, it would be a monstrous iniquity if the peers were to
+have no power of protecting themselves in their own House.
+
+In the last sentence of his speech the Chancellor of the Exchequer had
+"respectfully reserved to himself the freedom of acting in such a way as
+should appear to offer any hope of success in giving effect by a
+practical measure to the principle contained in the first resolution."
+And it was, probably, an exemplification of the power of which he thus
+bespoke the use that he the next year struck out a scheme for insuring
+the repeal of the paper-duties, including it in one bill with all his
+other financial propositions, instead of dividing them in the ordinary
+way in several distinct bills. It was a manoeuvre which too much
+resembled the system of "tacking," which had been so justly denounced as
+one of the most unseemly manoeuvres of faction in the previous
+century.[316] But, as some of the principal reasons which in the
+preceding year had led the Lords to condemn the repeal had ceased to
+exist, and the deficiency of the revenue had been converted into a
+surplus, they thought it wiser to prove their superiority of wisdom to
+the House of Commons by showing a more conciliatory spirit, and passed
+the bill; though the course adopted, which had the effect of depriving
+the Lords of that power of examination of the details of the financial
+scheme of the government which they had hitherto enjoyed without any
+question or dispute, was strongly protested against in both Houses, and
+by some members who were not generally unfriendly to the administration.
+
+A hundred years had now elapsed since George III. ascended the throne.
+It had been a period full of transactions of great importance,
+developing the constitution in such a manner and to such an extent as to
+make a change in its character but little inferior to those which had
+been produced by the contests of the preceding century. One principal
+result of the Revolution of 1688 has been described as having been the
+placing of the political power of the state chiefly in the hands of the
+aristocracy. The Reform Bill of 1832, which has been sometimes called a
+"second Revolution," transferred that power to the middle classes.[317]
+And what may be called the logical sequence of the later measures is the
+contrary of that which was designed to flow from the earlier ones. The
+changes which were effected in 1688 were intended to promote, and were
+believed to have insured, stability; to have established institutions of
+a permanent character, as far as human affairs can be invested with
+permanency. And down to the death of George II. the policy of succeeding
+ministers, of whom Walpole may be taken as the type, as he was
+unquestionably the most able, aimed chiefly at keeping things as they
+were. _Quieta non movere_. The Peerage Bill, proposed by a
+Prime-minister thirty years after the Revolution, was but an exaggerated
+instance of the perseverance with which that object was kept in view.
+But the Reform Bill of 1832, like the Emancipation Act which preceded
+it, on the contrary, contained in itself, in its very principle, the
+seeds and elements of farther change.
+
+The Emancipation Act, following and combined with the repeal of the Test
+Act, rendered it almost inevitable that religious toleration would in
+time be extended to all persuasions, even to those adverse to
+Christianity. And the Reform Bill, as has been already pointed out, by
+the principles on which it based its limitations of the franchise, laid
+the foundation for farther and repeated revision and modification.[318]
+The consequence is, that the aim of statesmen of the present day differs
+from that which was pursued by their predecessors. The statesman of the
+present day can no longer hope to avoid farther changes, and must,
+therefore, be content to direct his energies to the more difficult task
+of making them moderate and safe, consistent with the preservation of
+that balance of powers to which the country owes the liberty and
+happiness which it has hitherto enjoyed.
+
+It is in this point of view that the diffusion of education, beyond the
+blessing which it confers on the individual, is of especial importance
+to the state. Political theorists affirm that all men have an equal
+right to political power--to that amount, at least, of political power
+which is conferred by a vote at elections. Men of practical common-sense
+affirm that no one has a right to power of any kind, unless he can be
+trusted to forbear employing it to the injury of his fellow-creatures or
+of himself. And the only safeguard and security for the proper exercise
+of political power is sound and enlightened education. It is unnecessary
+to dwell on this point, because our statesmen of both parties (to their
+honor) give constant proof of their deep conviction of its importance.
+
+But, in closing our remarks, it may be allowable to point out the
+political lesson which, above all others, the teachers of the masses
+should seek to inculcate on their pupils. The art of government, and
+each measure of government, is, above all other things, the two-sided
+shield. There are so many plausible arguments which may be advanced on
+each side of almost every question of policy, that no candid man will
+severely condemn him who in such disputable matters forms an opinion
+different from his own. Age and experience are worse than valueless if
+they do not teach a man to think better of his kind; and the history of
+the period which we have been considering teaches no lesson more
+forcibly than this, that the great majority of educated men, and
+especially of our leading statesmen, are actuated by honest and
+patriotic motives. And we would presume to urge that more important than
+a correct estimate of any one transaction of the past, or even of any
+one measure to influence the future, is the habit of putting a candid,
+and therefore a favorable, construction on the characters and intentions
+of those to whom from time to time the conduct of the affairs of the
+nation is intrusted.
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 276: "Life of Palmerston," vol. i., c. vii.]
+
+[Footnote 277: "Life of the Prince Consort," ii, 303.]
+
+[Footnote 278: _Ibid_., p. 412.]
+
+[Footnote 279: Amos, "Fifty Years of the English Constitution," p. 289.]
+
+[Footnote 280: "Past Gleanings," i., 242.]
+
+[Footnote 281: "Life of the Prince Consort," iv., 458.]
+
+[Footnote 282: 219 to 210.]
+
+[Footnote 283: "Life of the Prince Consort," v., 100.]
+
+[Footnote 284: _Ibid_., p. 148.]
+
+[Footnote 285: "Life of Pitt," by Earl Stanhope, iii., 210.]
+
+[Footnote 286: "Life of the Prince Consort," iv., 329.]
+
+[Footnote 287: _Ibid._, p. 366.]
+
+[Footnote 288: "Constitutional History," iii., 319, 3d edition.]
+
+[Footnote 289: It should be added that, on a subsequent occasion, Mr.
+Roundell Palmer, member for Plymouth (now Lord Chancellor Selborne, and
+even then in the enjoyment of the highest professional reputation),
+declared his opinion to be in favor of the legality and constitutional
+propriety of the proceeding.]
+
+[Footnote 290: To illustrate this position, Lord Lyndhurst said: "The
+sovereign may by his prerogative, if he thinks proper, create a hundred
+peers with descendible qualities in the course of a day. That would be
+consistent with the prerogative, and would be perfectly legal; but
+everybody must feel, and everybody must know, that such an exercise of
+the undoubted prerogative of the crown would be a flagrant violation of
+the principles of the constitution. In the same manner the sovereign
+might place the Great Seal in the hands of a layman wholly unacquainted
+with the laws of the country. That also would be a flagrant violation of
+the constitution of this country."--Hansard's _Parliamentary Debates_,
+cxl., February 7, 1856. In the same debate Lord Derby defined
+"prerogative" as "the power of doing that which is beside the law."
+Hallam, in discussing the prosecution of Sir Edward Hales, fully
+recognizes the principle contended for by Lord Lyndhurst, saying that
+"it is by no means evident that the decision of the judges" in that case
+"was against law," but proceeding to show that "the unadvised assertion
+in a court of law" of such an exercise of the prerogative "may be said
+to have sealed the condemnation of the house of Stuart."--
+_Constitutional History_, vol. iii., c. xiv., p. 86.]
+
+[Footnote 291: In the reign of Richard II. the Earl of Oxford had been
+made Marquis of Dublin for life, but he already had a seat in the House
+as Earl. Henry V. had originally made the peerages of his brothers, the
+Dukes of Bedford and Gloucester, life peerages; but these were afterward
+surrendered and regranted "in the usual descendible form," so that they
+rather made against the present case than for it. Henry VIII. had
+created the Prince of Thomond Earl of Thomond for his life, but he had
+at the same time granted him the barony of Inchiquin "for himself and
+his heirs forever." It was also alleged that these life peerages had not
+been conferred by the King alone, but by the King with the authority and
+consent of Parliament, "these significant words being found in the
+patents."]
+
+[Footnote 292: The division was 153 to 133. Some years afterward,
+however, a clause in the act, which created a new appellate
+jurisdiction, empowered the sovereign to create peerages of this limited
+character, one of the clauses providing that "every Lord of Appeal in
+Ordinary should be entitled during his life to rank as a Baron by such
+style as her Majesty may be pleased to appoint, and shall during the
+time that he continues in office as a Lord of Appeal in Ordinary, and no
+longer be entitled to a writ of summons to attend, sit, and vote in the
+House of Lords. His dignity as a Lord of Parliament shall not descend to
+his heirs." As this act was passed long after the period at which the
+present volume closes, it does not belong to the writer to examine how
+far this act, in providing that every Lord of Appeal shall for the time
+rank as a Baron (the Lords of Appeal being, of course, appointed by the
+crown), is entitled to be spoken of as introducing a great
+constitutional innovation, big with future consequences, as it has been
+described by some writers.]
+
+[Footnote 293: In one notorious instance, that of the Earl of Bristol
+(_confer_ Hallam, i., 518), in the time of Charles I., the House of
+Lords had interfered and compelled the issue of the writ; their action
+forming a precedent for their right of interference in such matters,
+which in the present case the Lord Chancellor denied.]
+
+[Footnote 294: The grant of a pension of £1000 a year, with a baronetcy,
+to General Havelock, and more recently to Sir F. Roberts, are, it is
+believed, the only exceptions to this rule.]
+
+[Footnote 295: Bishop Lonsdale, of Lichfield, in reference to Simon
+Magus, from whose offer of money to the Apostles the offence derives its
+name, denying that there was any similarity between his sin and the act
+of purchasing an advowson or presentation, remarked that it might just
+as fitly be called magic as simony.]
+
+[Footnote 296: It has been, and will probably continue to be, a matter
+of dispute whether the first conception and plan of the insurrection
+originated with the restless boldness of the Mohammedans or the deeper
+fanaticism of the Hindoos. It is notorious that the prophecy that a
+century had been assigned by the Almighty as the allotted period of our
+supremacy in India had for many years been circulated among both; and,
+though the conspiracy was at first generally attributed to the
+Mohammedans, the argument that the period from the battle of Plassy, in
+1757, to the outbreak in 1857, though an exact century according to the
+Hindoo calendar, is three years longer according to the Mohammedan
+computation, seems an almost irresistible proof that the Brahmins were
+its original authors. Sir John Kaye, in his "History of the Sepoy War,"
+at the end of book iii., c. iii., prints the following note, as
+furnished to him by Mr. E.A. Reade, a gentleman of long experience in
+India: "I do not think I ever met one man in a hundred that did not give
+the Mohammedans credit for this prediction. I fully believe that the
+notion of change after a century of tenure was general, and I can
+testify, with others, to have heard of the prediction at least a quarter
+of a century previously. But, call it a prediction or a superstition,
+the credit of it must, I think, be given to the Hindoos. If we take the
+Hejira calendar, 1757 A.D. corresponds with 1171 Hejira; 1857 A.D. with
+1274 Hejira; whereas, by the lunisolar year of the Sumbut, 1757 is 1814
+Sumhut, and 1857 is 1914 Sumbut."]
+
+[Footnote 297: It is worthy of remark that, as early as 1829, the Earl
+of Ellenborough, then President of the Board of Control, had come to the
+conclusion that the Company was no longer competent to govern so vast a
+dominion as that of British India had gradually become. In his Diary,
+recently published (ii., 131), he expresses his firm conviction that,
+"in substituting the King's government for that of the Company, we shall
+be conferring a great benefit on India, and effecting the measure which
+is most likely to retain for England the possession of India;" and from
+the same work (ii., 61) we learn that Mr. Mountstuart Elphinstone, one
+of the ablest servants of whom the Company could boast, and who had
+recently been Governor of Bombay, even while confessing himself
+prejudiced in favor "of the existing system, under which he had been
+educated and lived," admitted that "the administration of the government
+in the King's name would be agreeable to the civil and military
+services, and to people in England. He doubted whether, as regarded the
+princes of India, it would signify much, as they now pretty well
+understood us." See also _ibid_., p. 414.]
+
+[Footnote 298: 318 to 173.]
+
+[Footnote 299: The whole bill is given in the "Annual Register" for the
+year 1858, p. 226.]
+
+[Footnote 300: See her letter to Lord Derby on the subject, given in the
+"Life of the Prince Consort," iv., 308; _confer_ also a memorandum of
+the Prince Consort, _ibid._, p. 310.]
+
+[Footnote 301: _Ibid._, p. 106.]
+
+[Footnote 302: It should be remarked that the arrangement originally
+carried out awoke among the European troops of the Company so deep and
+general a spirit of discontent as at one time threatened to break out in
+open mutiny; the ground of their dissatisfaction being "the transfer of
+their services in virtue of an act of Parliament, but without their
+consent." Accordingly, "on the announcement of the proclamation
+transferring the possessions of the East India Company to the crown,
+some of the soldiers of the Company's European force set up a claim for
+a free discharge or a bounty on re-enlistment." Lord Clyde's
+recommendation "that a concession should be made" was overruled by the
+government of India, and "pronounced inadmissible by the law-officers of
+the crown" in England. The dissatisfaction was allayed for the time by
+the judicious measures, equally conciliatory and firm, adopted by Lord
+Clyde, in whom all ranks of both armies felt equal confidence; but
+eventually the government became convinced of the necessity of granting
+discharges to every man who wished for one, provided he had not
+misconducted himself.--Shadwell's _Life of Lord Clyde_, ii., 407-416.]
+
+[Footnote 303: See _ante_, p. 385.]
+
+[Footnote 304: Stanhope's "Life of Pitt," i., 173.]
+
+[Footnote 305: Sir Theodore Martin quotes a passage from a letter of the
+_Times_ correspondent, giving a report of the effect of the proclamation
+on the natives: "Genuineness of Asiatic feeling is always a problem, but
+I have little doubt it is in this instance literally sincere. The people
+understand an Empress, and did not understand the Company. Moreover,
+they (I am speaking of the masses) have a very decided notion that the
+Queen has hanged the Company for offences 'which must have been very
+great,' and that fact gives hope of future justice."--_Life of the
+Prince Consort_, iv., 337.]
+
+[Footnote 306: The "Annual Register" says that "neither the Emperor nor
+the Empress was touched;" but Sir Theodore Martin ("Life of the Prince
+Consort," iv., 155) says that "the Emperor's nose was grazed, and that
+the Empress received a blow on the left eye which affected it for some
+time."]
+
+[Footnote 307: "Life of the Prince Consort," iv., 156.]
+
+[Footnote 308: Speech of Lord Palmerston, February 19.]
+
+[Footnote 309: It is remarkable that it was not a very full House, the
+numbers of the division being only 234 to 215. Many members absented
+themselves, being equally unwilling to condemn the bill or to approve
+the silence of the ministry.]
+
+[Footnote 310: 268 to 39.]
+
+[Footnote 311: "Life of the Prince Consort," v., 131.]
+
+[Footnote 312: "Life of the Prince Consort," i., 99.]
+
+[Footnote 313: Chapter II., p. 54.]
+
+[Footnote 314: It is known, from two letters from Lord Palmerston to the
+Queen, published in the "Life of the Prince Consort," v., 100--in one,
+written before the debate in the House of Lords, he expresses a hope
+that the smallness of the majority in the House of Commons will
+encourage the Lords to throw it out, and he "is bound in duty to say
+that, if they do so, they will perform a good public service;" and in
+another, the day after the division in the Lords, he writes again "that
+they have done a right and useful thing," adding that the feeling of the
+public was so strong against the measure, that those in the gallery of
+the House are said to have joined in the cheers which broke out when the
+numbers were announced.]
+
+[Footnote 315: 433 to 36.]
+
+[Footnote 316: See the proceedings of 1700 (Macaulay, "History of
+England," v., 278; and of 1704, Lord Stanhope's "Reign of Queen Anne,"
+p. 168). The Whig and the Tory writer equally condemn the "Tackers."]
+
+[Footnote 317: In the debate on life peerages ("Parliamentary History,"
+cxl., 356), Lord Grey spoke of "that great transfer of political power
+from one class to another which was accomplished by the Reform Bill" And
+Lord Campbell, speaking of Lord Grey himself in connection with that
+measure, says: "His Reform Bill ought to place him in a temple of
+British worthies by the side of Lord Somers, for it wisely remodelled
+the constitution, and it is hardly less important than the Bill of
+Rights."--_Life of Lord Campbell_, ii., 201.]
+
+[Footnote 318: A recent writer, professedly belonging to the Radical
+party, claims for it the credit of "being the legitimate issue of the
+Reform Bill of 1832." ("The State of Parties," by J.E. Kebbel,
+_Nineteenth Century_, March, 1881, p. 497.)]
+
+
+
+
+INDEX.
+
+
+ABBOTT, Mr., proposes a census.
+Addington, Mr., becomes Prime-minister,  See Sidmouth.
+Additional Force Bill.
+Albert, Prince, marries Queen Victoria.
+Alien' Act, the.
+Althorp, Lord, introduces a bill for the reform of the Poor-laws;
+  his speech on the condition of Ireland;
+  invites the House of Commons to rescind a vote.
+Amelia, Princess, death of.
+Archdall, Mr., on Catholic Emancipation, note.
+Association, Catholic, suppression of.
+
+BAKER, Mr., moves a resolution on the dismissal of the Coalition
+  Ministry.
+Barrington, Lord, moves the expulsion of Wilkes.
+Battle, wager of, abolished.
+Bernard, trial of, as accomplice of Orsini.
+Bishoprics, provision for the increase of;
+  exclusion of the occupants of the junior bishoprics from the House of
+  Peers;
+  resignation of, by aged bishops.
+Blucher, Field-marshal, proposes to put Napoleon to death.
+Boston, United States, tea ships at, boarded by rioters, and the cargo
+  thrown into the sea.
+Bristol, Lord, denounces the appointment of the Chief-justice to a seat
+  in the cabinet.
+Brougham, Mr., afterward Lord Chancellor, the chief adviser of the
+  Queen;
+  defends the ministry for stopping Lord Powis's bill.
+Brownlow, Mr., opposes Pitt's commercial reforms.
+Buonaparte, Napoleon, detention of.
+Burdett, Sir F., carries a motion for repeal of Roman Catholic
+  disabilities.
+Burke, Mr. B., opposes the expulsion of Wilkes;
+  supports Mr. Grenville's act;
+  complains of the insolence of the House of Peers;
+  supports the repeal of the bill for taxing the American Colonies;
+  on annual Parliaments;
+  brings in a bill for economical reform;
+  his "short account of a late administration";
+  asserts the right of the House of Peers to examine the public
+  accounts;
+  his violent language on the Regency Bill;
+  member of Lord Rockingham's second ministry;
+  his view of the attachment of the Colonies to England.
+Bute, Earl of, Prime-minister in 1762;
+  resigns office.
+
+CABINET, character of.
+Camden, Earl of, approves the resolution of the House of Commons;
+  opposes the Royal Marriage Act;
+  supports Lord Chatham's views on the American question;
+  moves the Regency bill of 1788.
+Campbell, Lord, his "Lives of the Chancellors" referred to;
+  his denunciation of the Declaratory Act;
+  and of the Regency bill;
+  on the Chief-justice in the cabinet.
+Canada, disquietude in;
+  union of the two provinces.
+Canning, Lord, grants the right of adoption to the Hindoo feudatories.
+Canning, Mr. G., attacks the appointment of the Chief-justice to a seat
+  in the cabinet; becomes Prime-minister;
+  dies;
+  his opinion on the question in which House of Parliament the
+  Prime-minister should be.
+Caroline, Princess of Brunswick, marries the Prince of Wales;
+  investigations into her conduct;
+  she dies.
+Cave, Mr., punished for publishing reports of debates.
+Census established.
+Charlotte, Princess, birth of.
+Chartists, rise of;
+  outrages of, at Birmingham and Newport.
+Chatham, Earl of, Secretary of State in 1760;
+  Lord Privy Seal in 1767; supports Lord Rockingham's resolution on the
+  expulsion of Wilkes;
+  denies the power of the Parliament to tax America.
+Church reform, sketched out by Sir Robert Peel;
+  earned by Lord Melbourne's ministry.
+Clarence, Duke of, opposes the abolition of the slave trade;
+  his leaning toward the Whigs.
+Clarendon, Earl of, omits to reply to the despatch of the French
+  minister.
+Clergy, Roman Catholic, question of endowing the.
+Colborne, Sir John crushes the insurrection in Canada.
+Colonies, general grant of constitutions to, in New Zealand, the Cape,
+  and Australia.
+Commons, House of privileges of, with respect to money bills.
+Conventicle Act, repeal of.
+Conway, General, Secretary of State, introduces a bill of indemnity.
+Cornwallis, Lord, surrenders in America.
+Corporations, reform of.
+Crosby, Brass, Mr, Lord Mayor, commits a messenger of the House of
+  Commons, and is himself committed to the Tower.
+Cumberland, Duke of, marries Mrs Horton.
+Cust, Sir J, Speaker of the House of Commons.
+
+DASHWOOD, Sir F.,  his revels at Medmenham Abbey.
+Declaratory Act.
+De Grey, Mr, Attorney-general, supports the resolutions against Wilkes.
+Denbigh, Lord, defends the employment of Hanoverian troops at Gibraltar.
+Denman, Lord Chief justice, his charge to the jury in the case of
+  Stockdale v. Hansard.
+Disraeli, Mr B, his act for the trial of election petitions;
+  he denounces Sir Robert Peel for not resigning when defeated on the
+  sugar-duties;
+  condemns Lord Clarendon's omission to reply to the French despatch;
+  supports the House of Lords on the paper duties.
+Dowdeswell, Mr, opposes the Royal Marriage Act.
+Dundas, Mr, moves an amendment to Mr Dunning's resolution.
+Dunning, Mr, afterward Lord Ashburton, supports Mr Glenvilles act;
+  criticizes a resolution on the influence of the crown.
+Dunham, Lord, Governor of Canada.
+
+EDUCATION, influence of the penal laws on in Ireland.
+Eldon, Lord, on the coronation oath in connection with the Catholic
+  question;
+  on the detention of Napoleon;
+  on life peerages.
+Elgin, Lord, Governor general of Canada.
+Ellenborough, Lord, supports the Additional Force Bill;
+  becomes a member of the Cabinet;
+  is recalled from the government of India by the Company.
+Emancipation of Roman Catholics designed by Pitt;
+  concurred by the Duke of Wellington.
+Erskine, Lord, as Chancellor, presides over the impeachment of Lord
+  Melville;
+  resists Lord Sidmouth's Six Acts.
+
+FITZGERALD, LORD E., opposes the English government.
+Fitzgerald, Mr Vesey, is defeated in Clare.
+Fitzgibbon, Mr (afterward Lord Clare), opposes the convention of
+  delegates in Dublin;
+  Attorney-general in Ireland, prosecutes the sheriff of Dublin;
+  supports the Regency bill.
+Fitzwilliam, Earl, is dismissed from the Lord-lieutenancy of Yorkshire.
+Five Mile Act repealed.
+Fox, Mr C., opposes Mr Grenville's act;
+  on the privileges claimed by the House of Commons respecting
+  money-bills;
+  _note_, on Parliamentary reform and annual Parliaments;
+  urges the appointment as Prime-Minister of the Duke of Portland;
+  resigns office;
+  becomes Secretary of State;
+  his India Bill;
+  violence of his attacks on Pitt at the beginning of his ministry;
+  his opinions on Colonial policy;
+  denies the Prince's marriage;
+  opposes the Regency bill;
+  opposes the Alien Act and other bills;
+  opposes Pitt's commercial reforms;
+  becomes Secretary of State;
+  supports the abolition of the slave trade;
+  dies.
+France, new revolution in 1848.
+Franklin, Dr, is examined by the House of Commons on Mr Glenville's
+  measures of taxation.
+
+GEORGE III., state of affairs at the accession of;
+  illness of in 1764;
+  firmness in the Gordon riots;
+  becomes deranged;
+  is attacked on the street;
+  resists the relaxation of Catholic restrictions;
+  becomes permanently deranged;
+  dies;
+  character of his reign.
+George IV. succeeds to the throne.
+Gladstone, Mr W.E., opposes the fortification of the dockyards;
+  proposes to repeal the paper-duties;
+  carries the repeal of the paper-duties;
+  desires to weaken the power of the House of Lords.
+Gloucester, Duke of, marries Lady Waldegrave.
+Gordon, Lord George, the Gordon riots.
+Goulburn, Mr. H, is Chancellor of the Exchequer.
+Grafton, Duke of, Prime-minister in 1767;
+  disapproves of American taxation.
+Graham, Sir J., as Home-secretary, orders the opening of letters.
+Grampound disfranchised.
+Granville, Earl, defends life peerages.
+Grattan, Mr. H., moves the repeal of Poynings' Act;
+  opposes Pitt's commercial reforms;
+  opposes Pitt's Regency bill.
+Grenville, Mr. G., becomes Prime minister;
+  opposes the expulsion of Wilkes;
+  brings in a bill for the investigation of election petitions;
+  imposes taxes on the North American Colonies.
+Grenville, Lord, introduces the Alien Bill;
+  opposes the Additional Force Bill;
+  brings in a bill for the abolition of the slave trade;
+  refuses a seat in the cabinet in 1812.
+Grey, Mr. (afterward Earl), opposes the Regency bill;
+  opposes the Alien Act;
+  opposes the union with Ireland;
+  proposes to diminish the number of members of the House of Commons;
+  opposes the abolition of slavery;
+  refuses a seat in the cabinet in 1812;
+  becomes Prime minister;
+  his ministry brings in Reform Bill;
+  defends a proposed creation of peers;
+  mentions the sovereign's opinion unconstitutionally;
+  letters from office.
+Grey, Earl (son of the preceding), his doctrine on the true principles
+  of colonial government;
+  on life peerages.
+Gower, Lord F.L., carries a resolution for the endowment of the Roman
+  Catholic clergy.
+Girizot, M., Foreign Secretary in France.
+
+HALIFAX, Earl of, issues a general warrant against the publishers, etc.,
+  of _The North Briton_.
+Hanoverian troops, employment of, at Gibraltar.
+Hansard, Mr., publishes the Parliamentary debates.
+Hardy, General, taken prisoner by Sir J. Warren.
+Hill, Mr. Roland, proposes a reform of the Post-office.
+Hillsborough, Lord, writes a circular letter to the North American
+  Colonies.
+Hoche, General, sails for Ireland.
+Holdernesse, Earl of, Secretary of State in 1760.
+Holland, Lord, opposes the Regency Bill.
+Holt, Chief justice, his decision on the question of slavery.
+Holsmann, Mr., supports the House of Lords on the paper duties.
+Humbert, General, taken prisoner in Mayo.
+
+INDIA, Fox's India Bill;
+  Pitt's India Bill;
+  Mutiny in;
+  transfer of the authority of the Company to the crown;
+  establishment of the Order of the Star of India;
+  is visited by the Prince of Wales.
+Ireland, affairs of;
+  connection with France;
+  rebellion in.
+
+JAMAICA, planters in, compensated for the diminution of the value
+  of their property by the abolition of slavery;
+  disturbances in;
+  its constitution is suspended.
+Judges, new tenure of their office.
+
+KING, the, cannot be a witness in any legal proceeding.
+
+LABOUCHERE, Mr. H., reproaches Sir Robert Peel for not resigning.
+Leopold, King of Belgium, points of the insufficiency of the description
+  of Prince Albert.
+Lewis, Sir. G.C., speech on the history and power of the East India
+  Company.
+Liverpool, Lord, earnest for the universal abolition of the slave trade;
+  becomes Prime minister;
+  makes the Catholic question an open question in the cabinet;
+  brings in, and subsequently withdraws, a "Bill of Pains and
+  Penalties";
+  against the Queen;
+  attacked by apoplexy and dies;
+  contemplates an increased grant to Maynooth.
+Lopes, Sir M., procures the return of Mr. Pool for Westbury.
+Louise, Princess, marriage of.
+Lowther, Sir John, obtains a grant of Inglewood Forest.
+Luttrell, Mr., is declared elected for Middlesex.
+Lyndhurst, Lord, carries an amendment on the Reform Bill;
+  introduces a Regency bill.
+
+MACINTOSH, Sir J., applies himself to mitigate the severity of the law.
+Mahon, Lord, brings in a bill to diminish the expenses of elections.
+Mansfield, Lord, condemns general warrants;
+  insists on the necessity of a bill of indemnity;
+  vindicates the supremacy of Parliament;
+  his house is burnt by the rioters in 1780.
+Martin, Mr., wounds Wilkes in a duel.
+Massachusetts, riots in.
+Maynooth, foundation of a college at;
+  is enlarged and more fully endowed.
+Melbourne, Lord, becomes Prime-minister;
+  resigns;
+  resumes office;
+  mismanages the arrangements for Prince Albert.
+Melville, Lord, is impeached.
+Metternich, Prince, is driven from Vienna.
+Miles, Mr., defeats the government on the sugar-duties.
+Moira, Lord, employed by the Regent to negotiate with the Whig leaders
+  in 1812.
+Money-bills, power of the House of Lords as to.
+Montesquieu, M. de, his opinion of the English constitution.
+Montmorin, M., Wilberforce writes to him on the subject of the
+  slave-trade.
+
+NAPOLEON, Louis, is elected President of the French Republic;
+  his _coup d'état_;
+  conspiracy against.
+Navigation laws, the, repeal of.
+Nelson, Lord, his victory at Copenhagen.
+Newcastle, Duke of, Prime minister in 1760.
+New Shoreham, disfranchisement of for bribery.
+Newspapers, tax on, reduced and afterward abolished.
+Nicholas, Emperor of Russia, writes to the Queen.
+Normanby, Lord, ambassador in Paris, complains of Lord Palmerston.
+North, Lord, supports the decision in favor of Mr. Luttrell;
+  opposes Mr. Grenville's act;
+  opposes Mr. Seymour's bill to limit the _Nullum Tempus_ Act;
+  opposes reform of Parliament;
+  rejects the demands of Ireland.
+Northington, Lord C., defends the embargo on corn;
+  indicates the supremacy of Parliament.
+_Nullum Tempus_ Act, the, extended.
+
+O'CONNELL, Mr. D., is returned for Clare;
+  is chief of the Catholic Association.
+Octennial act for Ireland.
+"Olive Branch, the,"
+Onslow, Colonel, complains of the publication of the debates.
+Orsini, conspiracy of.
+
+PALMERSTON, Lord, is dismissed from the Foreign-office;
+  introduces the bill for the transfer of the government of India to
+  the crown;
+  writes to the Queen on the abolition of the authority of the East
+  India Company;
+  is defeated on the Conspiracy Bill and resigns;
+  returns to office;
+  disapproves of the reduction of the paper-duty;
+  desires to uphold the House of Lords.
+Papineau. M., organizes an insurrection in Canada.
+Parke, Sir J., is created a peer for life.
+Parliament, first meeting of the United.
+Peel, Sir Robert, responsible for the change of ministry in 1834;
+  becomes Home-secretary;
+  resigns his seat for Oxford and fails to be re-elected;
+  impropriety of his resignation;
+  speech on introducing the bill for Catholic Emancipation;
+  becomes Prime-minister;
+  declines to form an administration in 1839;
+  supports Lord J. Russell's resolutions in the case of Stockdale _v._
+  Hansard;
+  his opinion on the question in which House the Prime-minister should
+  be;
+  becomes Prime-minister in 1841;
+  revises the commercial tariff;
+  suspends the Corn-law;
+  causes its abolition.
+Peel, Colonel, organizes the Volunteers.
+Peerages, life, legality of.
+Peers, the House of, strikes out of a corn bill some clauses giving
+  bounties;
+  their right to inquire into the public expenditure asserted by Lord
+  Camden and others;
+  their privileges as to money-bills;
+  provisions as to Irish peers in the Act of Union;
+  proposed creation of peers to carry the Reform Bill considered;
+  the House of Peers rejects the abolition of the paper-duty.
+Penal laws, in Ireland;
+  repeal of;
+  in the United Kingdom.
+Penu, Mr., sent from America to England with "the Olive Branch."
+Perceval, Mr., becomes Prime-minister;
+  proposes a Regency bill;
+  is murdered.
+Percy, Lord, proposes the entire abolition of slavery.
+Persigny, M. de, French Secretary of State, his despatch on Orsini's
+  conspiracy.
+Pigott, Sir A., brings in a bill on the slave-trade.
+Pitt, see Earl of Chatham.
+Pitt, Mr. T., denounces the influence of the crown.
+Pitt, Mr. W., on the privileges of House of Commons respecting
+  money-bills;
+  _note_;
+  becomes Prime-minister;
+  his long struggle against, and eventual defeat of the Opposition;
+  comparisons between his father and him;
+  his India bill;
+  his Quebec bill;
+  his Regency bill;
+  founds Maynouth;
+  carries the Irish Union;
+  resigns on the Catholic question.
+Plunkett, Mr., opposes the Irish Union.
+Ponsonby, Mr. G., condemns the policy of open questions.
+Poor-law, the, reform of.
+Portland, Duke of, becomes Prime-minister;
+  again.
+Post-office, reform of;
+  letters opened by the order of the Secretary of State.
+Powis, Earl, brings in a bill to preserve the Welsh sees.
+Pownall, Governor, introduces a corn bill.
+Poynings' Act;
+  repeal of.
+
+RADETSKY, MARSHAL, his campaign in North Italy.
+Reform of Parliament, Alderman Sawbridge proposes a measure of;
+  Mr. Pitt brings in a bill for;
+  agitation for, in 1818;
+  introduced and carried by Lord Grey's administration;
+  the people indifferent to farther reform.
+Regency bill of 1764;
+  of 1840;
+  former Regency bills had been passed in the reigns of Edward III.,
+  Richard II., Henry VI., and George II.;
+  in Ireland;
+  bill of 1810.
+Registration, extension of, 342.
+Rice, Mr. Spring, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, introduces
+  Post-office reform;
+  as Lord Monteagle proposes the rejection of the paper-duty bill.
+Roberts, Mr., returning officer for New Shoreham.
+Rochfort, Lord, introduces the Royal Marriage Act.
+Rockingham, Marquis of, Prime-minister in 1768;
+  moves a resolution condemning the proceedings against Wilkes;
+  Prime-minister a second time;
+  repeals the American taxes;
+  disapproves of the employment of Hanoverian troops at Gibraltar;
+  wisdom of his policy toward America;
+  his speech on the influence of the crown;
+  becomes Prime-minister a second time.
+Rolle, Mr., moots the question of the Prince's marriage.
+Romilly, Sir S., opposes the Regency bill;
+  applies himself to reforms of the law.
+Rose, Mr., opposes Sir A. Pigott's bill on the slave-trade.
+Russell, Lord J., his opinion on Fox's conduct in Opposition;
+  on the Regency bill;
+  carries the repeal of the Test Act;
+  introduces the Reform Bill;
+  introduces a bill for municipal reform;
+  his resolutions in the case of Stockdale v. Hansard;
+  becomes Prime--minister.
+Russia, war with.
+
+SANDWICH, EARL OF, denounces Wilkes's "Essay on Woman."
+Sarsfield, General, takes refuge in France.
+Savile, Sir G., his bill for the limitation of the _Nullum Tempus_ Act.
+Seaforth, Lord, reports of the treatment of slaves in Barbadoes.
+Seditious Meetings Act.
+Shelburne, Lord, denounces the employment of Hanoverian troops at
+  Gibraltar;
+  becomes Prime-minister.
+Sheridan, Mr. R., his language on the Prince's marriage;
+  opposes the Alien Act;
+  conceals Lord Yarmouth's intention to resign.
+Sidmouth, Lord, as Home-secretary, introduces six bills for the
+  suppression of sedition;
+  resigns office.
+Slavery, abolition of.
+Slave-trade, abolition of.
+Smith, Mr. W., M.P. for Norwich, on repeal of the Five Mile Act.
+Somersett, is released by Lord Mansfield.
+Stamp Act, imposed on the American Colonies by Mr. Grenville;
+  repealed by Lord Rockingham.
+Stanley, Mr., afterward Lord, and afterward Lord Derby, denounces the
+  Catholic Association;
+  brings in a bill for the abolition of slavery;
+  fails in the attempt to form a ministry in 1845;
+  becomes Prime-minister in 1852;
+  proposes a committee on life peerages;
+  becomes Prime-minister;
+  resigns.
+St. Vincent, Lord, opposes the abolition of the slave-trade.
+Stockdale, Mr., brings an action against Messrs. Hansard.
+Sugar-duties, Sir Robert Peel's ministry is defeated on a reduction of.
+Sussex, Duke of, protests against some clauses of the Regency Act.
+Sydenham, Lord, Governor-general of Canada.
+
+TANDY, NAPPER, proposes a congress.
+Temple, Earl, his interview with George III.
+Test and Corporation Acts are repealed.
+Thurlow, Mr., afterward Lord Chancellor, on the case of Wilkes;
+  defends the employment of Hanoverian troops at Gibraltar;
+  denounces Fox's India Bill;
+  approves of the King's employment of Lord Temple.
+Tone, Wolfe, commits suicide.
+Townsend, Lord, Lord-lieutenant of Ireland.
+Townsend, Mr. C., re-imposes taxes on North America.
+Traitorous Correspondence Bill.
+Troy, Dr., petitions for a Roman Catholic college in Ireland.
+
+UNION, the Irish.
+Union with Scotland, obstacles to, and advantages resulting from.
+
+VICTORIA, Queen, succeeds to the throne;
+  marries;
+  her careful exercise of her duties;
+  draws up a memorandum for the guidance of the ministers;
+  writes to foreign sovereigns.
+Victoria, the province of, grant of a constitution to.
+Villiers, Mr. C., advocates the repeal of the Corn-laws.
+Volunteers, rise of the Irish, 158; rise of the English.
+
+WALES, Prince or, son of George III., his conduct and establishment;
+  marries Mrs. Fitzherbert;
+  is attacked in the streets;
+  See George IV.
+Wales, Prince of, son of the Queen, visits India.
+Walpole, Sir R., the case of;
+  on election petitions;
+  refuses to repeal the Test Act;
+  his general policy.
+Walpole, Mr. Spencer, supports the Conspiracy Bill.
+Warburton, Bishop of Gloucester, denounces Wilkes.
+Ward, Mr., his motion on the appropriation of Church funds.
+Wedderburn, Mr., on the case of Wilkes;
+  supports Mr. Grenville's act;
+  his opinion on the Riot Act;
+  the chief legal adviser of the Prince of Wales;
+  suggests the Traitorous Correspondence Bill;
+  excites the King to resist the removal of Catholic disabilities.
+Wellesley, Marquis, proposed to be appointed Prime-minister.
+Wellington, Lord, afterward Duke of, his victories in the Peninsula and
+  in France;
+  becomes Commander-in-chief;
+  advises the King to decline dining with the Lord Mayor;
+  fails in the endeavor to form an administration;
+  becomes temporary Prime-minister, holding several offices;
+  condemns the recall of Lord Ellenborough.
+Westmoreland, Lord, opposes the abolition of the slave-trade.
+Wetherall, Sir Charles, is attacked at Bristol.
+Weymouth, Lord, Secretary of State, writes a letter to the Surrey
+  magistrates.
+Whately, Archbishop, his opinion on the Lord-lieutenancy of Ireland;
+  _note_.
+Whitbread, Mr., promotes the impeachment of Lord Melville.
+Wilberforce, Mr. W., proposes the admission of Roman Catholics to the
+  militia;
+  devotes himself to the abolition of the slave-trade.
+Wilkes, Mr., sets up _The North Briton_;
+  criticises the King's speech;
+  is apprehended;
+  is expelled the House of Commons for printing the "Essay on Woman;"
+  is elected for Middlesex, expelled, and re-elected;
+  as Lord Mayor behaves with spirit during the Gordon riots;
+  procures the expunction of the resolutions against him.
+William IV., his conduct on the Reform Bill;
+  dies.
+Windham, Mr., brings in a bill for reenforcing the army.
+Wolseley, Sir C., is elected M.P. by a Birmingham convention.
+
+YARMOUTH, Earl of, Lord Chamberlain.
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Constitutional History of England
+From 1760 to 1860, by Charles Duke Yonge
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HISTORY OF ENGLAND ***
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+England, by Charles Duke Yonge, M.A.</title>
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Constitutional History of England From
+1760 to 1860, by Charles Duke Yonge
+
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+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
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+Title: The Constitutional History of England From 1760 to 1860
+
+Author: Charles Duke Yonge
+
+Release Date: January 23, 2004 [EBook #10807]
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+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HISTORY OF ENGLAND ***
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+
+<h1>THE CONSTITUTIONAL HISTORY OF ENGLAND from 1760 to 1860</h1>
+<center><b>BY CHARLES DUKE YONGE, M.A.</b></center>
+<center>REGIUS PROFESSOR OF MODERN HISTORY, QUEEN'S COLLEGE,
+BELFAST AND AUTHOR OF "THE HISTORY OF THE BRITISH NAVY" "THE LIFE
+OF MARIE ANTOINETTE" ETC.</center>
+<center>NEW YORK</center>
+<hr />
+<a name="PRF" id="PRF"><!-- PRF --></a>
+<h2>PREFACE.</h2>
+<p>Mr. Hallam's "Constitutional History" closes, as is well known,
+with the death of George II. The Reformation, the great Rebellion,
+and the Revolution, all of which are embraced in the period of
+which it treats, are events of such surpassing importance, and such
+all-pervading and lasting influence, that no subsequent
+transactions can ever attract entirely equal attention. Yet the
+century which has elapsed since the accession of George III. has
+also witnessed occurrences not only full of exciting interest at
+the moment, but calculated to affect the policy of the kingdom and
+the condition of the people, for all future time, in a degree only
+second to the Revolution itself. Indeed, the change in some leading
+features and principles of the constitution wrought by the Reform
+Bill of 1832, exceeds any that were enacted by the Bill of Rights
+or the Act of Settlement. The only absolutely new principle
+introduced in 1688 was that establishment of Protestant ascendency
+which was contained in the clause which disabled any Roman Catholic
+from wearing the crown. In other respects, those great statutes
+were not so much the introduction of new principles, as a
+recognition of privileges of the people which had been long
+established, but which, in too many instances, had been disregarded
+and violated.</p>
+<p>But the Reform Bill conferred political power on classes which
+had never before been admitted to be entitled to it; and their
+enfranchisement could not fail to give a wholly new and democratic
+tinge to the government, which has been visible in its effect on
+the policy of all subsequent administrations.</p>
+<p>And, besides this great measure, the passing of which has often
+been called a new Revolution, and the other reforms, municipal and
+ecclesiastical, which were its immediate and almost inevitable
+fruits, the century which followed the accession of George III. was
+also marked by the Irish Union, the abolition of slavery, the
+establishment of the principle of universal religious toleration;
+the loss of one great collection of colonies, the plantation of and
+grant of constitutions to others of not inferior magnitude, which
+had not even come into existence at its commencement; the growth of
+our wondrous dominion in India, with its eventual transfer of all
+authority in that country to the crown; with a host of minor
+transactions and enactments, which must all be regarded as, more or
+less, so many changes in or developments of the constitution, as it
+was regarded and understood by the statesmen of the seventeenth
+century.</p>
+<p>It has seemed, therefore, to the compiler of this volume, that a
+narrative of these transactions in their historical sequence, so as
+to exhibit the connection which has frequently existed between
+them; to show, for instance, how the repeal of Poynings' Act, and
+the Regency Bill of 1788, necessitated the Irish Union; how
+Catholic Emancipation brought after it Parliamentary Reform, and
+how that led to municipal and ecclesiastical reforms, might not be
+without interest and use at the present time. And the modern
+fulness of our parliamentary reports (itself one not unimportant
+reform and novelty), since the accession of George III., has
+enabled him to give the inducements or the objections to the
+different enactments in the very words of the legislators who
+proposed them or resisted them, as often as it seemed desirable to
+do so.</p>
+<hr />
+<a name="TOC" id="TOC"><!-- TOC --></a>
+<h2>CONTENTS.</h2>
+<p><a href="#CH1">CHAPTER I.</a></p>
+<p>Mr. Hallam's View of the Development of the
+Constitution.&mdash;Symptoms of approaching Constitutional
+Changes.&mdash;State of the Kingdom at the Accession of George
+III.&mdash;Improvement of the Law affecting the Commissions of the
+Judges.&mdash;Restoration of Peace.&mdash;Lord Bute becomes
+Minister.&mdash;The Case of Wilkes.&mdash;Mr. Luttrell is Seated
+for Middlesex by the House of Commons.&mdash;Growth of
+Parliamentary Reporting.&mdash;Mr. Grenville's Act for trying
+Election Petitions.&mdash;Disfranchisement of Corrupt Voters at New
+Shoreham.</p>
+<p><a href="#CH2">CHAPTER II.</a></p>
+<p>The Regency Bill.&mdash;The Ministry of 1766 lay an Embargo on
+Corn.&mdash;An Act of Indemnity is Passed.&mdash;The <i>Nullum
+Tempus</i> Act concerning Crown Property; it is sought to Extend it
+to Church Property, but the Attempt fails.&mdash;The Royal Marriage
+Act.&mdash;The Lords amend a Bill imposing Export Duties, etc., on
+Corn.</p>
+<p><a href="#CH3">CHAPTER III.</a></p>
+<p>Mr. Grenville imposes a Duty on Stamps in the North American
+Colonies.&mdash;Examination of Dr. Franklin.&mdash;Lord
+Rockingham's Ministry Repeals the Duty.&mdash;Lord Mansfield
+affirms a Virtual Representation in the Colonies.&mdash;Mr. C.
+Townsend imposes Import Duties in America.&mdash;After some Years,
+the Civil War breaks out.&mdash;Hanoverian Troops are sent to
+Gibraltar.&mdash;The Employment of Hanoverian Regiments at
+Gibraltar and Minorca.&mdash;End of the War.&mdash;Colonial Policy
+of the Present Reign.&mdash;Complaints of the Undue Influence of
+the Crown.&mdash;Motions for Parliamentary Reform.&mdash;Mr.
+Burke's Bill for Economical Reform.&mdash;Mr. Dunning's Resolution
+on the Influence of the Crown.&mdash;Rights of the Lords on
+Money-bills.&mdash;The Gordon Riots.</p>
+<p><a href="#CH4">CHAPTER IV.</a></p>
+<p>Changes of Administration.&mdash;The Coalition
+Ministry.&mdash;The Establishment of the Prince of
+Wales.&mdash;Fox's India Bill.&mdash;The King Defeats it by the
+Agency of Lord Temple.&mdash;The Ministry is Dismissed, and
+Succeeded by Mr. Pitt's Administration.&mdash;Opposition to the New
+Ministry in the House of Commons.&mdash;Merits of the Contest
+between the Old and the New Ministry.&mdash;Power of
+Pitt.&mdash;Pitt's India Bill.&mdash;Bill for the Government of
+Canada.&mdash;The Marriage of the Prince of Wales to Mrs.
+Fitzherbert.&mdash;The King becomes Deranged.&mdash;Proposal of a
+Regency.&mdash;Opinions of Various Writers on the Course
+adopted.&mdash;Spread of Revolutionary Societies and
+Opinions.&mdash;Bills for the Repression of Sedition and
+Treason.&mdash;The Alien Act.&mdash;The Traitorous Correspondence
+Act.&mdash;Treason and Sedition Bills.&mdash;Failure of some
+Prosecutions under them.</p>
+<p><a href="#CH5">CHAPTER V.</a></p>
+<p>The Affairs of Ireland.&mdash;Condition of the Irish
+Parliament.&mdash;The Octennial Bill.&mdash;The Penal
+Laws.&mdash;Non-residence of the Lord-lieutenant.&mdash;Influence
+of the American War on Ireland.&mdash;Enrolment of the
+Volunteers.&mdash;Concession of all the Demands of
+Ireland.&mdash;Violence of the Volunteers.&mdash;Their
+Convention.&mdash;Violence of the Opposition in Parliament: Mr.
+Brownlow, Mr. Grattan, Mr. Flood.&mdash;Pitt's Propositions
+Fail.&mdash;Fitzgibbon's Conspiracy Bill.&mdash;Regency
+Question.&mdash;Recovery of the King.&mdash;Question of a
+Legislative Union.&mdash;Establishment of Maynooth
+College.&mdash;Lord Edward Fitzgerald.&mdash;Arguments for and
+against the Union.&mdash;It passes the Irish
+Parliament.&mdash;Details of the Measure.&mdash;General Character
+of the Union.&mdash;Circumstances which Prevented its
+Completeness.</p>
+<p><a href="#CH6">CHAPTER VI.</a></p>
+<p>A Census is Ordered.&mdash;Dissolution of Pitt's
+Administration.&mdash;Impeachment of Lord
+Melville.&mdash;Introduction of Lord Ellenborough into the
+Cabinet.&mdash;Abolition of the Slave-trade.&mdash;Mr. Windham's
+Compulsory Training Bill.&mdash;Illness of the King, and
+Regency.&mdash;Recurrence to the Precedent of 1788-'89.&mdash;Death
+of Mr. Perceval.&mdash;Lord Liverpool becomes
+Prime-minister.&mdash;Question of Appointments in the
+Household.&mdash;Appointment of a Prime-minister.</p>
+<p><a href="#CH7">CHAPTER VII.</a></p>
+<p>The Toleration Act.&mdash;Impropriety of making Catholic
+Emancipation (or any other Important Matter) an Open
+Question.&mdash;Joint Responsibility of all the
+Ministers.&mdash;Detention of Napoleon at St.
+Helena.&mdash;Question whether the Regent could Give Evidence in a
+Court of Law in a Civil Action.&mdash;Agitation for
+Reform.&mdash;Public Meetings.&mdash;The Manchester
+Meeting.&mdash;The Seditious Meetings Prevention Bill.&mdash;Lord
+Sidmouth's Six Acts.</p>
+<p><a href="#CH8">CHAPTER VIII.</a></p>
+<p>Survey of the Reign of George III.&mdash;The Cato Street
+Conspiracy.&mdash;The Queen's Return to England, and the
+Proceedings against her.&mdash;The King Visits Ireland and
+Scotland.&mdash;Reform of the Criminal Code.&mdash;Freedom of
+Trade.&mdash;Death of Lord Liverpool.&mdash;The Duke of Wellington
+becomes Prime-minister.&mdash;Repeal of the Test and Corporation
+Act.&mdash;O'Connell is Elected for Clare.&mdash;Peel Resigns his
+Seat for Oxford.&mdash;Catholic Emancipation.&mdash;Question of the
+Endowment of the Roman Catholic Clergy.&mdash;Constitutional
+Character of the Emancipation.&mdash;The Propriety of Mr. Peel's
+Resignation of his Seat for Oxford Questioned.</p>
+<p><a href="#CH9">CHAPTER IX.</a></p>
+<p>Demand for Parliamentary Reform.&mdash;Death of George IV., and
+Accession of William IV.&mdash;French Revolution of
+1830.&mdash;Growing Feeling in Favor of Reform.&mdash;Duke of
+Wellington's Declaration against Reform.&mdash;His Resignation:
+Lord Grey becomes Prime-minister.&mdash;Introduction of the Reform
+Bill.&mdash;Its Details.&mdash;Riots at Bristol and
+Nottingham.&mdash;Proposed Creation of Peers.&mdash;The King's
+Message to the Peers.&mdash;Character and Consequences of the
+Reform Bill.&mdash;Appointment of a Regency.&mdash;Re-arrangement
+of the Civil List.</p>
+<p><a href="#CH10">CHAPTER X.</a></p>
+<p>Abolition of Slavery.&mdash;Abridgment of the
+Apprenticeship.&mdash;The East India Company's Trade is Thrown
+Open.&mdash;Commencement of Ecclesiastical Reforms.&mdash;The New
+Poor-law.&mdash;State of Ireland.&mdash;Agitation against
+Tithes.&mdash;Coercion Bill.&mdash;Beginning of Church
+Reform.&mdash;Sir Robert Peel becomes Prime-minister.&mdash;Variety
+of Offices held Provisionally by the Duke of Wellington.&mdash;Sir
+Robert Peel Retires, and Lord Melbourne Resumes the
+Government.&mdash;Sir Robert Peel Proposes a Measure of Church
+Reform.&mdash;Municipal Reform.&mdash;Measures of Ecclesiastical
+Reform.</p>
+<p><a href="#CH11">CHAPTER XI.</a></p>
+<p>Death of William IV., and Accession of Queen
+Victoria.&mdash;Rise of the Chartists.&mdash;Resignation of Lord
+Melbourne in 1839, and his Resumption of Office.&mdash;Marriage of
+the Queen, and Consequent Arrangements.&mdash;The Precedence of the
+Prince, etc.&mdash;Post-office Reform.&mdash;War in
+Afghanistan.&mdash;Discontent in Jamaica.&mdash;Insurrection in
+Canada.&mdash;New Constitution for Canada and other
+Colonies.&mdash;Case of Stockdale and Hansard.</p>
+<p><a href="#CH12">CHAPTER XII.</a></p>
+<p>Sir Robert Peel becomes Prime-minister.&mdash;Commercial
+Reforms.&mdash;Free-trade.&mdash;Religious
+Toleration.&mdash;Maynooth.&mdash;The Queen's
+University.&mdash;Post-office Regulations.&mdash;The Opening of
+Letters.&mdash;Naturalization of Aliens.&mdash;Recall of Lord
+Ellenborough.&mdash;Reversal of the Vote on the Sugar
+Duties.&mdash;Refusal of the Crown to Sanction a Bill.&mdash;The
+Question of Increase in the Number of Spiritual Peers.&mdash;Repeal
+of the Corn-laws.&mdash;Revolution in France, and Agitation on the
+Continent.&mdash;Death of Sir Robert Peel.&mdash;Indifference of
+the Country to Reform.&mdash;Repeal of the Navigation
+Laws.&mdash;Resolutions in Favor of Free-trade.&mdash;The Great
+Exhibition of 1851.</p>
+<p><a href="#CH13">CHAPTER XIII.</a></p>
+<p>Dismissal of Lord Palmerston.&mdash;Theory of the Relation
+between the Sovereign and the Cabinet.&mdash;Correspondence of the
+Sovereign with French Princes.&mdash;Russian War.&mdash;Abolition
+of the Tax on Newspapers.&mdash;Life Peerages.&mdash;Resignation of
+two Bishops.&mdash;Indian Mutiny.&mdash;Abolition of the Sovereign
+Power of the Company.&mdash;Visit of the Prince of Wales to
+India.&mdash;Conspiracy Bill.&mdash;Rise of the
+Volunteers.&mdash;National Fortifications.&mdash;The Lords Reject
+the Measure for the Repeal of the Paper-duties.&mdash;Lord
+Palmerston's Resolutions.&mdash;Character of the Changes during the
+last Century.</p>
+<p><a href="#IDX">INDEX.</a></p>
+<hr />
+<a name="RULE4_1" id="RULE4_1"><!-- RULE4 1 --></a>
+<h2>CONSTITUTIONAL HISTORY OF ENGLAND.</h2>
+<a name="CH1" id="CH1"><!-- CH1 --></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER I.</h2>
+<p class="blockquote">Mr. Hallam's View of the Development of the
+Constitution.&mdash;Symptoms of approaching Constitutional
+Changes.&mdash;State of the Kingdom at the Accession of George
+III.&mdash;Improvement of the Law affecting the Commissions of the
+Judges.&mdash;Restoration of Peace.&mdash;Lord Bute becomes
+Minister.&mdash;The Case of Wilkes.&mdash;Mr. Luttrell is Seated
+for Middlesex by the House of Commons.&mdash;Growth of
+Parliamentary Reporting.&mdash;Mr. Grenville's Act for trying
+Election Petitions.&mdash;Disfranchisement of Corrupt Voters at New
+Shoreham.</p>
+<p>The learned and judicious writer to whom is due the first idea
+of a "Constitutional History of England," and of whose admirable
+work I here venture to offer a continuation, regards "the spirit of
+the government" as having been "almost wholly monarchical till the
+Revolution of 1688," and in the four subsequent reigns, with the
+last of which his volumes close, as "having turned chiefly to an
+aristocracy."[<a href="#note-1">1</a>] And it may be considered as
+having generally preserved that character through the long and
+eventful reign of George III. But, even while he was writing, a
+change was already preparing, of which more than one recent
+occurrence had given unmistakable warning. A borough had been
+disfranchised for inveterate corruption in the first Parliament of
+George IV.[<a href="#note-2">2</a>] Before its dissolution, the
+same House of Commons had sanctioned the principle of a state
+endowment of the Roman Catholic clergy in Ireland, and had given a
+third reading to a bill for the abolition of all civil restrictions
+affecting members of that religion. It was impossible to avoid
+foreseeing that the Parliamentary Reform inaugurated by the
+disfranchisement of Grampound would soon be carried farther, or
+that the emancipation, as it was termed, of all Christian sects was
+at least equally certain not to be long delayed. And it will be
+denied by no one that those measures, which had no very obscure or
+doubtful connection with each other, have gradually imparted to the
+constitution a far more democratic tinge than would have been
+willingly accepted by even the most liberal statesman of the
+preceding century, or than, in the days of the Tudors or of the
+Stuarts, would have been thought compatible with the maintenance of
+the monarchy.</p>
+<p>When George III. came to the throne, he found the nation engaged
+in a war which was occupying its arms not only on the Continent of
+Europe, but in India and America also, and was extending her glory
+and her substantial power in both hemispheres. <i>Inter arma silent
+leges</i>. And, while the contest lasted, neither legislators in
+Parliament nor the people outside had much attention to spare for
+matters of domestic policy. Yet the first year of the new reign was
+not suffered to pass without the introduction of one measure
+limiting the royal prerogative in a matter of paramount importance
+to the liberty of the people, the independence of the judges. The
+rule of making the commissions of the judges depend on their good
+conduct instead of on the pleasure of the crown had, indeed, been
+established at the Revolution; but it was still held that these
+commissions expired with the life of the sovereign who had granted
+them; and, at the accession of Anne, as also at that of George II.,
+a renewal of their commissions had been withheld from some members
+of the judicial bench. But now, even before the dissolution of the
+existing Parliament, the new King recommended to it such a change
+in the law as should "secure the judges in the enjoyment of their
+offices during their good behavior, notwithstanding any demise of
+the crown;" giving the proposal, which was understood to have been
+originally suggested by himself, additional weight by the very
+unusual step of making it the subject of a speech to the two Houses
+in the middle of the session. A bill to give effect to it was at
+once brought in, and, though the Houses sat only a fortnight
+longer, was carried before the dissolution.</p>
+<p>The close of the year 1762, however, saw the restoration of
+peace; and the circumstances connected with the treaty which
+re-established it gave birth to a degree of political and
+constitutional excitement such as had not agitated the kingdom for
+more than half a century. That treaty had not been concluded by the
+minister who had conducted the war. When George III. came to the
+throne he found the Duke of Newcastle presiding at the Treasury,
+but the seals of one Secretary of State in the hands of Mr. Pitt,
+who was universally regarded as the guiding genius of the ministry.
+The other Secretary of State was Lord Holdernesse. But, in the
+spring of 1761, as soon as the Parliament was dissolved,[<a href=
+"#note-3">3</a>] that statesman retired from office, and was
+succeeded by the Earl of Bute, a Scotch nobleman, who stood high in
+the favor of the King's mother, the Princess Dowager of Wales, but
+who had not till very recently been supposed to be actuated by
+political ambition, and who was still less suspected of any
+statesman-like ability to qualify him for the office to which he
+was thus promoted. It was presently seen, however, that he aspired
+to even higher dignity. He at once set himself to oppose Pitt's
+warlike policy; and, on the question of declaring war against
+Spain, he was so successful in inducing the rest of the cabinet to
+reject Pitt's proposals, that that statesman resigned his office in
+unconcealed indignation. Having got rid of the real master of the
+ministry, Bute's next step was to get rid of its nominal chief, and
+in the spring of 1762 he managed to drive the Duke of Newcastle
+from the Treasury, and was himself placed by the King at the head
+of the administration. So rapid an elevation of a man previously
+unknown as a politician could hardly fail to create very widespread
+dissatisfaction, which was in some degree augmented by the
+nationality of the new minister. Lord Bute was a Scotchman, and
+Englishmen had not wholly forgiven or forgotten the Scotch invasion
+of 1745. Since that time the Scotch had been regarded with general
+disfavor; Scotch poverty and Scotch greediness for the good things
+of England had furnished constant topics for raillery and sarcasm;
+and more than one demagogue and political writer had sought
+popularity by pandering to the prevailing taste for attacks on the
+whole nation. Foremost among these was Mr. John Wilkes, member for
+Aylesbury, a man of broken fortunes and still more damaged
+character, but of a wit and hardihood that made his society
+acceptable to some of high rank and lax morality, and caused his
+political alliance to be courted by some who desired to be regarded
+as leaders of a party; many of the transactions of the late reign
+having, unfortunately, not been favorable to the maintenance of any
+high standard of either public or private virtue. On Lord Bute's
+accession to office, Wilkes had set up a periodical paper, whose
+object and character were sufficiently indicated by its title,
+<i>The North Briton</i>, and in which the diligence of Lord Bute in
+distributing places among his kinsmen and countrymen furnished the
+staple of almost every number; while in many the Princess of Wales
+herself was not spared, as the cause, for motives not obscurely
+hinted at, of his sudden elevation. So pertinacious and virulent
+were the attacks thus launched at him, coinciding as they did, at
+least in one point, with the prejudices of the multitude, that they
+were commonly believed to have had some share in driving Lord Bute
+from office, which, in the spring of 1763, he suddenly resigned,
+hoping, as it might almost seem, thus to throw on his successor the
+burden of defending his measures. The most important of these
+measures had been the conclusion of the Treaty of Versailles,
+which, when it was first announced to Parliament, had been
+vehemently attacked in both Houses by Pitt and his followers, but
+had been approved by large majorities. Wilkes, however, not without
+reason, believed it to be still unpopular with the nation at large,
+and, flushed with his supposed victory over Lord Bute, was watching
+eagerly for some occasion of re-opening the question, when such an
+opportunity was afforded him by the King's speech at the
+prorogation of the Parliament, which took place a few days after
+Lord Bute's resignation.</p>
+<p>Lord Bute had been succeeded by Mr. George Grenville, who had
+for a time been one of his colleagues as Secretary of State; and on
+him, therefore, the duty devolved of framing the royal speech the
+opening sentences of which referred to "the re-establishment of
+peace" in terms of warm self-congratulation, as having been
+effected "upon conditions honorable to the crown and beneficial to
+the people." Wilkes at once caught at this panegyric, as affording
+him just such an opportunity as he had been seeking of renewing his
+attacks on the government, which he regarded as changed in nothing
+but the name of the Prime-minister.[<a href="#note-4">4</a>] And,
+four days after the prorogation,[<a href="#note-5">5</a>] he
+accordingly issued a new number of <i>The North Briton</i> (No.
+45), in which he heaped unmeasured sarcasm and invective on the
+peace itself, on the royal speech, and on the minister who had
+composed it. As if conscious that Mr. Grenville was less inclined
+by temper than Lord Bute to suffer such attacks without endeavoring
+to retaliate, he took especial pains to keep within the law in his
+strictures, and, accordingly, carefully avoided saying a
+disrespectful word of the King himself, whom he described as "a
+prince of many great and amiable qualities," "ever renowned for
+truth, honor, and unsullied virtue." But he claimed a right to
+canvass the speech "with the utmost freedom," since "it had always
+been considered by the Legislature and by the public at large as
+the speech of the minister." And he kept this distinction carefully
+in view through the whole number. The speech he denounced with
+bitter vehemence, as "an abandoned instance of ministerial
+effrontery," as containing "the most unjustifiable public
+declarations" and "infamous fallacies." The peace he affirmed to be
+"such as had drawn down the contempt of mankind on our wretched
+negotiators." And he described the present minister as a mere tool
+of "the favorite," by whom "he still meditated to rule the kingdom
+with a rod of iron." But in the whole number there was but one
+sentence which could be represented as implying the very slightest
+censure on the King himself, and even that was qualified by a
+personal eulogy. "The King of England," it said, "is not only the
+first magistrate of the country, but is invested by the law with
+the whole executive power. He is, however, responsible to his
+people for the due execution of the royal functions in the choice
+of ministers, etc., equally with the meanest of his subjects in his
+particular duty. The personal character of our present amiable
+sovereign makes us easy and happy that so great a power is lodged
+in such hands; but the favorite has given too just cause for him to
+escape the general odium. The prerogative of the crown is to exert
+the constitutional power intrusted to it in such a way, not of
+blind favor and partiality, but of wisdom and judgment. This is the
+spirit of our constitution. The people, too, have their
+prerogative; and I hope the fine words of Dryden will be engraven
+on our hearts, 'Freedom is the English subject's prerogative.'"</p>
+<p>These were the last sentences of No. 45. And in the present day
+it will hardly be thought that, however severe or even violent some
+of the epithets with which certain sentences of the royal speech
+were assailed may have been, the language exceeds the bounds of
+allowable political criticism. With respect to the King, indeed,
+however accompanied with personal compliments to himself those
+strictures may have been, it may be admitted that in asserting any
+responsibility whatever to the people on the part of the sovereign,
+even for the choice of his ministers, as being bound to exercise
+that choice "with wisdom and judgment," it goes somewhat beyond the
+strict theory of the constitution. Undoubtedly that theory is, that
+the minister chosen by the King is himself responsible for every
+circumstance or act which led to his appointment. This principle
+was established in the fullest manner in 1834, when, as will be
+seen hereafter, Sir Robert Peel admitted his entire responsibility
+for the dismissal of Lord Melbourne by King William IV., though it
+was notorious that he was in Italy at the time, and had not been
+consulted on the matter. But as yet such questions had not been as
+accurately examined as subsequent events caused them to be; and
+Wilkes's assertion of royal responsibility to this extent probably
+coincided with the general feeling on the subject.[<a href=
+"#note-6">6</a>] At all events, the error contained in it, and the
+insinuation that due wisdom and judgment had not been displayed in
+the appointment of Mr. G. Grenville to the Treasury, were not so
+derogatory to the legitimate authority and dignity of the crown as
+to make the writer a fit subject for a criminal prosecution. But
+Mr. Grenville was of a bitter temper, never inclined to tolerate
+any strictures on his own judgment or capacity, and fully imbued
+with the conviction that the first duty of an English minister is
+to uphold the supreme authority of the Parliament, and to chastise
+any one who dares to call in question the wisdom of any one of its
+resolutions. But <i>The North Briton</i> had done this, and more.
+No. 45 had not only denounced the treaty which both Houses had
+approved, but had insinuated in unmistakable language that their
+approval had been purchased by gross corruption (a fact which was,
+indeed, sufficiently notorious). And, consequently, Mr. Grenville
+determined to treat the number which contained the denunciation as
+a seditious libel, the publication of which was a criminal offence;
+and, by his direction, Lord Halifax, as Secretary of State, issued
+what was termed a general warrant&mdash;a warrant, that is, which
+did not name the person or persons against whom it was directed,
+but which commanded the apprehension of "the authors, printers, and
+publishers" of the offending paper, leaving the officers who were
+charged with its execution to decide who came under that
+description, or, in other words, who were guilty of the act
+charged, before they had been brought before any tribunal. The
+warrant was executed. Wilkes and some printers were apprehended;
+Wilkes himself, as if the minister's design had been to make the
+charge ridiculous by exaggeration, being consigned to the great
+state-prison of the Tower, such a use of which was generally
+limited to those impeached of high-treason. And, indeed, the
+commitment did declare that No. 45 of <i>The North Briton</i> was
+"a libel tending to alienate the affections of the people from his
+Majesty, and to excite them to traitorous insurrections against the
+government." Wilkes instantly sued out a writ of <i>habeas
+corpus</i>, and was without hesitation released by the Court of
+Common Pleas, on the legal ground that, "as a member of the House
+of Commons, he was protected from arrest in all cases except
+treason, felony, or a breach of the peace;" a decision which, in
+the next session of Parliament, the minister endeavored to overbear
+by inducing both Houses to concur in a resolution that "privilege
+of Parliament did not extend to the case of publishing seditious
+libels."</p>
+<p>In his life of Lord Camden,[<a href="#note-7">7</a>] who was
+Chief-justice of the Common Pleas at the time, Lord Campbell
+expresses a warm approval of this resolution, as one "which would
+now be considered conclusive evidence of the law." But, with all
+respect to the memory of a writer who was himself a Chief-justice,
+we suspect that in this case he was advancing a position as an
+author engaged in the discussion of what had become a party
+question, which he would not have laid down from the
+Bench.[<a href="#note-8">8</a>] The resolution certainly did not
+make it law, since it was not confirmed by any royal assent; and to
+interpret the law is not within the province of the House of
+Commons, nor, except when sitting as a Court of Appeal, of the
+House of Lords. We may, however, fully agree with the principle
+which Lord Campbell at the same time lays down, that "privilege of
+Parliament should not be permitted to interfere with the execution
+of the criminal law of the country." And this doctrine has been so
+fully acquiesced in since, that members of both Houses have in more
+than one instance been imprisoned on conviction for libel.</p>
+<p>The legality of the species of warrant under which Wilkes had
+been arrested was, however, a question of far greater importance;
+and on that no formal decision was pronounced on this occasion, the
+Lieutenant of the Tower, in his return to the writ of <i>habeas
+corpus</i>, and the counsel employed on both sides, equally
+avoiding all mention of the character of the warrant. But it was
+indirectly determined shortly afterward. The leaders of the
+Opposition would fain have had the point settled by what, in truth,
+would not have settled it&mdash;another resolution of the House of
+Commons. But, though it was discussed in several warm debates,
+Grenville always contrived to baffle his adversaries, though on one
+occasion his majority dwindled to fourteen.[<a href=
+"#note-9">9</a>] What, however, the House of Commons abstained from
+affirming was distinctly, though somewhat extra-judicially,
+asserted by Lord Camden, as Chief-justice of the Common Pleas.
+Wilkes, with some of the printers and others who had been arrested,
+had brought actions for false imprisonment, which came to be tried
+in his court; and they obtained such heavy damages that the
+officials who had been mulcted applied for new trials, on the plea
+of their being excessive. But the Chief-justice refused the
+applications, and upheld the verdict, on the ground that the
+juries, in their assessment of damages, had been "influenced by a
+righteous indignation at the conduct of those who sought to
+exercise arbitrary power over all the King's subjects, to violate
+Magna Charta, and to destroy the liberty of the kingdom, by
+insisting on the legality of this general warrant." Such a
+justification would hardly be admitted now. But, in a subsequent
+trial, a still higher authority, the Chief-justice of the King's
+Bench, Lord Mansfield, held language so similar, that, once more to
+quote the words of Lord Campbell, "without any formal judgment,
+general warrants have ever since been considered illegal."</p>
+<p>However, the release of Wilkes on the ground of his
+parliamentary privilege gave him but a momentary triumph, or rather
+respite. The prosecution was not abated by the decision that he
+could not be imprisoned before trial; while one effect of his
+liberation was to stimulate the minister to add another count to
+the indictment preferred against him, on which he might be expected
+to find it less easy to excite the sympathy of any party. Wilkes
+had not always confined his literary efforts to political
+pamphlets. There was a club named the Franciscans (in compliment to
+Sir Francis Dashwood, Lord Bute's Chancellor of the Exchequer, who,
+as well as Lord Sandwich, the First Lord of the Admiralty, was one
+of its members), which met at Medmenham Abbey, on the banks of the
+Thames, and there held revels whose license recalled the worst
+excesses of the preceding century. To this club Wilkes also
+belonged; and, in indulgence of tastes in harmony with such a
+brotherhood, he had composed a blasphemous and indecent parody on
+Pope's "Essay on Man," which he entitled "An Essay on Woman," and
+to which he appended a body of burlesque notes purporting to be the
+composition of Pope's latest commentator, the celebrated Dr.
+Warburton, Bishop of Gloucester. He had never published it (indeed,
+it may be doubted whether, even in that not very delicate age, any
+publisher could have been found to run the risk of issuing so
+scandalous a work), but he had printed a few copies in his own
+house, of which he designed to make presents to such friends as he
+expected to appreciate it. He had not, however, so far as it
+appears, given away a single copy, when, on the very first day of
+the next session of Parliament, Lord Sandwich himself brought the
+parody under the notice of the House of Lords. If there was a
+single member of the House whose delicacy was not likely to be
+shocked, and whose morals could not be injured by such a
+composition, it was certainly Lord Sandwich himself; but his zeal
+as a minister to support his chief kindled in him a sudden
+enthusiasm for the support of virtue and decency also; and, having
+obtained a copy by some surreptitious means, he now made a formal
+complaint of it to the House, contending that the use of the name
+of the Bishop of Gloucester as author of the notes constituted a
+breach of the privileges of the House. And he was seconded by the
+bishop himself, whose temper and judgment were, unhappily, very
+inferior to his learning and piety. It is recorded that he actually
+compared Wilkes to the devil, and then apologized to Satan for the
+comparison. But the Lords were in a humor to regard no violence
+against Wilkes as excessive; and, submitting to the guidance of the
+minister and the prelate, resolved that the "Essay on
+Woman,"[<a href="#note-10">10</a>] as also another poem by the same
+writer, a paraphrase of the "Veni Creator," was "a most scandalous,
+obscene, and impious libel," and presented an address to the King,
+requesting his Majesty "to give the most effectual orders for the
+immediate prosecution of the author." And, in the course of the
+next few weeks, the House of Commons outran the peers themselves in
+violence and manifest unfairness. They concurred with the Lords in
+ordering No. 45 of <i>The North Briton</i> to be burnt by the
+common hangman, an order which was not carried out without great
+opposition on the part of the London populace, who made it the
+occasion of a very formidable riot, in which the sheriffs
+themselves incurred no little danger; and, by another resolution,
+they ordered Wilkes to attend in his place to answer the charge of
+having published the two works. But at the time when they made this
+order it was well known that he could not obey it. A few days
+before he had been challenged by a Mr. Martin, who till very
+recently had been one of the Secretaries of the Treasury, and who
+was generally believed to have prepared himself for the conflict by
+diligent practice with a pistol; and in the duel which ensued
+Wilkes had been severely wounded. It was not only notorious that he
+had been thus disabled, but he sent a physician and surgeon of
+admitted eminence in their profession, and of unquestioned honor,
+to testify to the fact at the bar of the House; and subsequently he
+forwarded written certificates to the same purport from some French
+doctors who had special knowledge of gunshot wounds. But the
+Commons declined to accept this evidence as sufficient, and
+directed two other doctors to examine him. Wilkes, however, refused
+to admit them: his refusal was treated as a sufficient ground for
+pronouncing him "guilty of a contempt of the authority of the
+House," and for deciding on his case in his absence; and, on the
+19th of January, before the case had come on for trial, a
+resolution was carried that "Mr. Wilkes was guilty of writing and
+publishing <i>The North Briton</i> (No. 45), which this House had
+voted to be a false, scandalous, and seditious libel, and that, for
+the said offence, he be expelled the House." At a later period of
+the year, he was tried on the two charges of publishing No. 45 and
+the "Essay on Woman," was found guilty of both, and, as he did not
+appear to receive judgment, in November, 1764, he was outlawed.</p>
+<p>So far, it may be said to have been a drawn battle. If, on the
+one hand, the minister had procured the expulsion of Wilkes, on the
+other hand Wilkes had gained great notoriety and a certain amount
+of sympathy, and had, moreover, enriched himself by considerable
+damages; and again, if the nation at large was a gainer by the
+condemnation of general warrants, even that advantage might be
+thought to be dearly gained by the discredit into which the
+Parliament had fallen through its intemperance. But the contest
+between Wilkes and the ministry was only closed for a time; and
+when it was revived, a singular freak of fortune caused the very
+minister who had led the proceedings against him on this occasion
+to appear as his advocate. To avoid the consequences of his
+outlawry, he had taken up his abode in Paris, waiting for a change
+of ministry, which, as he hoped, might bring into power some to
+whom he might look for greater favor. But when, though in the
+course of the next two years two fresh administrations were formed,
+it was seen that neither Lord Rockingham, the head of the first,
+nor the Duke of Grafton and Mr. Pitt (promoted to the Earldom of
+Chatham), the heads of the second, had any greater sympathy with
+him than Mr. Grenville, he became desperate, and looked out for
+some opportunity of giving effect to his discontent. He found it in
+the dissolution of Parliament, which took place in the spring of
+1768. In spite of his outlawry, he instantly returned to England,
+and offered himself as a candidate for London. There, indeed, he
+did not succeed, though the populace was uproarious in his support,
+and drew his carriage through the streets as if in triumph. But,
+before the end of the month, he was returned at the head of the
+poll for Middlesex, when the mob celebrated his victory by great
+riot and outrages, breaking the windows of Lord Bute, as his old
+enemy, and of the Lord Mayor, as the representative of the City of
+London, which had rejected him, and insulting, and even in some
+instances beating, passers-by who refused to join in their cheers
+for "Wilkes and Liberty."</p>
+<p>He had already pledged himself to take the necessary steps to
+procure the reversal of his outlawry; and, in pursuance of his
+promise, he surrendered in the Court of King's Bench. But his
+removal to prison caused a renewal of the tumults with greater
+violence than before. The mob even rescued him from the officers
+who had him in custody; and when, having escaped from his
+deliverers, he, with a parade of obedience to the law, again
+surrendered himself voluntarily at the gate of the King's Bench
+Prison, they threatened to attack the jail itself, kindled a fire
+under its walls, which was not extinguished without some danger,
+and day after day assembled in such tumultuous and menacing crowds,
+that at last Lord Weymouth, the Secretary of State, wrote a letter
+to the Surrey magistrates, enjoining them to abstain from no
+measures which might seem necessary for the preservation of peace,
+even if that could only be effected by the employment of the
+soldiery. The riots grew more and more formidable, till at last the
+magistrates had no resource but to call out the troops, who, on one
+occasion, after they had been pelted with large stones, and in many
+instances severely injured, fired, killing or wounding several of
+the foremost rioters. So tragical an event seemed to Wilkes to
+furnish him with exactly such an opportunity as he desired to push
+himself into farther notoriety. He at once printed Lord Weymouth's
+letter, and circulated it, with an inflammatory comment, in which
+he described it as a composition having for its fruit "a horrid
+massacre, the consummation of a hellish plot deliberately planned."
+Too angry to be prudent, Lord Weymouth complained to the House of
+Lords of this publication as a breach of privilege, and the Lords
+formally represented it to the House of Commons as an insult
+deliberately offered to them by one of its members. There could be
+no doubt that such language as Wilkes had used was libellous. In
+its imputation of designs of deliberate wickedness, it very far
+exceeded the bitterest passages of <i>The North Briton</i>; and
+Lord Weymouth's colleagues, therefore, thought they might safely
+follow the precedent set in 1764, of branding the publication as a
+libel, and again procuring the expulsion of the libeller from the
+House of Commons. There were circumstances in the present case,
+such as the difference between the constituencies of Aylesbury and
+Middlesex, and the enthusiastic fervor in the offender's cause
+which the populace of the City had displayed, which made it very
+doubtful whether the precedent of 1764 were quite a safe one to
+follow; but the ministers not only disregarded every such
+consideration, but, as if they had wantonly designed to give their
+measure a bad appearance, and to furnish its opponents with the
+strongest additional argument against it, they mixed up with their
+present complaint a reference to former misdeeds of Wilkes with
+which it had no connection. On receiving the message of the Lords,
+they had summoned him to appear at the bar of the House of Commons,
+that he might be examined on the subject; but this proceeding was
+so far from intimidating him, that he not only avowed the
+publication of his comment on Lord Weymouth's letter, but gloried
+in it, asserting that he deserved the thanks of the people for
+bringing to light the true character of "that bloody scroll." Such
+language was regarded as an aggravation of his offence, and the
+Attorney-general moved that his comment on the letter "was an
+insolent, scandalous, and seditious libel;" and, when that motion
+had been carried, Lord Barrington followed it up with another, to
+the effect that "John Wilkes, Esq., a member of this House, who
+hath at the bar of this House confessed himself to be the author
+and publisher of what the House has resolved to be an insolent,
+scandalous, and seditious libel, and who has been convicted in the
+Court of King's Bench of having printed and published a seditious
+libel, and three[<a href="#note-11">11</a>] obscene and impious
+libels, and by the judgment of the said Court has been sentenced to
+undergo twenty-two months' imprisonment, and is now in execution
+under the said judgment, be expelled this House." This motion
+encountered a vigorous opposition, not only from Mr. Burke and the
+principal members of the Rockingham party, which now formed the
+regular Opposition, but also from Mr. Grenville, the former
+Prime-minister, who on the former occasion, in 1764, had himself
+moved the expulsion of the same offender. His speech on this
+occasion is the only one which is fully reported; and it deserved
+the distinction from the exhaustive way in which it dealt with
+every part of the question. It displayed no inclination to
+extenuate Wilkes's present offence, but it pointed out with great
+force the circumstance that the supporters of the motion were far
+from agreement as to the reasons by which they were guided; that
+some members of the greatest authority in the House, while they had
+avowed their intention of voting for the expulsion, had at the same
+time been careful to explain that the comment on Lord Weymouth's
+letter was not the ground of their vote; that so great a lawyer as
+Mr. Blackstone had asserted that that comment "had not been
+properly and regularly brought before the House," but had founded
+his intention to vote for the expulsion solely "upon that article
+of the charge which related to the three obscene and impious libels
+mentioned in it, disavowing in the most direct terms all the other
+articles." That, on the other hand, other members of deserved
+weight and influence, such as Lord Palmerston and Lord F. Campbell,
+had disdained the idea of regarding "the article of the three
+obscene and impious libels as affording any ground for their
+proceeding." So practised a debater as Mr. Grenville had but little
+difficulty, therefore, in arguing against the advocates of
+expulsion, when they were so divided that one portion of them did,
+in fact, reply to the other. But it would be superfluous here to
+enter into the arguments employed on either side to justify the
+expulsion, or to prove it to be unjustifiable, from a consideration
+of the character of either Wilkes or his publication. The strength
+and importance of Mr. Grenville's speech lay in the constitutional
+points which it raised.</p>
+<p>Some supporters of the ministers had dwelt upon the former
+expulsion, insisting that "a man who had been expelled by a former
+House of Commons could not possibly be deemed a proper person to
+sit in the present Parliament, unless he had some pardon to plead,
+or some merit to cancel his former offences." By a reference to the
+case of Sir R. Walpole, Mr. Grenville proved that this had not been
+the opinion of former Parliaments; and he contended, with
+unanswerable logic, that it would be very mischievous to the nation
+if such a principle should be now acted on, and such a precedent
+established, since, though employed in the first instance against
+the odious and the guilty, it might, when once established, be
+easily applied to, and made use of against, the meritorious and the
+innocent; and so the most eminent and deserving members of the
+state, under the color of such an example, by one arbitrary and
+discretionary vote of one House of Parliament, the worst species of
+ostracism, might be excluded from the public councils, cut off and
+proscribed from the rights of every subject of the realm, not for a
+term of years alone, but forever. He quoted from "L'Esprit des
+Lois" an assertion of Montesquieu, that "one of the excellences of
+the English constitution was, that the judicial power was separated
+from the legislative, and that there would be no liberty if they
+were blended together; the power over the life and liberty of the
+citizens would then be arbitrary, for the judge would be the
+legislator." And, having thus proved that it would be a violation
+of the recognized constitution to found a second expulsion on the
+first, he proceeded to argue that to expel him for this new offence
+would be impolitic and inexpedient, as a step which would
+inevitably lead to a contest with the constituency which he
+represented, since, "in the present disposition of the county of
+Middlesex, no one could entertain a doubt that Wilkes would be
+re-elected. The House would then probably think itself under a
+necessity of again expelling him, and he would as certainly be
+again re-elected. The House might, indeed, refuse to issue a new
+writ, which would be to deprive the freeholders of Middlesex of the
+right of choosing any other representative; but he could not
+believe that the House would think it fit to inflict such a
+punishment on the electors of a great county. Should it not do so,
+the other alternative would be to bring into the House as
+representative and knight of the shire for Middlesex a man chosen
+by a few voters only, in contradiction to the declared sense of a
+great majority of the freeholders on the face of the poll, upon the
+supposition that all the votes of the latter were forfeited and
+thrown away on account of the expulsion of Mr. Wilkes." It seemed
+premature to discuss that point before it arose, and therefore the
+Speaker contented himself for the present with saying that "he
+believed there was no example of such a proceeding; and that, if it
+should appear to be new and unfounded as the law of the land, or
+even if any reasonable doubt could be entertained of its legality,
+the attempt to forfeit the freeholders' votes in such a manner
+would be highly alarming and dangerous."</p>
+<p>Few prophecies have been more exactly fulfilled. The House did
+expel Mr. Wilkes; he did offer himself for re-election, and was
+re-elected; and the minister, in consequence, moved and carried a
+resolution that "John Wilkes, Esq., having been, in this session of
+Parliament, expelled this House, was and is incapable of being
+elected a member to serve in this present Parliament." And, in
+pursuance of this vote, a writ was again issued. At the end of
+another month the proceeding required to be repeated. Wilkes had
+again offered himself for re-election. No other candidate had
+presented himself, and, in answer to an inquiry, the under-sheriff
+reported that "no other candidate had been proposed but John
+Wilkes, Esq., and that no elector had given or tendered his vote
+for any other person." Once more the House resolved that he was
+"incapable of being elected," and issued a new writ. But on this
+second occasion the ministry had provided a rival candidate in the
+person of the Honorable H.K. Luttrell. He was duly proposed and
+seconded; a poll was taken and kept open for several days, and, as
+it appeared at the close that 1143 votes had been given for Wilkes
+and 296 for Mr. Luttrell, the sheriff again returned Wilkes as duly
+elected.</p>
+<p>A debate of singularly angry excitement arose on the reception
+of this return. Even lawyers, such as Mr. De Grey, the
+Attorney-general, and Sir Fletcher Norton, who had been
+Attorney-general, were not ashamed to denounce the conduct of the
+sheriff in returning Mr. Wilkes as "highly improper and indecent,"
+as "a flying in the face of a resolution of the House of Commons;"
+and Sir Fletcher even ventured to advance the proposition that, "as
+the Commons were acting in a judicial capacity, their resolutions
+were equal to law." Lord North, too, the Chancellor of the
+Exchequer, as we learn from the "Parliamentary History," "spoke
+long, but chiefly to the passions. He described Mr. Wilkes and his
+actions in a lively manner; showed the variety of troubles which he
+had given the ministry; and that unless, by voting in Mr. Luttrell,
+an end were put to this debate, the whole kingdom would be in
+confusion; though he owned that he did not think that measure would
+put an end to the distractions. He spoke much more to the
+expediency than to the legality of the measure proposed."</p>
+<p>On the other side, it was contended by several members, Burke
+and Mr. Grenville being of the number, that "the House of Commons
+alone could not make a law binding any body but themselves. That,
+if they could disqualify one person, they could disqualify as many
+as they pleased, and thus get into their own hands the whole power
+of the government;" and precedents were produced to prove that
+votes of the House of Lords, and also of the House of Commons,
+regarding their own members, had been disregarded by the judges of
+the Court of King's Bench as being contrary to law. But the
+minister was secure of the steadiness of his adherents, and a
+majority of 221 to 152 declared that Mr. Luttrell had been duly
+elected.</p>
+<p>But Lord North was correct in his anticipation that their vote
+would not put an end to the agitation on the question, and it was
+renewed in the next session in a manner which at one time
+threatened to produce a breach between the two Houses.</p>
+<p>The "Parliamentary History" closes its report of the debate on
+the resolution by which Mr. Luttrell was seated with a summary of
+the arguments used in it, taken from the "Annual Register," which,
+as is universally known, was at this time edited by Mr. Burke. It
+is a very fair and candid abstract, which, in fact, puts the whole
+question on one single issue, "that the House of Commons is the
+sole court of judicature in all cases of election, and that this
+authority is derived from the first principles of our government,
+viz., the necessary independence of the three branches of the
+Legislature." But, though that doctrine was fully admitted by the
+Opposition, they made "that very admission a ground for reviving
+the question in the next session, by moving for a resolution which
+should declare that, 'being a Court of Judicature, the House of
+Commons, in deciding matters of election, was bound to judge
+according to the law of the land, and the known and established law
+of Parliament, which was part thereof.'" It was understood that
+this resolution, if carried, was intended as a stepping-stone to
+others which should condemn the decision of the previous session;
+yet it seemed such a truism that even the ministers could not
+venture to deny it; but they proposed to defeat the object of its
+framers by adding to it a declaration that the late decision was
+"agreeable to the said law of the land." And we might pass on to
+the subsequent debate, in which the constitutional correctness of
+that addition was distinctly challenged, did it not seem desirable
+to notice two arguments which were brought forward against the
+motion, one by an independent member, Mr. Ongley, the other by the
+Attorney-general. Mr. Ongley contended that "a power of preserving
+order and decency is essentially necessary to every aggregate body;
+and, with respect to this House, if it had not power over its
+particular members, they would be subject to no control at all."
+The answer to this argument is obvious: that a right on the part of
+the House to control the conduct of its members is a wholly
+different thing from a right to determine who are or ought to be
+members; and that for the House to claim this latter right, except
+on grounds of qualification or disqualification legally proved,
+would be to repeat one of the most monstrous of all Cromwell's acts
+of tyranny, when, in 1656, he placed guards at the door of the
+House, with orders to refuse admission to all those members whom,
+however lawfully elected, he did not expect to find sufficiently
+compliant for his purposes. Mr. De Grey's argument was of a
+different character, being based on what he foretold would be the
+practical result of a decision that expulsion did not involve an
+incapacity to be re-elected. If it did not involve such incapacity,
+and if, in consequence, Mr. Wilkes should be re-elected, he
+considered that the House would naturally feel it its duty to
+re-expel him as often as the constituency re-elected him. But one
+answer given to this argument was, that to expel a second time
+would be to punish twice for one offence, a proceeding at variance
+not only with English law but with every idea of justice. Another,
+and one which has obtained greater acceptance, was, that the
+legitimate doctrine was, that the issue of a new writ gave the
+expelled member an appeal from the House to the constituency, and
+that the constituency had a constitutional right to overrule the
+judgment of the House, and to determine whether it still regarded
+the candidate as its most suitable representative.</p>
+<p>The ministers, however, were, as before, strong enough in the
+House to carry their resolution. But the Opposition returned to the
+charge, taking up an entirely different though equally general
+position, "That, by the law of the land and the known law and usage
+of Parliament, no person eligible by common right can be
+incapacitated by vote or resolution of this House, but by act of
+Parliament only." It is remarkable that, in the debate which
+ensued, two members who successively rose to the dignity of Lord
+Chancellor, Mr. Thurlow and Mr. Wedderburn, took different sides;
+but nothing could shake the ministerial majority. The resolution
+was rejected. And when Lord Rockingham proposed the same resolution
+in the House of Lords, though it was supported by all the eloquence
+of Lord Chatham, he was beaten by a majority of more than two to
+one, and the ministers even carried a resolution declaring "that
+any interference of the House of Lords with any judgment of the
+House of Commons, in matters of election, would be a violation of
+the constitutional rights of the Commons."</p>
+<p>Even these decisive defeats of the Opposition did not finally
+terminate the struggle. The notoriety which Wilkes had gained had
+answered his purpose to no slight extent. The City had adopted his
+cause with continually increasing earnestness and effect. It had
+made him Sheriff, Alderman, Lord Mayor, and had enriched him with
+the lucrative office of City Chamberlain; and, as one of the City
+magistrates, he subsequently won the good opinion of many who had
+previously condemned him, by his conduct during the Gordon Riots,
+in which he exerted his authority with great intrepidity to check
+and punish the violence of the rioters. And when, in 1782, Lord
+Rockingham became, for the second time, Prime-minister, he thought
+he might well avail himself of the favor he had thus acquired, and
+of the accession to office of those whom the line which they had
+formerly taken bound to countenance him, to bring forward a motion
+for the expunction of the resolutions against him which had been
+passed in 1770. It was carried by a largo majority; and though this
+was as evidently a party division as those had been by which he had
+been defeated twelve years before, still, as the last resolution on
+the subject, it must be regarded as decisive of the law and
+practice of Parliament, and as having settled the doctrine that
+expulsion does not incapacitate a member who has been expelled from
+immediate re-election.[<a href="#note-12">12</a>]</p>
+<p>The establishment of this rule, and the abolition of general
+warrants, were, however, not the only nor the most important result
+of these proceedings. They led indirectly to an innovation which,
+it is hardly too much to say, has had a greater influence on the
+character and conduct of Parliament, and indeed on the whole
+subsequent legislation of the country, than can be attributed to
+any other single cause. Hitherto the bulk of the people had enjoyed
+but very scanty and occasional means of acquiring political
+education. At times of vehement political excitement, or any
+special party conflict, pamphlets and periodical essays had
+enlightened their readers&mdash;necessarily a select and small
+body&mdash;on particular topics. But standing orders of both
+Houses, often renewed, strictly forbade all publication of the
+debates which took place in either. To a certain extent, these
+orders had come to be disregarded and evaded. Almost ever since the
+accession of the House of Brunswick, a London publisher had given
+to the world an annual account of the Parliamentary proceedings and
+most interesting discussions of the year; and before the middle of
+the reign of George II, two monthly magazines had given sketches of
+speeches made by leading members of each party. The reporters,
+however, did not venture to give the names of the speakers at full
+length, but either disguised them under some general description,
+or at most gave their initials; and sometimes found that even this
+profession of deference to the standing orders did not insure them
+impunity. As late as the year 1747, Cave, the proprietor and editor
+of the <i>Gentleman's Magazine</i>, was brought to the bar of the
+House of Commons for publishing an account of a recent debate, and
+only obtained his release by expressions of humble submission and
+the payment of heavy fees. The awe, however, which his humiliation
+and peril had been intended to diffuse gradually wore off; the keen
+interest which was awakened by the ministerial changes at the
+beginning of the reign of George III., which have been already
+mentioned, naturally prompted a variety of efforts to gratify it by
+a revelation of the language concerning them which was held by
+statesmen of different parties; and these revelations were no
+longer confined to yearly or monthly publications. More than one
+newspaper had of late adopted the practice of publishing what it
+affirmed to be a correct report of the debates of the previous day,
+though, in fact, each journal garbled them to suit the views of the
+party to which it belonged, and, to quote the words of the
+historian of the period, "misrepresented the language and arguments
+of the speakers in a manner which could hardly be considered
+accidental."[<a href="#note-13">13</a>] The speakers on the
+ministerial side in the debates on the Middlesex election had been
+especial objects of these misrepresentations; and, at the beginning
+of 1771, one of that party, Colonel Onslow, M.P. for Guilford,
+brought the subject before the House, complaining that many
+speeches, and his own among them, had been misrepresented by two
+newspapers which he named, and that "the practice had got to an
+infamous height, so that it had become absolutely necessary either
+to punish the offenders or to revise the standing orders."[<a href=
+"#note-14">14</a>] And he accordingly moved "that the publication
+of the newspapers of which he complained was a contempt of the
+orders and a breach of the privileges of the House, and that the
+printers be ordered to attend the House at its next sitting." The
+habitual unfairness of the reports was admitted by the Opposition;
+but the publishers complained of evidently felt assured of their
+sympathy (which, indeed, was sufficiently, and not very decorously,
+shown by its leaders inflicting on the House no fewer than
+twenty-three divisions in a single night), and, relying on their
+countenance, they paid no attention to the order of the House. A
+fresh order for their arrest having been issued, the
+Sergeant-at-arms reported that he had been unable to execute it, by
+reason of their absence from their homes; on which the House, not
+disposed to allow itself to be thus trifled with, now addressed his
+Majesty with a request that he would issue his royal proclamation
+for their apprehension. And Colonel Onslow made a fresh motion,
+with a similar complaint of the publishers of six more
+newspapers&mdash;"three brace," as he described them in language
+more sportsman like than parliamentary. Similar orders for their
+appearance and, when these were disregarded, for their
+apprehension, were issued. And at last one of those who had been
+mentioned in the royal proclamation, Mr. Wheble, printer of the
+<i>Middlesex Journal</i>, was apprehended by an officer named
+Carpenter, and carried before the sitting magistrate at Guildhall,
+who, by a somewhat whimsical coincidence, happened to be Alderman
+Wilkes. Wilkes not only discharged him, on the ground that there
+was "no legal cause of complaint against him," but when Wheble, in
+retaliation, made a formal complaint of the assault committed on
+him by Carpenter in arresting him, bound Wheble over to prosecute,
+and Carpenter to answer the complaint, at the next quarter
+sessions, and then reported what he had done in an official Letter
+to the Secretary of State. Thomson, another printer, was in like
+manner arrested; and, when brought before Mr. Oliver, another
+alderman, was discharged by him. And when, a day or two afterward,
+a third (Mr. Miller) was apprehended by Whetham, a messenger of the
+House of Commons, Mr. Brass Crosby, the Lord Mayor, and the two
+Aldermen, signed a warrant committing Whetham to prison for
+assaulting Miller. Whetham was bailed by the Sergeant-at-arms, who
+reported what had occurred to the House; and the House, as the Lord
+Mayor and Alderman Oliver were members of it, as representatives
+for London and Honiton, ordered that they should attend the House
+in their places, to explain their conduct, and that Mr. Wilkes
+should attend at the bar of the House. Wilkes, declining to
+recognize the validity of the resolutions which had seated Colonel
+Luttrell for Middlesex, refused compliance with such an order,
+writing a letter to the Speaker, in which he "observed that no
+notice was taken of him as a member of the House; and that the
+Speaker's order did not require him to attend in his place." And he
+"demanded his seat in Parliament, and promised, when he had been
+admitted to his seat, to give the House a most exact detail of his
+conduct." But the Lord Mayor pleaded the charters of the City as a
+justification of his act in releasing a citizen of London who had
+been arrested on a warrant which had not been backed by a City
+magistrate, and demanded to be heard by counsel in support of his
+plea. His demand, however, was refused, and he and Alderman Oliver
+were committed to the Tower; but, as if the ministers were afraid
+of re-opening the question of Colonel Luttrell's election for
+Middlesex, they evaded taking notice of Wilkes's disobedience to
+their order by a singularly undignified expedient, issuing a fresh
+order for his appearance on the 8th of April, and adjourning till
+the 9th.</p>
+<p>The ministers now moved the appointment of a select committee to
+investigate the whole affair; and the committee, before the end of
+the month, made an elaborate report, which, however, abstained from
+all mention of the offence committed by the printers, and confined
+itself to an assertion that "the power and authority of the House
+to compel the attendance of any commoner had ever extended as well
+to the City of London, without exception on account of charters
+from the crown or any pretence of separate jurisdiction, as to
+every other part of the realm." And this assertion may be regarded
+as having been uphold by the refusal of the judges to release the
+Lord Mayor and Alderman when they sued out writs of <i>habeas
+corpus</i>; and they consequently remained prisoners in the Tower
+till they were released by the prorogation.</p>
+<p>But with this report of the committee the matter was suffered to
+drop. The transaction had caused almost unprecedented excitement,
+which was not confined to the City, for the grand-juries of many
+English counties and a committee of the Dublin merchants showed
+their sympathy with the Opposition by sending up addresses to the
+imprisoned City magistrates; and the ministers had a prudent fear
+of keeping alive an agitation which had not been always free from
+danger to the public tranquillity.[<a href="#note-15">15</a>] In
+effect, the victory remained with the Opposition. No farther
+attempt was made to punish any of the printers; and, though the
+standing orders which forbid such publication have never been
+formally repealed, ever since that time the publishers of
+newspapers and other periodicals have been in the constant habit of
+giving regular details of the proceedings of both Houses of
+Parliament. And one enterprising publisher, Mr. Hansard, has for
+many years published a complete record of the debates in both
+Houses, which is continually appealed to in the Houses themselves,
+by members of both parties, as a manual of political and
+parliamentary history.</p>
+<p>The practice, as it now prevails, is one of the many instances
+of the practical wisdom with which this nation often deals with
+difficult subjects. The standing order is retained as an instrument
+which, in certain cases, it may possibly be expedient to employ;
+as, in fact, it has been employed in one or two instances in the
+present reign, when matters have been under consideration which,
+however necessary to be discussed, were of such a nature that the
+publication of the details into which some speakers deemed it
+desirable to go was regarded by others as calculated to be
+offensive to the taste, if not injurious to the morals, of the
+community at large. But the very fact of such an occasional
+enforcement of the standing orders under very peculiar
+circumstances implies a recognition of the propriety of its more
+ordinary violation; of the principle that publication ought to be
+the general rule, and secrecy the unusual exception. And, indeed,
+it is, probably, no exaggeration to say that such publication is
+not only valuable, as the best and chief means of the political
+education of the people out-of-doors, but is indispensable to the
+working of our parliamentary system such as it has now become. The
+successive Reform Bills, which have placed the electoral power in
+the hands of so vast a body of constituents as was never imagined
+in the last century, have evidently regarded the possession by the
+electors of a perfect knowledge of the language held and the votes
+given by their representatives as indispensable to the proper
+exercise of the franchises which they have conferred. And, even if
+there had previously been no means provided for their acquisition
+of such information, it is certain that the electors would never
+have consented to be long kept in the dark on subjects of such
+interest. In another point of view, the publication of the debates
+is equally desirable, in the interest of the members themselves,
+whether leaders or followers of the different parties. Not to
+mention the stimulus that it affords to the cultivation of
+eloquence&mdash;an incentive to which even those least inclined or
+accustomed to put themselves forward are not entirely
+insensible&mdash;it enables the ministers to vindicate their
+measures to the nation at large, the leaders of the Opposition to
+explain their objections or resistance to those measures in their
+own persons, and not through the hired agency of pamphleteers, and
+each humbler member to prove to his constituents the fidelity with
+which he has acted up to the principles his assertion of which
+induced them to confide their interests and those of the kingdom to
+his judgment and integrity. Secrecy and mystery may serve, or be
+supposed to serve, the interests of arbitrary rulers; perfect
+openness is the only principle on which a free constitution can be
+maintained and a free people governed.</p>
+<p>It seems convenient to take all the measures which, in this
+first portion of the reign before us, affected the proceedings or
+constitution of Parliament together; and, indeed, one enactment of
+great importance, which was passed in 1770, it is hardly
+unreasonable to connect in some degree with the decision of the
+House which adjudged the seat for Middlesex to Colonel Luttrell.
+Ever since the year 1704 it had been regarded as a settled point
+that the House of Commons had the exclusive right of determining
+every question concerning the election of its members. But it was
+equally notorious that it had exercised that right in a manner
+which violated every principle of justice and even of decency.
+Election petitions were decided by the entire House, and were
+almost invariably treated as party questions, in which impartiality
+was not even professed. Thirty years before, the Prime-minister
+himself (Sir Robert Walpole) had given notice to his supporters
+that "no quarter was to be given in election petitions;" and it was
+a division on one petition which eventually drove him from office.
+There was not even a pretence made of deciding according to
+evidence, for few of the members took the trouble to hear it. A few
+years after the time of which we are speaking, Lord George Germaine
+thus described the mode of proceeding which had previously
+prevailed: "The managers of petitions did not ask those on whose
+support they calculated to attend at the examination of witnesses,
+but only to let them know where they might be found when the
+question was going to be put, that they might be able to send them
+word in time for the division." The practice had become a public
+scandal, by which the constituencies and the House itself suffered
+equally&mdash;the constituencies, inasmuch as they were liable to
+be represented by one who was in fact only the representative of a
+minority; the House itself, since its title to public confidence
+could have no solid or just foundation but such as was derived from
+its members being in every instance the choice of the majority.
+Yet, so long as petitions were judged by the whole House, there
+seemed no chance of the abuse being removed, the number of judges
+conferring the immunity of shamelessness on each individual. To
+remedy such a state of things, in the spring of 1770 Mr. G.
+Grenville brought in a bill which provided for the future trial of
+all such petitions by a select committee of fifteen members,
+thirteen of whom should be chosen by ballot, one by the sitting
+member whose seat was petitioned against, and one by the
+petitioner. The members of the committee were to take an oath to do
+justice similar to that taken by jurymen in the courts of law; and
+the committee was to have power to compel the attendance of
+witnesses, to examine them on oath, and to enforce the production
+of all necessary papers; it was also to commence its sittings
+within twenty-four hours of its appointment, and to sit from day to
+day till it should be prepared to present its report. It was not to
+the credit of the ministers that they made the passing of such a
+bill a party question. The abuse which it was designed to remedy
+was notorious, and Mr. Grenville did not exaggerate its magnitude
+when he declared that, "if it were not checked, it must end in the
+ruin of public liberty." He was supported by Burke, and by two
+lawyers, Mr. Dunning and Mr. Wedderburn, both destined to rise to
+some of the highest offices in their profession; but he was opposed
+by the Attorney-general, by Lord North, as leader of the House, and
+by Mr. Fox&mdash;not yet turned into a patriot by Lord North's
+dismissal of him from office. The debates, both in the whole House
+and in committee, were long and earnest. Some of the ministerial
+underlings were not ashamed to deny the necessity of any alteration
+in the existing practice; but their more favorite argument was
+founded on the impropriety of the House "delegating its authority
+to a committee," which was asserted to be "an essential alteration
+of the constitution of the House of Commons." Lord North himself
+had too keen an instinct of propriety to deny the existence of a
+great evil, and contented himself with pleading for time for
+farther consideration; while the Attorney-general confined his
+objections to some details of the bill, which it would be easy to
+amend. Others, with too accurate a foresight, doubted the efficacy
+of the measure, and prophesied that the additional sanction of the
+oath, by which its framer hoped to bind the committees to a just
+and honest decision, would, "like oaths of office and Custom-house
+oaths, soon fall into matters of form, and lose all sanction, and
+so make bad worse." On the other hand, besides the arguments
+founded on the admitted greatness of the evil to be remedied, it
+was shown that the institution of committees, such as the bill
+proposed the appointment of, was sanctioned by numerous precedents;
+and though the committees&mdash;sometimes consisting of as many as
+two hundred members&mdash;were by far too large to make it probable
+that all would bestow a careful attention on the whole case, there
+was "nothing in the journals of the House to show that their
+decisions were not regarded as final, or as requiring no subsequent
+confirmation from the whole House." Generally speaking, Lord North
+could trust the steadiness of his majority; but, to his great
+surprise, on this occasion he found himself deserted by the country
+gentlemen, who voted in a body for the bill, although their
+spokesman, Sir W. Bagot, had been in no slight degree offended by
+some remarks of Burke, who, with a strange imprudence, had claimed
+a monopoly of the title of "friends of the constitution" for
+himself and his party, and had sneered at the country gentlemen, as
+"statesmen of a very different description, though, by a late
+description given of them, a Tory was now the best species of
+Whig." And the union of the two bodies proved irresistible; the
+bill was carried by a majority of sixty-two, and the government did
+not venture to carry on their resistance to it in the House of
+Lords, any interference by which would, indeed, have been resented
+by the Commons, as a violation of their privileges.</p>
+<p>At first the duration of the bill was limited to seven years;
+but in 1774 it was made perpetual by a still larger majority, the
+experience of its working having converted many who had at first
+opposed it, but who now bore willing testimony to its efficacy.
+Unhappily, though the House could make the bill perpetual, at least
+till formally repealed, it could not invest its good effects with
+equal durability. After a time, the same complaints were advanced
+against the decision of election committees that had formerly been
+employed to discredit the judgments of the whole House. The success
+or failure of a petition again became a party question; and as in a
+committee of an odd number the ministerialists or the Opposition
+must inevitably have a majority of at least one member, before the
+end of the reign it had become as easy to foretell the result of a
+petition from the composition of the committee as it had been in
+the time of Walpole. And it was with the approval of almost all
+parties&mdash;an approval extorted only by the absolute necessity
+of the case&mdash;that, after one or two modifications of Mr.
+Grenville's act had been tried, Mr. Disraeli induced the House to
+surrender altogether its privilege of judging of elections, and to
+submit the investigations of petitions on such subjects to the only
+tribunal sufficiently above suspicion to command and retain the
+confidence of the nation, the judges of the high courts of law.</p>
+<p>We shall probably be doing the House of Commons of the day no
+injustice, if we surmise that the degree in which public attention
+had recently been directed to the representation, and the interest
+which the people were beginning to show in the purity of elections,
+as the principle on the maintenance of which the very liberties of
+all might depend, had some share in leading the House to establish
+the wholly new, though most necessary, precedent of punishing a
+constituency for habitual and inveterate corruption. It may be
+called the first fruits of Mr. Grenville's act. At the end of the
+same year in which that statute had been passed, a select committee
+had sat to try the merits of a petition which complained of an
+undue return for the borough of New Shoreham. And its report
+brought to light an organized system of corruption, which there was
+too much reason to fear was but a specimen of that which prevailed
+in many other boroughs as yet undetected. It appeared from the
+report, founded as it was on the evidence and confession of many of
+the persons inculpated, that a society had long existed in New
+Shoreham, entitled the Christian Club, which, under this specious
+name, was instituted, as they frankly acknowledged, for the express
+purpose of getting as much money as possible at every election from
+the candidates they brought in. The members of the club were under
+an oath and bond of &pound;500 not to divulge the secrets of the
+club, and to be bound by the majority. On every election, a
+committee of five persons was nominated by the club to treat with
+the candidates for as much money as they could get. And, in
+pursuance of this system, when, on the death of Sir Stephen
+Cornish, one of the members for the borough, five candidates
+offered themselves to supply the vacancy, this committee of five
+opened negotiations with them all. The offers of the rival
+purchasers were liberal enough. One (General Smith) proposed to buy
+the entire club in the lump for &pound;3000, adding a promise to
+build 600 tons of shipping in the town. A second (a Mr. Rumbold)
+was willing to give every freeman &pound;35; and his offer was
+accepted by the committee, who, however, cautioned him that no
+freeman was entitled to the money who was not a member of the
+Christian Club. He willingly agreed to this limitation of his
+expenditure, and both he and the club regarded the matter as
+settled. He paid every freeman who belonged to the club his
+stipulated bribe, and on the polling day they tendered eighty-seven
+votes in his favor, the entire constituency being something under
+one hundred and fifty. The general, finding his &pound;3000
+declined, did not go to the poll; but a Mr. Purling and Mr. James
+did, the latter polling only four votes, the former only
+thirty-seven. What bribe Mr. Purling had given was never revealed;
+but by some means or other he had contrived to render himself the
+most acceptable of all the candidates to Mr. Roberts, the returning
+officer. Roberts had himself been a member of the Christian Club,
+but had quarrelled with it, and on the day of the election, as
+Rumbold's voters came up, he administered to each of them the oath
+against bribery. They took it without scruple; but he took it on
+himself to pronounce seventy-six of them disqualified, and to
+refuse their votes; and, having thus reduced Mr. Rumbold's voters
+to eleven, he returned Mr. Purling as duly elected.</p>
+<p>Mr. Rumbold, not unnaturally, petitioned against such a return;
+when Mr. Roberts admitted the facts alleged against him, but
+pleaded that he had acted under the advice of counsel, who had
+assured him that it was within his own discretion to admit or to
+refuse any votes that might be tendered, and that he might lawfully
+refuse any "which in his own mind he thought illegal." It is a
+striking proof of the laxity which prevailed on every quarter in
+electioneering practices, that the House, to a great extent,
+admitted his justification or excuse as valid. By a strange stretch
+of lenity, they gave him credit for an honest intention, and
+contented themselves with ordering him to be reprimanded by the
+Speaker. But the case of the bribed freemen and of the borough
+generally was too gross to be screened by any party. All agreed
+that the borough must be regarded as incurably corrupt, and
+deserving of heavy punishment. The Attorney-general was ordered to
+prosecute the five members of the managing committee for "an
+illegal and corrupt conspiracy;" and a bill was brought in to
+disfranchise and declare forever incapable of voting at any
+election eighty-one freemen who had been proved to have received
+bribes, and to punish the borough itself, by extending the right of
+voting at future elections to all the freeholders in the rape of
+Bramber, the district of Sussex in which New Shoreham lies, an
+arrangement which reduced the borough itself to comparative
+insignificance. Mr. Fox opposed the bill, on the ground that the
+offence committed could be sufficiently punished by the ordinary
+courts of law. But he stood alone in his resistance; the bill was
+passed, and a salutary precedent was established; the penalty
+inflicted on New Shoreham being for many years regarded as the most
+proper punishment for all boroughs in which similar practices were
+proved to prevail.</p>
+<p>And it might have continued to be thought so, had corruption
+been confined to the smaller boroughs; but there was no doubt that
+in many large towns corruption was equally prevalent and
+inveterate, while there were also many counties in which the cost
+of a contest was by far too large to be accounted for by any
+legitimate causes of expenditure. And consequently, as time wore
+on, severer measures were considered necessary. Some boroughs were
+deprived of the right of election altogether; in others, whose
+population or constituency was too numerous to make their permanent
+disfranchisement advisable, the writ was suspended for a time, that
+its suspension might serve both as a punishment and as a warning, a
+practice which is still not unfrequently adopted. But no plan could
+be devised for dealing with the evil in counties, till what seemed
+hopeless to achieve by direct legislation was, in a great degree,
+effected by the indirect operation of the Reform Bill of 1832. The
+shortening of the duration of an election, which was henceforth
+concluded in a single day, and the multiplication of polling
+places, which rendered it impossible to ascertain the progress of
+the different candidates till the close of the poll, were
+provisions having an inevitable and most salutary effect in
+diminishing alike the temptation to bribe on the part of the
+candidate, and the opportunity of enhancing the value of his vote
+by the elector. The vast increase of newspapers, by diffusing
+political education and stimulating political discussion, has had,
+perhaps, a still greater influence in the same direction. And, as
+bribery could only be brought to bear on electors too ignorant to
+estimate the importance of the exercise of the franchise by any
+higher test than the personal advantage it might bring to
+themselves, it is to the general diffusion of education among the
+poorer classes, and their gradually improved and improving
+intelligence that a complete eradication of electoral corruption
+can alone be looked for.</p>
+<p>Notes:</p>
+<p><a name="note-1" id="note-1"><!-- Note Anchor 1 --></a>[Footnote
+1: "Constitutional History," vol. iii., p. 380; ed. 3, 1832. The
+first edition was published in 1827.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-2" id="note-2"><!-- Note Anchor 2 --></a>[Footnote
+2: Grampound. Corrupt voters had been disfranchised in New Shoreham
+as early as 1771, and the franchise of the borough of Cricklade had
+been transferred to the adjoining hundreds in 1782.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-3" id="note-3"><!-- Note Anchor 3 --></a>[Footnote
+3: Parliament was dissolved March 19. Lord Bute succeeded Lord
+Holdernesse March 25.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-4" id="note-4"><!-- Note Anchor 4 --></a>[Footnote
+4: The greater part of Lord Bute's colleagues did, in fact, retain
+their offices. Lord Egremont and Lord Halifax continued to be
+Secretaries of State; Lord Henley (afterward Lord Northington)
+retained the Great Seal; Lord North and Sir John Turner remained as
+Lords of the Treasury; and Mr. Yorke and Sir Fletcher Norton were
+still Attorney and Solicitor General.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-5" id="note-5"><!-- Note Anchor 5 --></a>[Footnote
+5: Parliament was prorogued April 19, and <i>The North Briton</i>
+(No. 45) was published April 23.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-6" id="note-6"><!-- Note Anchor 6 --></a>[Footnote
+6: A letter of the Prince Consort examines the principle of
+ministerial responsibility with so remarkable a clearness of
+perception and distinctness of explanation, that we may be excused
+for quoting it at length: "The notion that the responsibility of
+his advisers impairs the monarch's dignity and importance is a
+complete mistake. Here we have no law of ministerial
+responsibility, for the simple reason that we have no written
+constitution; but this responsibility flows as a logical necessity
+from the dignity of the crown and of the sovereign. 'The King can
+do no wrong,' says the legal axiom, and hence it follows that
+somebody must be responsible for his measures, if these be contrary
+to law or injurious to the country's welfare. Ministers here are
+not responsible <i>qu&acirc;</i> ministers, that is,
+<i>qu&acirc;</i> officials (as such they are responsible to the
+crown), but they are responsible to Parliament and the people, or
+the country, as 'advisers of the crown.' Any one of them may advise
+the crown, and whoever does so is responsible to the country for
+the advice he has given. The so-called accountability of ministers
+to Parliament does not arise out of an abstract principle of
+responsibility, but out of the practical necessity which they are
+under of obtaining the consent of Parliament to legislation and the
+voting of taxes, and, as an essential to this end, of securing its
+confidence. In practice, ministers are liable to account for the
+way and manner in which they have administered the laws which they,
+conjointly with the Parliament, have made, and for the way they
+have expended the moneys that have been voted for definite objects.
+They are bound to furnish explanations, to justify their
+proceedings, to satisfy reasonable scruples, and the answer, 'We
+have, as dutiful subjects, obeyed the sovereign,' will not be
+accepted. 'Have you acted upon conviction, or have you not?' is the
+question. 'If you have not, then you are civil servants of the
+crown, who counsel and do what you consider wrong or unjust, with a
+view to retain your snug places or to win the favor of the
+sovereign.' And this being so, Parliament withdraws its confidence
+from them. Herein, too, lies that ministerial power of which
+sovereigns are so much afraid. They can say, 'We will not do this
+or that which the sovereign wishes, because we cannot be
+responsible for it.' But why should a sovereign see anything here
+to be afraid of? To him it is, in truth, the best of safeguards. A
+really loyal servant should do nothing for which he is not prepared
+to answer, even though his master desires it. This practical
+responsibility is of the utmost advantage to the sovereign. Make
+independence, not subservience, the essential of service, and you
+compel the minister to keep his soul free toward the sovereign, you
+ennoble his advice, you make him staunch and patriotic, while
+time-servers, the submissive instruments of a monarch's extreme
+wishes and commands, may lead, and often have led, him to
+destruction.</p>
+<p>"But to revert to the law of responsibility. This ought not to
+be in effect a safeguard for law itself. As such, it is superfluous
+in this country, where law reigns, and where it would never occur
+to any one that this could be otherwise. But upon the Continent it
+is of the highest importance; as, where the government is an
+outgrowth of a relation of supremacy and subordination between
+sovereign and subject, and the servant, trained in ideas natural to
+this relation, does not know which to obey, the law of the
+sovereign, the existence of such a law would deprive him of the
+excuse which, should he offend the law, and so be guilty of a
+crime, is ready to his hand in the phrase, 'The sovereign ordered
+it so, I have merely obeyed,' while it would be a protection to the
+sovereign that his servants, if guilty of a crime, should not be
+able to saddle him with the blame of it."&mdash;<i>Life of the
+Prince Consort</i>, v., 262.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-7" id="note-7"><!-- Note Anchor 7 --></a>[Footnote
+7: "Lives of the Lord Chancellors," c. cxliii.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-8" id="note-8"><!-- Note Anchor 8 --></a>[Footnote
+8: Indeed, the opinion which Lord Campbell thus expresses is
+manifestly at variance with that which he had previously pronounced
+in his life of Lord Northington, where he praised the House of
+Lords for "very properly rejecting the bill passed by the Commons
+declaring general warrants to be illegal, leaving this question to
+be decided (as it was, satisfactorily) by the Courts of Common
+Law."]</p>
+<p><a name="note-9" id="note-9"><!-- Note Anchor 9 --></a>[Footnote
+9: From a speech of Mr. Grenville delivered at a later period
+(February 3, 1769, "Parliamentary History," xvi., 548), it appears
+that the Secretaries of State who signed this general warrant did
+so against their own judgment. "They repeatedly proposed to have
+Wilkes's name inserted in the warrant of apprehension, but were
+overruled by the lawyers and clerks of the office, who insisted
+that they could not depart from the long-established precedents and
+course of proceeding." And in one of these debates, Mr. Pitt, while
+denouncing with great severity Grenville's conduct in procuring the
+issue of this particular warrant, was driven to a strange
+confession of his own inconsistency, since he was forced to admit
+that, while Secretary of State, he had issued more than one general
+warrant in exactly similar form.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-10" id="note-10">
+<!-- Note Anchor 10 --></a>[Footnote 10: Strange to say, it does
+not seem absolutely certain that Wilkes was the author of the
+"Essay on Woman." Horace Walpole eventually learned, or believed
+that he had learned, that the author was a Mr. Thomas Potter. (See
+Walpole's "George III.," i., 310; and Cunningham's "Note on his
+Correspondence," iv., 126.)]</p>
+<p><a name="note-11" id="note-11">
+<!-- Note Anchor 11 --></a>[Footnote 11: These are the words of the
+resolution.&mdash;<i>Parliamentary History</i>, xvi., 537. But it
+does not appear what the three libels were. The "Essay on Woman"
+was one, the paraphrase of "Veni Creator" was a second; no third of
+that character is mentioned.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-12" id="note-12">
+<!-- Note Anchor 12 --></a>[Footnote 12: The last resolution is
+approved by Mr. Hallam. "If a few precedents were to determine all
+controversies of constitutional law, it is plain enough from the
+journals that the House has assumed the power of incapacitation.
+But as such authority is highly dangerous and unnecessary for any
+good purpose, and as, according to all legal rules, so
+extraordinary a power could not be supported except by a sort of
+prescription that cannot be shown, the final resolution of the
+House of Commons, which condemned the votes passed in times of
+great excitement, appears far more consonant to first
+principles."&mdash;<i>Constitutional History</i>, iii., 357.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-13" id="note-13">
+<!-- Note Anchor 13 --></a>[Footnote 13: Adolphus, "History of
+England," i., 484.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-14" id="note-14">
+<!-- Note Anchor 14 --></a>[Footnote 14: An idea of the license
+which the newspapers complained of had permitted themselves at this
+time may be derived from the manner in which one of them had
+introduced a speech of Mr. Jeremiah Dyson, M.P. for Weymouth, and a
+Commissioner of the Treasury: "Jeremiah Weymouth, the
+d&mdash;&mdash;n of the kingdom, spoke as follows." And it may seem
+that the Opposition (for the affair was made a party question) can
+hardly be acquitted of a discreditable indifference to the dignity
+of the House in supporting a resolution of Colonel Barr&eacute;,
+that "Jeremiah Weymouth, the d&mdash;&mdash;n of this kingdom, is
+not a member of this House." On which the previous question was
+moved by the ministers, and carried by 120 to
+38.&mdash;<i>Parliamentary History</i>, xvii., 78. And an instance
+of rather the opposite kind, of the guarded way in which the most
+respectable publications were as yet accustomed to relate the
+transactions of Parliament, may be gathered from the account of the
+proceedings in the case of Wilkes, given in the "Annual Register"
+for 1770&mdash;drawn up, probably, by Burke himself&mdash;in which
+Lord Camden is only mentioned as "a great law lord;" Lord Chatham
+as "Lord C&mdash;&mdash;m;" Lord Rockingham as "a noble Marquis who
+lately presided at the head of public affairs;" the King as "the
+K&mdash;&mdash;;" Parliament as "P.;" and the House of Commons as
+the "H. of C."&mdash;<i>Annual Register</i>, 1770, pp. 59-67.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-15" id="note-15">
+<!-- Note Anchor 15 --></a>[Footnote 15: On more than one occasion
+there had been disturbances in the City, and in the streets
+adjacent to the Houses of Parliament, which were little short of
+riot. One day the mob paraded effigies of the principal ministers,
+which, after hanging and beheading them, they committed to the
+flames with great uproar. On another day Mr. Charles Fox (as yet a
+vehement Tory) complained to the House that the mob in Palace Yard
+had insulted him, breaking the glasses of his chariot, and pelting
+him with oranges, stones, etc.&mdash;<i>Parliamentary History</i>,
+xvii., 163.]</p>
+<hr />
+<a name="CH2" id="CH2"><!-- CH2 --></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER II.</h2>
+<p class="blockquote">The Regency Bill.&mdash;The Ministry of 1766
+lay an Embargo on Corn.&mdash;An Act of Indemnity is
+Passed.&mdash;The <i>Nullum Tempus</i> Act concerning Crown
+Property; it is sought to Extend it to Church Property, but the
+Attempt fails.&mdash;The Royal Marriage Act.&mdash;The Lords amend
+a Bill imposing Export Duties, etc., on Corn.</p>
+<p>The prosecution of Wilkes was not the only act of Mr.
+Grenville's administration which excited both the Parliament and
+the people. In 1764 the King was attacked by a serious illness,
+and, as the Prince of Wales was an infant scarcely two years old,
+it was manifestly necessary to make arrangements for a Regency, in
+the event of the throne becoming vacant while the heir was still a
+minor. A similar necessity had arisen in the preceding reign on the
+death of the present King's father, and a bill had accordingly been
+introduced by Mr. Pelham, the minister of the day, which, in the
+event of the reigning sovereign dying during the minority of the
+boy who had now become the immediate heir to the throne, vested
+both the guardianship of his person and the Regency of the kingdom
+in his mother, the Princess Dowager of Wales, who, however, in the
+latter capacity, was only to act with the advice of a council,
+composed of her brother-in-law, the Duke of Cumberland, and nine
+principal officers of state. It was not concealed by either the
+King or the Duke that they would have preferred a different
+arrangement, one which would have conferred an uncontrolled Regency
+on the Duke himself; but the bill was passed by great majorities in
+both Houses, and served in some respects as a model for that which
+was now to be brought forward, the difference being that the Regent
+was not to be expressly named in it. To quote the words of the
+royal speech, the King "proposed to the consideration of the two
+Houses whether, under the present circumstances, it would not be
+expedient to vest in him the power of appointing from time to time,
+by instrument in writing under his sign-manual, either the Queen or
+any other member of the royal family usually residing in Great
+Britain, to be the guardian of the person of his successor, and the
+Regent of these kingdoms, until such successor should attain the
+age of eighteen years, subject to such restrictions and regulations
+as were specified and contained in an act passed on a similar
+occasion in the fourteenth year of the late King; the Regent so
+appointed to be assisted by a council, composed of the several
+persons who, by reason of their dignities and offices, were
+constituted members of the council established by that act,
+together with those whom the Parliament might think proper to leave
+to his nomination."</p>
+<p>It may be doubted whether such a power as his Majesty desired
+was quite consistent with the principles of the constitution.
+Parliament had, indeed, granted Henry VIII. the still greater power
+of nominating a series of successors; but the appointment which he
+consequently made by will was eventually superseded, when, on the
+failure of his immediate descendants, the representative of his
+elder sister, whom he had passed over, was seated on the throne, to
+the exclusion of the descendants of his younger sister, to whom he
+had given the preference. In France, the last two kings, Louis
+XIII. and XIV., had both, when on their death-beds, assumed the
+right of making the arrangements for the Regency which would become
+necessary, the heir to the throne being in each case a minor; but
+in each instance the arrangements which they had made were
+disregarded.</p>
+<p>However, on the present occasion the minister (who must be taken
+to have framed the King's speech) and the Parliament agreed in the
+propriety of conferring the nomination of the Regent on the King
+himself;[<a href="#note-16">16</a>] and the bill might have passed
+almost without notice, had it not been for a strange display of the
+Prime-minister's ill-temper and mismanagement. Mr. Grenville was at
+all times uncourtly and dictatorial in his manner, even to the King
+himself; he was also of a suspicious disposition; and though he was
+universally believed to have owed his promotion to his present
+office to the recommendation of Lord Bute,[<a href=
+"#note-17">17</a>] he was extremely jealous of his predecessor. He
+professed to believe, and probably did believe, that the King was
+still greatly under Lord Bute's influence (though, in fact, they
+had never met since that minister had quitted the Treasury), that
+Lord Bute was still as closely connected with the Princess of Wales
+as scandal had formerly reported him to be, and that George III.,
+under the pressure of their combined influence, would be induced to
+name his mother rather than his wife as the future Regent. And he
+was so entirely swayed by this ridiculous and wholly groundless
+fear, that, when the bill to give effect to the royal
+recommendation was introduced into the House of Lords, he
+instigated one of his friends to raise the question who were
+included in the general term "the royal family," which Lord
+Halifax, as Secretary of State, answered by saying that he regarded
+it as meaning "those only who were in order of succession to the
+throne." Such a definition would have excluded the Queen as
+effectually as the Princess Dowager; and when Mr. Grenville found
+the peers reluctant to accept this view (which, indeed, his own
+Lord Chancellor pronounced untenable), he then sent another of his
+colleagues to represent to the King that his mother was so
+unpopular that, even if the Lords should pass the bill in such a
+form as rendered her eligible for nomination, the Commons would
+introduce a clause to exclude her by name. With great
+unwillingness, and, it is said, not without tears, George III.
+consented to the bill being so drawn as to exclude her, and it
+passed the Lords in such a form. But when it reached the Commons it
+was found that if the leaders of the Opposition hated Bute much,
+they hated Grenville more. They moved the insertion of the name of
+the Princess Dowager as one of the members of the royal family whom
+the King might nominate Regent, if it should please him. Even
+Grenville had not the boldness publicly to disparage his royal
+master's royal mother; the Princess's name was inserted by a
+unanimous vote in the list of those from whom the King was
+empowered to select the Regent, and the amendment was gladly
+accepted by the House of Lords.[<a href="#note-18">18</a>]</p>
+<p>In spite, however, of the unanimity of the two Houses on the
+question, it will probably be thought that the authors of the
+amendment, by which it was proposed to address the King with an
+entreaty to name in the bill the person to whom he desired to
+intrust the Regency, acted more in the spirit of the constitution
+than those who were contented that the name should be omitted;
+indeed, that statesmen of the present century agree in holding that
+an arrangement of such importance should be made by the Houses of
+Parliament, in concurrence with the sovereign, and not by the
+sovereign alone, is shown by the steps taken to provide for a
+Regency in the event of the demise of the reigning sovereign while
+the heir was a minor, in the last and in the present reign, the
+second bill (that of 1840) being in this respect of the greater
+authority, since Lord Melbourne, the Prime-minister, did not
+propose it without previously securing the approval of the Duke of
+Wellington, in his character of leader of the Opposition.</p>
+<p>We pass over for a moment the administration of Lord Rockingham,
+as we have already passed over the taxation of our North American
+Colonies by Mr. Grenville, because it will be more convenient to
+take all the transactions relating to that subject together when we
+arrive at the time when the troubles arising out of the policy of
+the different administrations toward those Colonies were brought to
+a head by the breaking out of civil war. Lord Rockingham's
+ministry, which succeeded Mr. Grenville's, had, as is well known,
+but a brief existence, and was replaced by the cabinet so
+whimsically composed by Mr. Pitt, who reserved to himself the
+office of Privy Seal, with the Earldom of Chatham; the Duke of
+Grafton being the nominal head of the Treasury, but the direction
+of affairs being wholly in the hands of the new Earl, till the
+failure of his health compelled his temporary retirement from
+public life. Lord Chatham was brother-in-law to Mr. Grenville, to
+whom in the occasional arrogance and arbitrariness of his
+disposition he bore some resemblance; and one of the earliest acts
+of his administration, when coupled with the language which he held
+on the subject in the House of Lords, displayed that side of his
+character in a very conspicuous light.</p>
+<p>The summer of 1766 had been unusually wet and cold, both at home
+and abroad, and the harvest had, in consequence, been so deficient
+as to cause a very general apprehension of scarcity, while rumors
+were spread that the high prices which the shortness of the crops
+could not fail to produce were artificially raised by the selfish
+covetousness of some of the principal corn-dealers, who were buying
+up all the grain which came into the market, and storing it, with
+the object of making an exorbitant profit out of the necessities of
+the consumer, not only at home but abroad. The poorer classes,
+seeing themselves, as they believed, threatened with famine, rose
+in riotous crowds, in some places attacking the barns in which the
+corn was stored, and threatening destruction to both the
+storehouses and the owners. The ministry first tried to repress the
+discontent by the issue of a proclamation against "forestallers and
+regraters," framed in the language and spirit of the Middle Ages;
+and, when that proved ineffectual to restore confidence, they
+issued an Order in Council absolutely prohibiting the exportation
+of any kind of grain, and authorizing the detention of any vessels
+lying in any British harbor which might be loaded with such a
+cargo. Our annals furnished no instance of such an embargo having
+been laid on any article of commerce in time of peace; but the
+crisis was difficult, the danger to the tranquillity of the kingdom
+was great and undeniable, the necessity for instant action seemed
+urgent, and probably few would have been inclined to cavil at Lord
+Chatham's assertion, that the embargo "was an act of power which,
+during the recess of Parliament, was justifiable on the ground of
+necessity," had the ministry at once called Parliament together to
+sanction the measure by an act of indemnity. But Lord Chatham was
+at all times inclined to carry matters with a high hand, and
+willingly adopted the opinion advanced by the Chancellor (Lord
+Northington), that "the measure was strictly legal, and that no
+indemnity was necessary." Lord Northington's language on the
+subject Lord Campbell describes as "exhibiting his characteristic
+rashness and recklessness, which seemed to be aggravated by age and
+experience,"[<a href="#note-19">19</a>] and the censure does not
+seem too severe, since he presently "went so far as to maintain
+that the crown had a right to interfere, even against a positive
+act of parliament, and that proof of the necessity amounted to a
+legal justification." But, however ill-considered his language may
+have been, Lord Chatham adopted it, and acted on it so far as to
+decline calling the Parliament together before the appointed time,
+though, when the Houses did meet, he allowed General Conway, as
+Secretary of State, to introduce a bill of indemnity in the House
+of Commons. It was warmly opposed in that House, partly on the
+ground that, if such a measure as the embargo had been necessary,
+it would have been easy to have assembled Parliament before the
+Order in Council was issued (for, in fact, the proclamation against
+forestallers and regraters had been issued on the 10th of
+September, when Parliament, if not farther prorogued, would have
+met within a week). But on that same day Parliament was farther
+prorogued from the 16th of September till the 11th of
+November,[<a href="#note-20">20</a>] and it was not till after that
+prorogation, on the 24th of September, that the Order in Council
+was issued.</p>
+<p>In the House of Lords it seems to have been admitted that the
+embargo was, under all the circumstances, not only desirable, but
+"indispensably necessary."[<a href="#note-21">21</a>] But the
+Opposition in that House, being led by a great lawyer
+(Chief-justice Lord Mansfield), took a wider view of the whole
+case; and, after denouncing the long prorogation of Parliament as
+having been so culpably advised that there was no way left of
+meeting the emergency but by an interposition of the royal power,
+directed the principal weight of their argument against the
+doctrine of the existence of any dispensing power. It was urged
+that the late Order in Council could only be justified by "the
+general proposition that of any, and, if of any, of every, act of
+parliament the King, with the advice of the Privy Council, may
+suspend the execution and effect whenever his Majesty, so advised,
+judges it necessary for the immediate safety of the people." And
+this proposition was denounced as utterly inconsistent with the
+principles of the Revolution, which had been "nothing but a most
+lawless and wicked invasion of the rights of the crown," if such a
+dispensing power were really one of the lawful prerogatives of the
+sovereign. Reference was made to the powers in more than one
+instance, and especially in the case of ship-money claimed and
+exercised by Charles I.; and it was affirmed that "the dispensing
+and suspending power, and that of raising money without the consent
+of Parliament, were precisely alike, and stood on the very same
+ground. They were born twins; they lived together, and together
+were buried in the same grave at the Revolution, past all power of
+resurrection." It was even argued that the dispensing or suspending
+power was yet more dangerous than that of raising money without a
+Parliamentary vote, since it was a power which might do the most
+mischief, and with the greatest speed, so many were the subjects
+which it included. It would be a return to the maxims of the
+idolators of prerogative as understood in those earlier days, that
+is, of absolute and arbitrary power, <i>a Deo Rex, a Rege Lex</i>.
+It was farther argued that, unless it could be said that the moment
+Parliament breaks up the King stands in its place, and that the
+continuance of acts is consigned into his hands, he cannot of right
+suspend any more than he can make laws, both acts requiring the
+same power. The law is above the King, and the crown as well as the
+subject is bound by it as much during the recess as in the session
+of Parliament; and therefore the wisdom of the constitution has
+excluded every discretion in the crown over a positive statute, and
+has emancipated Parliament from the royal prerogative, leaving the
+power of suspension, which is but another name for a temporary
+repeal, to reside where the legislative power is lodged&mdash;that
+is, in King, Lords, and Commons, who together constitute the only
+supreme authority of this government. Precedents were cited to
+prove that in former times different ministries had avoided thus
+taking the law into their own hands, as when, in 1709 and again in
+1756, there was a similar apprehension of scarcity, even though
+both those years were years of war. And the Bill of Rights was
+quoted as the statute in which every sort of dispensing power was
+condemned, though, as exercised by James II., it had only been
+exerted in dispensing with penal laws and remitting penalties.</p>
+<p>"Finally," said one speaker, who perhaps was Lord Mansfield
+himself, "he is not a moderate minister who would rashly decide in
+favor of prerogative in a question where the rights of Parliament
+are involved, nor a prudent minister who, even in a doubtful case,
+commits the prerogative, by a wanton experiment, to what degree the
+people will bear the extent of it. The opposite course was that by
+which a minister would consult the best interests of the crown, as
+well as of the people. The safety of the crown, as well as the
+security of the subject, requires the closing up of every avenue
+that can lead to tyranny."[<a href="#note-22">22</a>]</p>
+<p>These arguments prevailed, and the indemnity bill was passed, to
+quote the words of the "Annual Register"&mdash;at that time written
+by Burke&mdash;"very much to the satisfaction of the public." And
+that it should have been so accepted is creditable to the
+good-sense of both parties. The precedent which was thus
+established does, indeed, seem to rest on a principle indispensable
+to the proper working of a constitutional government. In so
+extensive an empire as ours, it is scarcely possible that sudden
+emergencies, requiring the instant application of some remedy,
+should not at times arise; and, unless Parliament be sitting at the
+time, such can only be adequately dealt with if the ministers of
+the crown have the courage to take such steps as are necessary,
+whether by the suspension of a law or by any other expedient, on
+their own responsibility, trusting in their ability to satisfy the
+Parliament, instantly convoked to receive their explanation, of the
+necessity or wisdom of their proceedings; and in the candor of the
+Parliament to recognize, if not the judiciousness of their action,
+at all events the good faith in which it has been taken, and the
+honest, patriotic intention which has dictated it. The
+establishment of the obligation instantly to submit the question to
+the judgment of Parliament will hardly be denied to be a sufficient
+safeguard against the ministerial abuse of such a power; and the
+instances in which such a power has since been exercised, coupled
+with the sanction of such exercise by Parliament, are a practical
+approval and ratification by subsequent Parliaments of the course
+that was now adopted.[<a href="#note-23">23</a>]</p>
+<p>The next year a not very creditable job of the ministry led to
+the enactment of a statute of great importance to all holders of
+property which had ever belonged to the crown. In the twenty-first
+year of James I. a bill had been passed giving a secure tenure of
+their estates to all grantees of crown lands whose possession of
+them had lasted sixty years. The Houses had desired to make the
+enactment extend to all future as well as to all previous grants.
+But to this James had refused to consent; and, telling the Houses
+that "beggars must not be choosers," he had compelled them to
+content themselves with a retrospective statute. Since his time,
+and especially in the reigns of Charles II. and William III., the
+crown had been more lavish and unscrupulous than at any former
+period in granting away its lands and estates to favorites. And no
+one had been so largely enriched by its prodigality as the most
+grasping of William's Dutch followers, Bentinck, the founder of the
+English house of Portland. Among the estates which he had obtained
+from his royal master's favor was one which went by the name of the
+Honor of Penrith. Subsequent administrations had augmented the
+dignities and importance of his family. Their Earldom had been
+exchanged for a Dukedom; but the existing Duke was an opponent of
+the present ministry, who, to punish him, suggested to Sir James
+Lowther, a baronet of ancient family, and of large property in the
+North of England, the idea of applying to the crown for a grant of
+the forest of Inglewood, and of the manor of Carlisle, which
+hitherto had been held by Portland as belonging to the Honor of
+Penrith, but which, not having been expressly mentioned in the
+original grant by William III., it was now said had been regarded
+as included in the honor only by mistake. It was not denied that
+Portland had enjoyed the ownership of these lands for upward of
+seventy years without dispute; and, had the statute of James been
+one of continual operation, it would have been impossible to
+deprive him of them. But, as matters stood, the Lords of the
+Treasury willingly listened to the application of Sir James
+Lowther; they even refused permission to the Duke to examine the
+original deed and the other documents in the office of the
+surveyor, on which he professed to rely for the establishment of
+his right; and they granted to Sir James the lands he prayed for at
+a rent which could only be regarded as nominal. The injustice of
+the proceeding was so flagrant, that in the beginning of 1768 Sir
+George Savile brought in a bill to prevent any repetition of such
+an act by making the statute of James I. perpetual, so that for the
+future a possession for sixty years should confer an indisputable
+and indefeasible title. The ministers opposed it with great
+vehemence, even taking some credit to themselves for their
+moderation in not requiring from the Duke a repayment of the
+proceeds of the lands in question for the seventy years during
+which he had held them. But the case was so bad that they could
+only defeat Sir George Savile by a side-wind and a scanty majority,
+carrying an amendment to defer any decision of the matter till the
+next session. Sir George, however, was not discouraged; he renewed
+his motion in 1769, when it was carried by a large majority, with
+an additional clause extending its operation to the Colonies in
+North America; and thus, in respect of its territorial rights, the
+crown was placed on the same footing as any private individual, and
+the same length of tenure which enabled a possessor to hold a
+property against another subject henceforth equally enabled him to
+hold it against the crown. The policy not less than the justice of
+such an enactment might have been thought to commend it to every
+thinking man as soon as the heat engendered by a party debate had
+passed away. It had merely placed the sovereign and the subject on
+the same footing in respect of the security which prescription gave
+to possession. And it might, therefore, have been thought that the
+vote of 1769 had settled the point in every case; since what was
+the law between one private individual and another, and between the
+sovereign and a subject, might well have been taken to be of
+universal application. But the ministry were strangely unwilling to
+recognize such a universal character in the late act, and found in
+the peculiar character of ecclesiastical bodies and ecclesiastical
+property a pretext for weakening the force of the late enactment,
+by denying the applicability of the principle to the claims of
+ecclesiastical chapters. In 1772 Mr. Henry Seymour, one of the
+members for Huntingdon, moved for leave to bring in a bill, which
+he described as one "for quieting the subjects of the realm against
+the dormant claims of the Church;" or, in other words, for putting
+the Church on the same footing with respect to property which had
+passed out of its possession as the crown had been placed in by the
+act of 1769. He contended that such a bill ought to be passed, not
+only on the general principle that possessors who derived their
+property from one source ought not to be less secure than they who
+derived it from another, but also on the grounds that, as
+ecclesiastical bodies occasionally used their power, "length of
+possession, which fortified and strengthened legal right and just
+title in every other case, did in this alone render them more weak
+and uncertain," from the difficulty which often occurred in finding
+documentary proof of very ancient titles; and that this was not an
+imaginary danger, since a member of the House then present had
+recently lost &pound;120,000 by a bishop reviving a claim to an
+estate after the gentleman's family had been in undisturbed
+possession of it above a hundred years. The defence of the Church,
+however, was taken up by Mr. Skinner, Attorney-general for the
+Duchy of Lancaster, who argued that though, in the case of the
+crown, the <i>nullum tempus</i> which it had formerly claimed, and
+which had been put an end to in 1769, was "an engine in the hands
+of the strong to oppress the weak, the <i>nullum tempus</i> of the
+Church was a defence to the weak against the strong," as its best
+if not its sole security "against the encroachment of the laity."
+The "Parliamentary History" records that in the course of a long
+debate Lord North opposed the bringing in of the bill, as did "the
+Lord-advocate of Scotland, who gave as a reason in favor of the
+bill, though he voted against it, that a law of similar nature had
+passed in Scotland, and that the whole kingdom, clergy as well as
+laity, found the very best effects from it."[<a href=
+"#note-24">24</a>] Burke argued in favor of the bill with great
+force, declaring that in so doing "he did not mean anything against
+the Church, her dignities, her honor, her privileges, or her
+possessions; he should wish even to enlarge them all; but this bill
+was to take nothing from her but the power of making herself
+odious." But the ministerial majority was too well disciplined to
+be broken, and Mr. Seymour could not even obtain leave to bring in
+the bill.</p>
+<p>The year 1772 was marked by the discussion of a measure which
+the King seems to have regarded as one of private interest only,
+affecting his personal rights over his own family. But it is
+impossible to regard transactions which may affect the right of
+succession to the throne as matters of only private interest. And
+indeed the bill was treated as one involving a constitutional
+question by both sides of both Houses, and as such was discussed
+with remarkable earnestness, and with vehemence equalling that of
+any other debate which had as yet taken place since the
+commencement of the reign. The bill had its origin in the personal
+feelings of the King himself, who had been greatly annoyed at the
+conduct of his brother, the Duke of Cumberland, in marrying a widow
+of the name of Horton, daughter of Lord Irnham, and sister of the
+Colonel Luttrell whom the vote of the House of Commons had seated
+as member for Middlesex; and perhaps still more at the discovery
+that his other brother, the Duke of Gloucester, to whom he was
+greatly attached, had married another subject, the widowed Lady
+Waldegrave. His Majesty's dissatisfaction was, perhaps, heightened
+by the recollection that he himself, in early manhood, had also
+been strongly attracted by the charms of another subject, and had
+sacrificed his own inclinations to the combined considerations of
+pride of birth and the interests of his kingdom. And, though there
+was a manifest difference between the importance of the marriage of
+the sovereign himself and that of princes who were never likely to
+become sovereigns, he thought it not unreasonable that he should be
+empowered to exercise such a general guardianship over the entire
+family, of which he was the head, as might enable him to control
+its members in such arrangements, by making his formal sanction
+indispensable to the validity of any matrimonial alliances which
+they might desire to contract. A somewhat similar question had been
+raised in 1717, when George I., having quarrelled with the Prince
+of Wales (afterward George II.), asserted a claim to control and
+direct the education of all the Prince's children, and, when they
+should be of marriageable age, to arrange their marriages. The
+Prince, on the other hand, insisted on his natural and inalienable
+right, as their father, to have the entire government of his own
+offspring, a right which, as he contended, no royal prerogative
+could be enabled or permitted to override. That question was not,
+however, brought before Parliament, to which, at that time, the
+King could, probably, not have trusted for any leanings in his
+favor; but he referred it, in an informal way, to the Lord
+Chancellor (Lord Cowper) and the Common-law Judges. They
+investigated it with great minuteness. A number of precedents were
+adduced for the marriage and education of the members of the royal
+family being regulated by the sovereign, beginning with Henry III.,
+who gave his daughter Joan, without her own consent, in marriage to
+the King of Scotland, and coming down to the preceding century, at
+the commencement of which the Council of James I. committed the
+Lady Arabella Stuart and Mr. Seymour to the Tower for contracting a
+secret marriage without the King's permission, and at the end of
+which King William exercised the right of selecting a tutor for the
+Duke of Gloucester, the son of the Princess Anne, without any
+consultation with the Princess herself; and finally the judges,
+with only two dissenting voices, expressed their conviction that
+the King was entitled to the prerogative which he claimed. The case
+does not, however, seem to have been regularly argued before them;
+there is no trace of their having been assisted in their
+deliberations by counsel on either side, and their extra-judicial
+opinion was clearly destitute of any formal authority;[<a href=
+"#note-25">25</a>] so that it came before Parliament in some degree
+as a new question.</p>
+<p>But George III. was not of a disposition to allow such matters
+to remain in doubt, and, in compliance with his desire, a bill was,
+in 1772, introduced by Lord Rochfort, as Secretary of State, which
+proposed to enact that no descendants of the late King, being
+children or grandchildren, and presumptive heirs of the sovereign,
+male or female, other than the issue of princesses who might be
+married into foreign families, should be capable of contracting a
+valid marriage without the previous consent of the reigning
+sovereign, signified under his sign-manual, and that any marriage
+contracted without such consent should be null and void. The King
+or the ministers apparently doubted whether Parliament could be
+prevailed on to make such a prohibition life-long, and therefore a
+clause was added which provided that if any prince or princess
+above the age of twenty-five years should determine to contract a
+marriage without such consent of the sovereign, he or she might do
+so on giving twelve months' notice to the Privy Council; and such
+marriage should be good and valid, unless, before the expiration of
+the twelve months, both Houses of Parliament should declare their
+disapproval of the marriage. The concluding clause of the bill made
+it felony "to presume to solemnize, or to assist, or to be present,
+at the celebration of any such marriage without such consent being
+first obtained."</p>
+<p>The bill was stoutly resisted in both Houses at every stage,
+both on the ground of usage and of general principle. It was
+positively denied that the "sovereign's right of approving of all
+marriages in the royal family," which was asserted in the preamble
+of the bill, was either founded in law, or established by
+precedent, or warranted by the opinion of the judges. And it was
+contended that there never had been a time when the possession of
+royal rank had been considered necessary to qualify any one to
+become consort of an English prince or princess. It had not even
+been regarded as a necessary qualification for a queen. Three of
+the wives of Henry VIII. had been English subjects wholly
+unconnected with the royal family; nor had the Parliament nor the
+people in general complained of any one of those marriages;
+moreover, two of his children, who had in their turn succeeded to
+the crown, had been the offspring of two of those wives; and in the
+last century James II., while Duke of York, had married the
+daughter of an English gentleman; and, though it had not been
+without notorious reluctance that his royal brother had sanctioned
+that connection, it was well known that Charles II. himself had
+proposed to marry the niece of Cardinal Mazarin. In the House of
+Peers, Lord Camden especially objected to the clause annulling a
+marriage between persons of full age; and in the Commons, Mr.
+Dowdeswell, who had been Chancellor of the Exchequer in Lord
+Rockingham's administration, dwelt with especial vigor on the
+unreasonableness of the clause which fixed twenty-five as the age
+before which no prince or princess could marry without the King's
+consent. "Law, positive law," he argued, "and not the arbitrary
+will of an individual, should be the only restraint. Men who are by
+law allowed at twenty-one[<a href="#note-26">26</a>] to be fit for
+governing the realm may well be supposed capable of choosing and
+governing a wife."[<a href="#note-27">27</a>] Lord Folkestone
+condemned with great earnestness the expression in the preamble
+that the bill was dictated "by the royal concern for the honor and
+dignity of the crown," as implying a doctrine that an alliance of a
+subject with a branch of the royal family is dishonorable to the
+crown&mdash;a doctrine which he denounced as "an oblique insult" to
+the whole people, and which, as such, "the representatives of the
+people were bound to oppose." And he also objected to the
+"vindicatory part," as he termed the clause which declared those
+who might assist, or even be present, at a marriage contracted
+without the royal permission guilty of felony.[<a href=
+"#note-28">28</a>]</p>
+<p>The ministry, however, had a decided majority in both Houses,
+and the bill became and remains the law of the land, though
+fourteen peers, including one bishop, entered a protest against it
+on nine different grounds, one of which condemned it as "an
+extension of the royal prerogative for which the great majority of
+the judges found no authority;" while another, with something of
+prophetic sagacity, urged that the bill "was pregnant with civil
+discord and confusion, and had a natural tendency to produce a
+disputed title to the crown."</p>
+<p>It may be doubted whether the circumstances which had induced
+George III. to demand such a power as that with which the bill
+invested him justified its enactment. He was already the father of
+a family so numerous as to render it highly improbable that either
+of his brothers or any of their children would ever come to the
+throne; while, as a previously existing law barred any prince or
+princess who might marry a Roman Catholic from the succession, the
+additional restraint imposed by the new statute practically limited
+their choice to an inconveniently small number of foreign royal
+houses, many of which, to say the least, are not superior in
+importance or purity of blood to many of our own nobles.</p>
+<a name="horton" id="horton"></a>
+<p>Nor can it be said to have been successful in accomplishing his
+Majesty's object. It is notorious that two of his sons, and very
+generally believed that one of his daughters, married subjects; the
+Prince of Wales having chosen a wife who was not only inferior in
+rank and social position to Lady Waldegrave or Mrs. Horton, but was
+moreover a Roman Catholic; and that another of his sons petitioned
+more than once for permission to marry an English heiress of
+ancient family. And our present sovereign may be thought to have
+pronounced her opinion that the act goes too far, when she gave one
+of her younger daughters in marriage to a nobleman who, however
+high in rank, has no royal blood in his veins. The political
+inconvenience which might arise from the circumstance of the
+reigning sovereign being connected by near and intimate
+relationship with a family of his British subjects will, probably,
+always be thought to render it desirable that some restriction
+should be placed on the marriage of the heir-apparent; but where
+the sovereign is blessed with a numerous offspring, there seems no
+sufficient reason for sending the younger branches of the royal
+house to seek wives or husbands in foreign countries. And as the
+precedent set in the case of the Princess Louise has been generally
+approved, it is probable that in similar circumstances it may be
+followed, and that such occasional relaxation of the act of 1772
+will be regarded as justified by and consistent with the
+requirements of public policy as well as by the laws of
+nature.[<a href="#note-29">29</a>] Generally speaking, the two
+Houses agreed in their support of the ministerial policy both at
+home and abroad; but, in spite of this political harmony, a certain
+degree of bad feeling existed between them, which on one occasion
+led to a somewhat singular scene in the House of Commons. The
+Commons imputed its origin to the discourtesy of the Lords, who,
+when members of the Commons were ordered by their House to carry
+its bills up to the peers, sometimes kept them "waiting three hours
+in the lobby among their lordships' footmen before they admitted
+them." Burke affirmed that this had happened to himself, and that
+he "spoke of it, not out of any personal pride, nor as an indignity
+to himself, but as a flagrant disgrace to the House of Commons,
+which, he apprehended, was not inferior in rank to any other branch
+of the Legislature, but co-ordinate with them." And the irritation
+which such treatment excited led the Commons, perhaps not very
+unnaturally, to seek some opportunity to vindicate their dignity.
+They found it in an amendment which the Lords made on a corn bill.
+In the middle of April, 1772, resolutions had been passed by the
+Commons, in a committee of the whole House, imposing certain duties
+on the importation of wheat[<a href="#note-30">30</a>] and other
+grain when they were at a certain price, which was fixed at 48s.,
+and granting bounties on exportation when the price fell below 44s.
+The Lords made several amendments on the bill, and, among others,
+one to strike out the clause which granted bounties. But when the
+bill thus amended came back to the Commons, even those who disliked
+the principle of bounties resented this act of the Lords in
+meddling with that question, which they regarded as a violation of
+their peculiar and most cherished privilege, the exclusive right of
+dealing with questions of taxation. Governor Pownall, who had
+charge of the bill, declared that the Lords had forgotten their
+duty when they interfered in raising money by the insertion of a
+clause that "no bounty should be paid upon exported corn." And on
+this ground he moved the rejection of the bill.[<a href=
+"#note-31">31</a>] In the <a href="#CH13">last chapter of this
+volume</a>, a more fitting occasion for examining the rights and
+usages of the House of Lords with respect to money-bills will be
+furnished by a series of resolutions on the subject, moved by the
+Prime-minister of the day. It is sufficient here to say that the
+power of rejection is manifestly so different from that of
+originating grants&mdash;which is admitted to belong exclusively to
+the Commons&mdash;and that there were so many precedents for the
+Lords having exerted this power of rejection in the course of the
+preceding century, that they probably never conceived that in so
+doing now they were committing any encroachment on the
+constitutional rights and privileges of the Lower House. But on
+this occasion the ill-feeling previously existing between the two
+Houses may be thought to have predisposed the Commons to seek
+opportunity for a quarrel. And there never was a case in which both
+parties in the House were more unanimous. Governor Pownall called
+the rejection of the clause by the Lords "a flagrant encroachment
+upon the privileges of the House," and affirmed that the Lords had
+"forgotten their duty." Burke termed it "a proof that the Lords did
+not understand the principles of the constitution, an invasion of a
+known and avowed right inherent in the House as the representatives
+of the people," and expressed a hope that "they were not yet so
+infamous and abandoned as to relinquish this essential right," or
+to submit to "the annihilation of all their authority." Others
+called it "an affront which the House was bound to resent, and the
+more imperatively in consequence of the absence of a good
+understanding between the two Houses." And the Speaker, Sir John
+Cust, went beyond all his brother members in violence, declaring
+that "he would do his part in the business, and toss the bill over
+the table." The bill was rejected <i>nem. con.</i>, and the Speaker
+tossed it over the table, several of the members on both sides of
+the question kicking it as they went out;[<a href=
+"#note-32">32</a>] and to such a pitch of exasperation had they
+worked themselves up, that "the Game Bill, in which the Lords had
+made alterations, was served in a similar manner," though those
+alterations only referred to the penalties to be imposed for
+violations of the Game-law, and could by no stretch of ingenuity be
+connected with any question of taxation.</p>
+<p>Notes:</p>
+<p><a name="note-16" id="note-16">
+<!-- Note Anchor 16 --></a>[Footnote 16: A motion was, indeed, made
+(but the "Parliamentary History," xvi., 55, omits to state by whom)
+that the House should "humbly entreat his Majesty, out of his
+tender and paternal regard for his people, that he would be
+graciously pleased to name the person or persons whom, in his royal
+wisdom, he shall think fit to propose to the consideration of
+Parliament for the execution of those high trusts, this House
+apprehending it not warranted by precedent nor agreeable to the
+principles of this free constitution to vest in any person or
+persons not particularly named and approved of in Parliament the
+important offices of Regent of these kingdoms and guardian of the
+royal offspring heirs to the crown." But "it passed in the
+negative," probably, if we may judge by other divisions on motions
+made by the same party, by an overwhelming majority.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-17" id="note-17">
+<!-- Note Anchor 17 --></a>[Footnote 17: No one doubted that this
+choice had been made under the influence of Lord Bute, and was
+designed for the preservation of that influence.&mdash;Lord
+Stanhope, <i>History of England</i>, v., 41.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-18" id="note-18">
+<!-- Note Anchor 18 --></a>[Footnote 18: In his speech in the House
+of Lords on the Regency Bill of 1840, the Duke of Sussex stated
+that George III. had nominated the Queen as Regent in the first
+instance, and, in the event of her death, the Princess
+Dowager.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-19" id="note-19">
+<!-- Note Anchor 19 --></a>[Footnote 19: "Lives of the
+Chancellors," c. cxli.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-20" id="note-20">
+<!-- Note Anchor 20 --></a>[Footnote 20: It appears from these
+dates that it was not yet understood that Parliament could not be
+prorogued for a longer period than forty days.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-21" id="note-21">
+<!-- Note Anchor 21 --></a>[Footnote 21: These words occur in a
+speech attributed to Lord Mansfield. There is no detailed account
+of the debates on this subject in either House. All that exists in
+the "Parliamentary History" is a very brief abstract of the
+discussion in the Commons, and a document occupying above sixty
+pages of the same work (pp. 251-314), entitled "A Speech on behalf
+of the Constitution against the Suspending and Dispensing
+Prerogative," etc., with a foot-note explaining that "this speech
+was supposed to be penned by Lord Mansfield, but was, in fact,
+written by Mr. Macintosh, assisted by Lord Temple and Lord
+Lyttleton." It certainly seems to contain internal evidence that it
+was not written by any lawyer, from the sneers at and denunciations
+of lawyers which it contains, as a class of men who "have often
+appeared to be the worst guardians of the constitution, and too
+frequently the wickedest enemies to, and most treacherous betrayers
+of, the liberties of their country." But, by whomsoever it was
+"penned" and published, the arguments which it contains against the
+dispensing power were, probably, those which had been urged by the
+great Chief-justice, and as such I have ventured to cite them
+here.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-22" id="note-22">
+<!-- Note Anchor 22 --></a>[Footnote 22: In his "Lives of the
+Chief-justices" (c. xxxvi., life of Lord Mansfield), Lord Campbell
+says, with reference to this case: "The Chief-justice's only
+considerable public exhibition during this period was his attack on
+the unconstitutional assertion of Lord Chatham and Lord Camden,
+that, in a case of great public emergency, the crown could by law
+dispense with an act of parliament. The question arising from the
+embargo on the exportation of corn, in consequence of apprehended
+famine, he proved triumphantly that, although the measure was
+expedient and proper, it was a violation of law, and required to be
+sanctioned by an act of indemnity." And Lord Campbell adds, in a
+note: "This doctrine, acted upon in 1827, during the administration
+of Mr. Canning, and on several subsequent occasions, is now
+universally taken for constitutional law" (ii., 468).]</p>
+<p><a name="note-23" id="note-23">
+<!-- Note Anchor 23 --></a>[Footnote 23: To adduce a single
+instance, worthy of remark as affecting the personal liberty of the
+subject, in 1818 a bill of indemnity was passed to sanction the
+action of the ministry in arresting and detaining in prison,
+without bringing them to trial, several persons accused of being
+implicated in seditious proceedings (<i>vide infra</i>).]</p>
+<p><a name="note-24" id="note-24">
+<!-- Note Anchor 24 --></a>[Footnote 24: Vol. xvii., 304.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-25" id="note-25">
+<!-- Note Anchor 25 --></a>[Footnote 25: The case is mentioned by
+Lord Campbell in his "Lives of the Chancellors," c. cxxi. (life of
+Lord Macclesfield) and c. cxxiv. (life of Lord Chancellor
+King).]</p>
+<p><a name="note-26" id="note-26">
+<!-- Note Anchor 26 --></a>[Footnote 26: In fact, however, the age
+at which a young prince was considered competent to exercise the
+royal authority in person had been fixed at eighteen; and it is so
+stated in the speech in which the King, in 1765, recommended the
+appointment of a Regent to Parliament.&mdash;<i>Parliamentary
+History</i>, xvi., 52.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-27" id="note-27">
+<!-- Note Anchor 27 --></a>[Footnote 27: This idea was expanded
+into an epigram, which appeared in most of the daily papers, and
+has been thought worthy of being preserved in the "Parliamentary
+History," xvii., 401 (note):</p>
+<p class="poetry">"Quoth Dick to Tom, 'This act appears<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Absurd, as I'm alive,<br />
+To take the crown at eighteen years,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;A wife at twenty-five.<br />
+The mystery how shall we explain?<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;For sure, as Dowdeswell said,<br />
+Thus early if they're fit to <i>reign</i>,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;They must be fit to <i>wed</i>.'<br />
+Quoth Tom to Dick, 'Thou art a fool,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;And nothing know'st of life;<br />
+Alas! it's easier far to rule<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;A kingdom than a wife.'"]</p>
+<p><a name="note-28" id="note-28">
+<!-- Note Anchor 28 --></a>[Footnote 28: It is remarkable that this
+clause on one occasion proved an obstacle to the punishment of the
+abettors of such a marriage. In 1793 the Duke of Sussex married
+Lady Augusta Murray, first at Rome, and afterward, by banns, at St.
+George's, Hanover Square. And when the affair came to be
+investigated by the Privy Council, Lord Thurlow denounced the
+conduct of the pair in violent terms, and angrily asked the
+Attorney-general, Sir John Scott, why he had not prosecuted all the
+parties concerned in this abominable marriage. Sir John's reply, as
+he reported it himself, was sufficiently conclusive: "I answered
+that it was a very difficult business to prosecute; that the act,
+it was understood, had been drawn by Lord Mansfield, the
+Attorney-general Thurlow, and the Solicitor-general Wedderburn,
+who, unluckily, had made all persons present at the marriage guilty
+of felony. And as nobody could prove the marriage except a person
+who had been present at it, there could be no prosecution, because
+nobody present could be compelled to be a witness."&mdash;Thorp's
+<i>Life of Eldon</i>, i., 235.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-29" id="note-29">
+<!-- Note Anchor 29 --></a>[Footnote 29: A protest against the
+bill, entered by fourteen peers, including one bishop (of Bangor),
+denounced it, among other objections, as "contrary to the original
+inherent rights of human nature ... exceeding the power permitted
+by Divine Providence to human legislation ... and shaking many of
+the foundations of law, religion, and public
+security."&mdash;<i>Parliamentary History</i>, xvii., 391.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-30" id="note-30">
+<!-- Note Anchor 30 --></a>[Footnote 30: The import duty on wheat
+was fixed at 6<i>d</i>. a quarter on grain, and 2<i>d</i>. per cwt.
+on flour, when the price of wheat in the kingdom should be at or
+above 48s.; when it was at or above 44s., the exportation was to be
+altogether prohibited.&mdash;<i>Parliamentary History</i>, xvii.,
+476.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-31" id="note-31">
+<!-- Note Anchor 31 --></a>[Footnote 31: See Hallam,
+"Constitutional History," iii., 38-46, ed. 1833, where, as far as
+the imperfection of our early Parliamentary records allows, he
+traces the origin of the assertion of this peculiar privilege by
+the Commons, especially referring to a discussion of the proper
+limits of this privilege in several conferences between the two
+Houses; where, as on some other occasions, he sees, in the
+assertion of their alleged rights by the Commons, "more disposition
+to make encroachments than to guard against those of others." A few
+years before (in 1763), the House of Lords showed that they had no
+doubt of their right to reject a money-bill, since they divided on
+the Cider Bill, which came under that description. As, however, the
+bill was passed, that division was not brought under the notice of
+the House. But in 1783, in the time of the Coalition Ministry, the
+peers having made amendments on the American Intercourse Bill, "the
+Speaker observed that, as the bill empowered the crown to impose
+duties, it was, strictly speaking, a money-bill, and therefore the
+House could not, consistently with its own orders, suffer the Lords
+to make any amendments on it, and he recommended that the
+consideration of their amendments should be postponed for three
+months, and in the mean time a new bill framed according to the
+Lords' amendments should be passed." The recommendation was
+approved by Mr. Pitt, as leader of the Opposition, and approved and
+acted on by Mr. Fox, as leader of the ministry in that House. But,
+at the same time, Mr. Fox fully admitted the right of the Lords to
+discuss such questions, "for it would be very absurd indeed to send
+a loan bill to the Lords for their concurrence, and at the same
+time deprive them of the right of deliberation. To lay down plans
+and schemes for loans belonged solely to the Commons; and he was
+willing, therefore, that the amended bill should be rejected,
+though he was of opinion that the order of the House respecting
+money-bills was often too strictly construed." And he immediately
+moved for leave to bring in a new bill, which was verbatim the same
+with the amended bill sent down by the
+Lords.&mdash;<i>Parliamentary History</i>, xxiii., 895. The
+question was revived in the present reign, on the refusal of the
+Lords to concur in the abolition of the duty on paper, when the
+whole subject was discussed with such elaborate minuteness, and
+with so much more command of temper than was shown on the present
+occasion, that it will be better to defer the examination of the
+principle involved till we come to the history of that
+transaction.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-32" id="note-32">
+<!-- Note Anchor 32 --></a>[Footnote 32: "Parliamentary History,"
+xvii., 515.]</p>
+<hr />
+<a name="CH3" id="CH3"><!-- CH3 --></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER III.</h2>
+<p class="blockquote">Mr. Grenville imposes a Duty on Stamps in the
+North American Colonies.&mdash;Examination of Dr.
+Franklin.&mdash;Lord Rockingham's Ministry Repeals the
+Duty.&mdash;Lord Mansfield affirms a Virtual Representation in the
+Colonies.&mdash;Mr. C. Townsend imposes Import Duties in
+America.&mdash;After some Years, the Civil War breaks
+out.&mdash;Hanoverian Troops are sent to Gibraltar.&mdash;The
+Employment of Hanoverian Regiments at Gibraltar and
+Minorca.&mdash;End of the War.&mdash;Colonial Policy of the Present
+Reign.&mdash;Complaints of the Undue Influence of the
+Crown.&mdash;Motions for Parliamentary Reform.&mdash;Mr. Burke's
+Bill for Economical Reform.&mdash;Mr. Dunning's Resolution on the
+Influence of the Crown.&mdash;Rights of the Lords on
+Money-bills.&mdash;The Gordon Riots.</p>
+<p>But during these years another matter had been gradually forcing
+its way to the front, which, though at first it attracted but
+comparatively slight notice, when it came to a head, absorbed for
+several years the whole attention, not only of these kingdoms, but
+of foreign countries also. It was originally&mdash;in appearance,
+at least&mdash;merely a dispute between Great Britain and her
+Colonies in North America on the mode of obtaining a small revenue
+from them. But, in its progress, it eventually involved us in a
+foreign war of great magnitude, and thus became the one subject of
+supreme interest to every statesman in Europe. England had not
+borne her share in the seven years' war without a considerable
+augmentation of the national debt, and a corresponding increase in
+the amount of yearly revenue which it had become necessary to
+raise;[<a href="#note-33">33</a>] and Mr. Grenville, as Chancellor
+of the Exchequer, had to devise the means of meeting the demand. A
+year before, he had supported with great warmth the proposal of Sir
+Francis Dashwood, his predecessor at the Exchequer, to lay a new
+tax upon cider. Now that he himself had succeeded to that office,
+he cast his eyes across the Atlantic, and, on the plea that the
+late war had to a certain extent been undertaken for the defence of
+the Colonies in North America, he proposed to make them bear a
+share in the burden caused by enterprises from which they had
+profited. Accordingly, in March, 1764, he proposed a series of
+resolutions imposing a variety of import duties on different
+articles of foreign produce imported into "the British Colonies and
+plantations in America," and also export duties on a few articles
+of American growth when "exported or conveyed to any other place
+except to Great Britain." Another resolution affirmed "that, toward
+defraying the said expense, it might be proper to charge certain
+stamp-duties in the said Colonies and plantations."</p>
+<p>The resolutions imposing import and export duties were passed by
+both Houses almost without comment. That relating to a stamp-duty
+he did not press at the moment, announcing that he postponed it for
+a year, in order to ascertain in what light it would be regarded by
+the Colonists themselves; and as most, if not all, of the Colonies
+had a resident agent in London, he called them together, explained
+to them the object and anticipated result of the new imposition
+(for such he admitted it to be), and requested them to communicate
+his views to their constituents, adding an offer that, if they
+should prefer any other tax likely to be equally productive, he
+should be desirous to consult their wishes in the matter.</p>
+<p>He probably regarded such language on his part as a somewhat
+superfluous exercise of courtesy or conciliation, so entire was his
+conviction of the omnipotence of Parliament, and of the
+impossibility of any loyal man or body of men calling its power in
+question. But he was greatly deceived. His message was received in
+America with universal dissatisfaction. Of the thirteen States
+which made up the body of Colonies, there was scarcely one whose
+Assembly did not present a petition against the proposed measure,
+and against any other which might be considered as an alternative.
+Grenville, however, was not a man to be moved by petitions or
+remonstrances. He was rather one whom opposition of any kind
+hardened in his purpose; and, as no substitute had been suggested,
+at the opening of the session of 1765 he proposed a series of
+resolutions requisite to give effect to the vote of the previous
+year, and imposing "certain stamp-duties and other duties" on the
+settlements in America, perhaps thinking to render his disregard of
+the objections which had been made less unpalatable by the
+insertion of words binding the government to apply the sums to be
+thus raised to "the expenses of defending, protecting, and
+securing" the Colonies themselves. The resolutions were passed, as
+the "Parliamentary History" records, "almost without debate," on
+the 6th of March.[<a href="#note-34">34</a>] But the intelligence
+was received in every part of the Colonies with an indignant
+dissatisfaction, which astonished even their own agents in
+England.[<a href="#note-35">35</a>] Formidable riots broke out in
+several provinces. In Massachusetts the man who had been appointed
+Distributor of Stamps was burnt in effigy; the house of the
+Lieutenant-governor was attacked by a furious mob, who avowed their
+determination to murder him if he fell into their hands; and
+resolutions were passed by the Assemblies of the different States
+to convene a General Congress at New York in the autumn, to
+organize a resistance to the tax, and to take the general state of
+affairs into consideration.</p>
+<p>Before, however, that time came, a series of events having no
+connection with these transactions had led to a change of ministry
+in England, and the new cabinet was less inclined to carry matters
+with a high hand. Indeed, even the boldest statesman could hardly
+have learned the state of feeling which had been excited in America
+without apprehension, and those who had the chief weight in the new
+administration were not men to imperil the state by an insistance
+on abstract theories of right and prerogative. Accordingly, when,
+after Lord Rockingham had become Prime-minister, Parliament met in
+December, 1765, the royal speech recommended the state of affairs
+in America to the consideration of Parliament (a recommendation
+which manifestly implied a disposition on the part of the King's
+advisers to induce the House of Commons to retrace its steps),
+papers were laid before Parliament, and witnesses from America were
+examined, and among them a man who had already won a high
+reputation by his scientific acquirements, but who had not been
+previously prominent as a politician, Dr. Benjamin Franklin. He had
+come over to England as agent for Pennsylvania, and his
+examination, as preserved in the "Parliamentary History," may be
+taken as a complete statement of the matter in dispute from the
+American point of view, and of the justification which the
+Colonists conceived themselves to have for refusing to submit to
+pay such a tax as had now been imposed upon them. At a later day he
+was one of the most zealous, as he was probably one of the
+earliest, advocates of separation from England; but as yet neither
+his language nor his actions afforded any trace of such a
+feeling.</p>
+<p>He affirmed[<a href="#note-36">36</a>] the general temper of the
+Colonists toward Great Britain to have been, till this act was
+passed, the best in the world. They considered themselves as a part
+of the British empire, and as having one common interest with it.
+They did not consider themselves as foreigners. They were jealous
+for the honor and prosperity of this nation, and always were, and
+always would be, ready to support it as far as their little power
+went. They considered the Parliament of Great Britain as the great
+bulwark and security of their liberties and privileges, and always
+spoke of it with the utmost respect and veneration. They had given
+a practical proof of their goodwill by having raised, clothed, and
+paid during the last war nearly 25,000 men, and spent many
+millions; nor had any Assembly of any Colony ever refused duly to
+support the government by proper allowances from time to time to
+public officers. They had always been ready, and were ready now, to
+tax themselves. The Colonies had Assemblies of their own, which
+were their Parliaments. They were, in that respect, in the same
+situation as Ireland. Their Assemblies had a right to levy money on
+the subject, then to grant to the crown, and, indeed, had
+constantly done so; and he himself was specially instructed by the
+Assembly of his own State to assure the ministry that, as they
+always had done, so they should always think it their duty to grant
+such aids to the crown as were suitable to their circumstances and
+abilities, whenever called upon for the purpose in a constitutional
+manner; and that instruction he had communicated to the ministry.
+But the Colonies objected to Parliament laying on them such a tax
+as that imposed by the Stamp Act. Some duties, they admitted, the
+Parliament had a right to impose, but he drew a distinction between
+"those duties which were meant to regulate commerce and internal
+taxes." The authority of Parliament to regulate commerce had never
+been disputed by the Colonists. The sea belonged to Britain. She
+maintained by her fleets the safety of navigation on it; she kept
+it clear of pirates; she might, therefore, have a natural and
+equitable right to some toll or duty, on merchandise carried
+through that part of her dominions, toward defraying the expenses
+she was at in ships to maintain the safety of that carriage. But
+the case of imposition of internal taxes was wholly different from
+this. The Colonists held that, by the charters which at different
+times had been granted to the different States, they were entitled
+to all the privileges and liberties of Englishmen. They found in
+the Great Charters, and the Petition and Declarations of Right,
+that one of the privileges of English subjects is that they are not
+to be taxed but by their common consent; and these rights and
+privileges had been confirmed by the charters which at different
+times had been granted to the different States. In reply to a
+question put to him, he allowed that in the Pennsylvania charter
+there was a clause by which the King granted that he would levy no
+taxes on the inhabitants unless it were with the consent of the
+Colonial Assembly, or by an act of Parliament; words which
+certainly seemed to reserve a right of taxation to the British
+Parliament; but he also demonstrated that, in point of fact, the
+latter part of the clause had never been acted on, and the
+Colonists had, therefore, relied on it, from the first settlement
+of the province, that the Parliament never would nor could, by the
+color of that clause in the charter, assume a right of taxing them
+till it had qualified itself to exercise such right by admitting
+representatives from the people to be taxed. And, in addition to
+objections on principle, he urged some that he regarded as of great
+force as to the working of this particular tax imposed by the Stamp
+Act. It was not an equal tax, as the greater part of the revenue
+derived from it must arise from lawsuits for the recovery of debts,
+and be paid by the lower sort of people; it was a heavy tax on the
+poor, and a tax on them for being poor. In the back settlements,
+where the population was very thin, the inhabitants would often be
+unable to get stamps without taking a long journey for the purpose.
+The scarcity of specie, too, in the country would cause the
+pressure to be felt with great severity, as, in his opinion, there
+was not gold and silver enough in the Colonies to pay the
+stamp-duty for a single year. In reply to another question, whether
+the Colonists would be satisfied with a repeal of the Stamp Act
+without a formal renunciation of the abstract right of Parliament
+to impose it, he replied that he believed they would be satisfied.
+He thought the resolutions of right would give them very little
+concern, if they were never attempted to be carried into practice.
+The Colonies would probably consider themselves in the same
+situation in that respect as Ireland. They knew that the English
+Parliament claimed the same right with regard to Ireland, but that
+it never exercised it; and they might believe that they would never
+exercise it in the Colonies any more than in Ireland. Indeed, they
+would think that it never could exercise such a right till
+representatives from the Colonies should be admitted into
+Parliament, and that whenever an occasion arose to make Parliament
+regard the taxation of the Colonies as indispensable,
+representatives would be ordered.</p>
+<p>This last question put to the witness, like several others in
+the course of his examination, had been framed with the express
+purpose of eliciting an answer to justify the determination on the
+subject to which Lord Rockingham and his colleagues had come. It
+could not be denied that the government was placed in a situation
+of extreme difficulty&mdash;difficulty created, in part, by the
+conduct of the Colonists themselves. That, as even their most
+uncompromising advocate, Mr. Pitt, admitted, had been imprudent and
+intemperate, though it was the imprudence of men who "had been
+driven to madness by injustice." On the one hand, to repeal an act
+the opposition to which had been marked by fierce riots, such as
+those of Boston, and even in the Assemblies of some of the States
+by language scarcely short of treason,[<a href="#note-37">37</a>]
+seemed a concession to intimidation scarcely compatible with the
+maintenance of the dignity of the crown or the legitimate authority
+of Parliament. On the other hand, to persist in the retention of a
+tax which the whole population affected by it was evidently
+determined to resist to the uttermost, was to incur the still
+greater danger of rebellion and civil war. In this dilemma, the
+ministers resolved on a course calculated, as they conceived, to
+avoid both evils, by combining a satisfaction of the complaints of
+the Colonists with an assertion of the absolute supremacy of the
+British crown and Parliament for every purpose. And on February 24,
+1766, the Secretary of State brought in a bill which, after
+declaring, in its first clause, "that the King's Majesty, by and
+with the consent of the Lords spiritual and temporal, and Commons
+of Great Britain, in Parliament assembled, had, hath, and of right
+ought to have, full power and authority to make laws and statutes
+of sufficient force and validity to bind the Colonists and people
+of America, subjects of the crown of Great Britain, in all cases
+whatsoever," proceeded to repeal the Stamp Act, giving a strong
+proof of the sincerity of the desire to conciliate the Colonists by
+the unusual step of fixing the second reading of the bill for the
+next day.</p>
+<p>But in its different clauses it encountered a twofold
+opposition, which he had, probably, not anticipated. It is
+unnecessary to notice that which rested solely on the inexpediency
+of repealing the Stamp Act, "the compulsory enforcement of which
+was required by the honor and dignity of the kingdom." But the
+first clause was even more strenuously resisted, on grounds which
+its opponents affirmed to rest on the fundamental principles of the
+constitution. It was urged in the House of Commons by Mr. Pitt
+that, "as the Colonies were not represented in Parliament, Great
+Britain had no legal right nor power to lay a tax upon
+them&mdash;that taxation is no part of the governing or legislative
+power. Taxes," said the great orator, "are the voluntary gift and
+grant of the Commons alone. In legislation the three estates of the
+realm are alike concerned; but the concurrence of the peers and the
+crown to a tax is only necessary to clothe it with the form of a
+law; the gift and grant is in the Commons alone.... The distinction
+between legislation and taxation is essentially necessary to
+liberty."</p>
+<p>Mr. Pitt had no claim to be considered as a great authority in
+the principles of constitutional law. George II., slight as was his
+political knowledge or wisdom, complained on one occasion of the
+ignorance of a Secretary of State who had never read Vattel; and in
+this very debate he even boasted of his ignorance of "law-cases and
+acts of Parliament." But his coadjutor in the House of Lords (Lord
+Camden, at this time Chief-justice of the Common Pleas) owed the
+chief part of the respect in which he was held to his supposed
+excellence as a constitutional lawyer, and he fully endorsed and
+expanded Pitt's arguments when the bill came up to the House of
+Lords. He affirmed that he spoke as "the defender of the law and
+the constitution; that, as the affair was of the greatest
+consequence, and in its consequences might involve the fate of
+kingdoms, he had taken the strictest review of his arguments, he
+had examined and re-examined all his authorities; and that his
+searches had more and more convinced him that the British
+Parliament had no right to tax the Americans. The Stamp Act was
+absolutely illegal, contrary to the fundamental laws of nature,
+contrary to the fundamental laws of this constitution&mdash;a
+constitution governed on the eternal and immutable laws of nature.
+The doctrine which he was asserting was not new; it was as old as
+the constitution; it grew up with it; indeed, it was its support.
+Taxation and representation are inseparably united. God hath joined
+them; no British government can put them asunder. To endeavor to do
+so is to stab our very vitals." And he objected to the first clause
+(that which declared the power and right to tax), on the ground
+that if the ministers "wantonly pressed this declaration, although
+they were now repealing the Stamp Act, they might pass it again in
+a month." He even argued that "they must have future taxation in
+view, or they would hardly assert their right to enjoy the pleasure
+of offering an insult." He was answered by Lord Northington (the
+Chancellor) and by Lord Mansfield (the Chief-justice), both of whom
+supported the motion to repeal the tax, but who also agreed in
+denying the soundness of his doctrine that, as far as the power was
+concerned, there was any distinction between a law to tax and a law
+for any other purpose; and Lord Mansfield farther denied the
+validity of the argument which it had been attempted to found on
+the circumstance that the Colonies were not represented in
+Parliament, propounding, on the contrary, what Lord Campbell calls
+"his doctrine of virtual representation." "There can," said he, "be
+no doubt but that the inhabitants of the Colonies are represented
+in Parliament, as the greatest part of the people of England are
+represented, among nine millions of whom there are eight who have
+no votes in electing members of Parliament. Every objection,
+therefore, to the dependency of the Colonies upon Parliament which
+arises upon the ground of representation goes to the whole present
+constitution of Great Britain.... For what purpose, then, are
+arguments drawn from a distinction in which there is no real
+difference of a virtual and an actual representation? A member of
+Parliament chosen for any borough represents not only the
+constituents and inhabitants of that particular place, but he
+represents the inhabitants of every other borough in Great Britain.
+He represents the City of London and all the other Commons of the
+land, and the inhabitants of all the colonies and dominions of
+Great Britain, and is in duty and conscience bound to take care of
+their interests."</p>
+<p>Lord Mansfield's doctrine of a virtual representation of the
+Colonies must be admitted to be overstrained. The analogy between
+the case of colonists in a country from no part of which
+representatives are sent to Parliament, and that of a borough or
+county where some classes of the population which may, in a sense,
+be regarded as spokesmen or agents of the rest form a constituency
+and return members, must be allowed to fail; yet the last sentences
+of this extract are worth preserving, as laying down the important
+constitutional principle, subsequently expanded and enforced with
+irresistible learning and power of argument by Burke, that a member
+of the House of Commons is not a delegate, bound, under all
+circumstances, to follow the opinions or submit to the dictation of
+his constituents, but that from the moment of his election he is a
+councillor of the whole kingdom, bound to exercise an independent
+judgment for the interests of the whole people, rather than to
+guide himself by the capricious or partial judgments of a small
+section of it. But in its more immediate objects--that of
+establishing the two principles, that the constitution knows of no
+limitation to the authority of Parliament, and of no distinction
+between the power of taxation and that of any other kind of
+legislation--Lord Mansfield's speech is now universally admitted to
+have been unanswerable.[<a href="#note-38">38</a>]</p>
+<p>The abstract right was unquestionably on the side of the
+minister and the Parliament who had imposed the tax. But he is not
+worthy of the name of statesman who conceives absolute rights and
+metaphysical distinctions to be the proper foundation for measures
+of government, and pays no regard to custom, to precedent, to the
+habits and feelings of the people to be governed; who, disregarding
+the old and most true adage, <i>summum jus summa injuria</i>, omits
+to take into his calculations the expediency of his actions when
+legislating for a nation which he is in the daily habit of weighing
+in his private affairs. The art or science of government are
+phrases in common use; but they would be void of meaning if all
+that is requisite be to ascertain the strict right or power, and
+then unswervingly to act upon it in all its rigor. And, therefore,
+while it must be admitted that the character of the power vested in
+King, Lords, and Commons assembled in Parliament is unlimited and
+illimitable, and that the legal competency to enact a statute
+depends in no degree whatever on the wisdom or folly, the justice
+or wickedness, of the statute, the advice given to a constitutional
+sovereign by his advisers must be guided by other considerations.
+To quote by anticipation the language addressed to the Commons on
+this subject by Burke eight years afterward, the proper policy was
+"to leave the Americans as they anciently stood ... To be content
+to bind America by laws of trade. Parliament had always done it.
+And this should be the reason for binding their trade. Not to
+burden them by taxes; Parliament was not used to do so from the
+beginning; and this should be the reason for not taxing. These are
+the arguments of states and kingdoms."[<a href=
+"#note-39">39</a>]</p>
+<p>The ministry were strong enough to carry their resolutions
+through both Houses. Their measure was divided into two acts, one
+known as the Declaratory Act, asserting the absolute and universal
+authority of Parliament; the other repealing the Stamp Act of the
+preceding year. And both were passed without alteration, though the
+Lords divided against them on both the second and third readings of
+the bill for repeal founded on them,[<a href="#note-40">40</a>]
+some of them entering long protests in the journals of the House.
+The right to tax was asserted, but the tax itself was repealed. And
+Franklin's estimate of the feelings on the subject entertained by
+his countrymen was fully verified by the reception which the
+intelligence met with in the Colonies. To quote the description of
+Lord Stanhope: "In America the repeal of the Stamp Act was received
+with universal joy and acclamation. Fireworks and festivals
+celebrated the good news, while addresses and thanks to the King
+were voted by all the Assemblies.... The words of the Declaratory
+Act, indeed, gave the Americans slight concern. They fully believed
+that no practical grievance could arise from it. They looked upon
+it merely as a salve to the wounded pride of England; as only that
+'bridge of gold' which, according to the old French saying, should
+always be allowed to a retreating assailant."[<a href=
+"#note-41">41</a>]</p>
+<p>A recent writer, however, has condemned the addition of the
+declaration of the abstract right to tax with great vehemence.
+"Nothing," says Lord Campbell,[<a href="#note-42">42</a>] "could
+exceed the folly of accompanying the repeal of the Stamp Act with
+the statutable declaration of the abstract right to tax." But it
+does not seem difficult to justify the conduct of the ministry in
+this particular. For, besides the great weight deservedly attached
+to Franklin's assurance that the declaration would not be objected
+to by the Colonists, and besides the consideration that, on a
+general view, it was desirable, if not indispensable, to impress on
+all classes of subjects, whether at home or abroad, the
+constitutional doctrine of the omnipotence of Parliament, the line
+of argument adopted by Mr. Pitt and Lord Camden, in denying that
+omnipotence, left the ministers no alternative but that of
+asserting it, unless they were prepared to betray their trust as
+guardians of the constitution. Forbearance to insist on the
+Declaratory Act could not fail to have been regarded as an
+acquiescence on their part in a doctrine which Lord Campbell in the
+same breath admits to be false. It may be added, as a consideration
+of no small practical weight, that, without such a Declaratory Act,
+the King would have been very reluctant to consent to the other and
+more important Repealing Act. And, on the whole, the conduct of the
+ministry may, we think, be regarded as the wisest settlement both
+of the law and of the practice. It asserted the law in a manner
+which offended no one; and it made a precedent for placing the
+spirit of statesmanship above the letter of the law, and for
+forbearing to put forth in its full strength the prerogatives whose
+character was not fully understood by those who might be affected
+by them, and also could plead that Parliament itself had
+contributed to lead them to misunderstand it by its own conduct in
+never before exerting it.</p>
+<p>For the moment, then, contentment and tranquillity were restored
+in the Colonies. Unhappily, they were not lasting. The same year
+which saw the triumph of the Rockingham administration in the
+repeal of the Stamp Act, witnessed also its fall before a
+discreditable intrigue. And the ministry which succeeded it had not
+been a year in office before the new Chancellor of the Exchequer,
+Charles Townsend, revived the discontents in America which Lord
+Rockingham had appeased. It cannot be said, however, that the blame
+should all belong to him; or that the Rockingham party in the House
+of Commons were entirely free from a share in it. They
+were&mdash;not unnaturally, perhaps&mdash;greatly irritated at the
+intrigue by which Lord Chatham had superseded them, and were not
+disinclined to throw difficulties in the way of their successors,
+for which the events of the next year afforded more than one
+opportunity. Lord Chatham, as has been mentioned, was universally
+recognized as the chief of the new ministry, though he abstained
+from taking the usual office of First Lord of the Treasury, and
+contented himself with the Privy Seal; but he had constructed it of
+such discordant elements[<a href="#note-43">43</a>] that no
+influence but his own could preserve consistency in its acts or
+harmony among its members, as nothing but his name could give it
+consideration either in Parliament or in the country. In the first
+months of the next year, 1767, he was attacked with an illness
+which for a time disabled him from attending the cabinet, being,
+apparently, the forerunner of that more serious malady which,
+before the end of the summer, compelled his long retirement from
+public life; and the Opposition took advantage of the state of
+disorganization and weakness which his illness caused among his
+colleagues, to defeat them on the Budget in the House of Commons,
+by an amendment to reduce the land-tax, which caused a deficiency
+in the supplies of half a million. This deficiency it, of course,
+became necessary to meet by some fresh tax; and Townsend&mdash;who,
+though endowed with great richness of eloquence, was of an
+imprudent, not to say rash, temper, and was possessed of too
+thorough a confidence in his own ingenuity and fertility of
+resource ever to be inclined to take into consideration any
+objections to which his schemes might be liable&mdash;proposed to
+raise a portion of the money which was needed by taxes on glass,
+paper, tea, and one or two other articles, to be paid as import
+duties in the American Colonies. His colleagues, and especially the
+Duke of Grafton himself, the First Lord of the Treasury, and as
+such the nominal Prime-minister, having been also, as Secretary of
+State, a member of Lord Rockingham's ministry, which had repealed
+the former taxes, did not consent to the measure without great and
+avowed reluctance; but yielded their own judgment to the strong
+feeling in its favor which notoriously existed in the House of
+Commons.[<a href="#note-44">44</a>] Indeed, that House passed the
+clauses imposing these import duties without hesitation, being,
+probably, influenced in no small degree by the evidence given in
+the preceding year by Dr. Franklin, who, as has been already seen,
+had explained that the Colonists drew a distinction between what he
+called "internal taxes" and import duties "intended to regulate
+commerce," and that to the latter class they were not inclined to
+object. And a second consideration was, that these new duties were
+accompanied and counterbalanced by a reduction of some other taxes;
+so that the ministry contended that the effect of these financial
+measures, taken altogether, would be to lower to the Colonists the
+price of the articles affected by them rather than to raise it. But
+one of the resolutions adopted provided that the whole of the money
+to be raised from these taxes should not be spent in America, but
+that, after making provision for certain Colonial objects
+specified, "the residue of such duties should be paid into the
+receipt of his Majesty's Exchequer, and there reserved, to be from
+time to time disposed of by Parliament toward defraying the
+necessary expenses of defending, protecting, and securing the said
+Colonies and plantations." And this clause seems to have been
+understood as designed to provide means for augmenting the number
+of regular troops to be maintained in the Colonies, whose
+employment in the recent disturbances had made them more unpopular
+than formerly.[<a href="#note-45">45</a>]</p>
+<p>At all events, the intelligence of these new taxes, though only
+import duties, found the Colonists in a humor to resist any
+addition of any kind to their financial burdens. The events of the
+last two years had taught them their strength. It was undeniable
+that the repeal of the Stamp Act had been extorted by the riots in
+Boston and other places, and the success of this system of
+intimidation could not fail to encourage its repetition.
+Accordingly, the news of this fresh attempt at taxation was met by
+a unanimous determination to resist it. Newspaper writers and
+pamphleteers denounced not only the duties but the ministry which
+imposed them. Petitions from almost every State were sent over to
+England, addressed to the King and to the Parliament; but the
+violent temper of the leaders of the populace was not content to
+wait for answers to them. Associations were at once formed in
+Boston and one or two other cities, where resolutions were adopted
+in the spirit of retaliation (as their framers avowed), to desist
+from the importation of any articles of British commerce, and to
+rely for the future on American manufactures. The principal
+Custom-house officers at Boston were badly beaten, and others were
+compelled to seek refuge in a man-of-war which happened to be in
+the harbor.</p>
+<p>It would be painful, and at the present day useless, to trace
+the steps by which these local disturbances gradually grew into one
+general insurrection. The spirit of resistance was undoubtedly
+fanned by a party which from the first contemplated a total
+separation from England as its ultimate result,[<a href=
+"#note-46">46</a>] if, indeed, they had not conceived the design
+even before Grenville had given the first provocation to
+discontent. But the Colonists were not without advocates in
+England, even among the members of the government. The Duke of
+Grafton, while he remained Prime-minister, was eager to withdraw
+all the duties of which they complained; but he was overruled by
+the majority of his colleagues. He prevailed, however, so far that
+Lord Hillsborough, the Secretary of State, was authorized to write
+a circular-letter to the governors of the different provinces, in
+which he disowned, in the most distinct language possible, "a
+design to propose to Parliament to lay any farther taxes upon
+America for the purpose of raising a revenue," and promised for the
+next session a repeal of all the taxes except that on tea; and when
+the Duke retired from the Treasury, and was succeeded by Lord
+North, that statesman himself brought forward the promised repeal
+in an elaborate speech,[<a href="#note-47">47</a>] in which he
+explained that the duty on tea, which he alone proposed to retain,
+had been originally a boon to the Americans rather than an injury,
+as being accompanied by the removal of a far heavier tax. But he
+admitted that even that consideration was not the one which
+influenced him in his opinion that that duty should be maintained,
+so greatly was the perception that the real object of those who
+complained of it was, not the redress of a grievance, but the
+extinction of a right which was an essential part of "the
+controlling supremacy of England." The fact that the right to tax
+had been denied made it a positive duty on the part of the English
+minister to exert that right. "To temporize would be to yield, and
+the authority of the mother country, if now unsupported, would be
+relinquished forever." And he avowed his idea of the policy proper
+to be pursued to be "to retain the right of taxing America, but to
+give it every relief that might be consistent with the welfare of
+the mother country." He carried his resolution, though the
+minority&mdash;which on this occasion was led by Mr. Pownall, who
+had himself been Governor of Massachusetts, and who moved an
+amendment to include tea in the list of taxes proposed to be
+repealed&mdash;was stronger than usual.[<a href="#note-48">48</a>]
+But the concession failed to conciliate a single Colonist; it had
+become, as Burke said four years afterward, a matter of
+feeling,[<a href="#note-49">49</a>] and the irritation fed on
+itself, till, in 1773, a fresh act, empowering the East India
+Company to export tea to the Colonies direct from their own
+warehouses without its being subject to any duty in
+England&mdash;which Lord North undoubtedly intended as a boon to
+the Colonists&mdash;only increased the exasperation. The ships
+which brought the tea to Boston were boarded and seized by a
+formidable body of rioters disguised as native savages, and the tea
+was thrown into the sea. The intelligence was received in England
+with very different feelings by the different parties in the state.
+The ministers conceived themselves forced to assert the dignity of
+the crown, and proposed bills to inflict severe punishment on both
+the City of Boston and the whole Province of Massachusetts. The
+Opposition insisted on removing the cause of these disturbances by
+a total repeal of the tea-duty. The minister prevailed by a far
+larger majority than before, but his success only increased the
+exasperation in the Colonies; and it was an evil omen for peace
+that the leaders of the resistance began to search the records of
+the English Long Parliament "for the revolutionary precedents and
+forms of the Puritans of that day."[<a href="#note-50">50</a>] The
+next year saw fresh attempts to procure the repeal of the obnoxious
+tax rejected by the House of Commons; but, before the news of this
+division reached America, blood had already been shed.[<a href=
+"#note-51">51</a>] Civil war began. The next year the Colonies, now
+united in one solid body, asserted their Independence, taking the
+title of the United States; and, though the government at home made
+more than one effort to recall the Colonists to their allegiance,
+and sent out commissioners of high rank, with large powers of
+concession; and though in one remarkable instance the mission of
+Mr. Penn, in the summer of 1775, with the petition to the King
+known as "the Olive Branch," seemed to show a desire for a
+maintenance of the union on the part of the Colonial
+Congress,[<a href="#note-52">52</a>] from the moment that the sword
+was drawn all hope of preserving the connection of the Colonies
+must have been seen by all reasonable men to be at an end.</p>
+<p>It is beside our present purpose to recapitulate the military
+operations of the war, though they verified another of Burke's
+warnings, that, supposing all moral difficulties to be got over,
+the ocean remained&mdash;that could not be dried up; and, as long
+as it continued in its present bed, so long all the causes which
+weakened authority by distance must continue. In fact, distance
+from England was one of the main circumstances which decided the
+contest. The slowness of communication&mdash;almost inconceivable
+to the present generation&mdash;rendered impossible that regularity
+in the transport of re-enforcements and supplies which was
+indispensable to success; and, added to the strange absence of
+military skill shown by every one of the British generals, soon
+placed the eventual issue of the war beyond a doubt. But one
+measure by which Lord North's government endeavored to provide for
+the strengthening of the army employed in America was so warmly
+challenged on constitutional grounds, that, though the fortunate
+separation of Hanover from Great Britain has prevented the
+possibility of any recurrence of such a proceeding, it would be
+improper to pass it over.</p>
+<p>In his speech at the opening of the autumnal session of 1775,
+the King announced to the Houses that, in order to leave a larger
+portion of the established forces of the kingdom available for
+service in North America, he "had sent a part of his Electoral
+troops to the garrisons of Gibraltar and Port Mahon." And the
+announcement aroused a vehement spirit of opposition, which found
+vent in the debates of both Houses on the address, and in two
+substantive motions condemning the measure as a violation of the
+constitution as established by the Bill of Rights and the Act of
+Settlement. It was strenuously maintained that both these statutes
+forbade the raising or keeping on foot a standing army in the
+kingdom in time of peace, and also the introduction of foreign
+troops into this kingdom, without the previous consent of
+Parliament, on any pretence whatever; and that "the fact that
+Gibraltar and Minorca were detached from these islands did not
+exclude them from the character of forming a part of the British
+dominion." And on these grounds Lord Shelburne, who supported Lord
+Rockingham on an amendment to the address, did not hesitate to
+denounce this employment of the Hanoverian regiments, as
+"fundamentally infringing the first principles of our government,"
+and to declare it "high-treason against the constitution." He
+asked, "if there were a settled plan to subdue the liberties of
+this country, what surer means could be adopted than those of
+arming Roman Catholics and introducing foreign troops?"[<a href=
+"#note-53">53</a>] and compared the measure under discussion to the
+case of the Dutch regiments of William III., "which the Parliament
+wisely refused to allow him to retain." In the House of Commons,
+the Opposition was led by Sir James Lowther and Governor Johnstone,
+the latter of whom "appealed to the clause in the Act of Settlement
+which enacted that no person born of other than English parents
+should enjoy any office or place of trust, civil or military,
+within the kingdom;" and argued that to employ foreign officers in
+the protection of a British fortress was to place them in an
+"office of great military trust."</p>
+<p>The discussion brought to light strange divisions and weakness
+in the ministry. The ministerial lawyers differed on the grounds on
+which they relied, the Attorney-general, Thurlow, denying that the
+expression "this kingdom" in the Bill of Rights included the
+foreign dependencies of the crown[<a href="#note-54">54</a>] (a
+narrowing of its force which the Chancellor, Lord Bathurst, wholly
+repudiated), while the argument on which he himself insisted most
+strongly, that the existence of rebellion in America put end to all
+conditions which supposed the kingdom to be at peace, could not
+obtain the support of any one of his colleagues. But a plea urged
+by an independent member, Lord Denbigh, was regarded by some of the
+speakers with greater favor; his contention being that neither the
+Bill of Rights nor the Act of Settlement had been violated, since
+both those great statutes must be interpreted with reference to the
+time at which they were framed, and to the recent acts of James II.
+and William III., the recurrence of which they had been designed to
+prevent, acts to which the present proceeding bore no
+resemblance.</p>
+<p>A stronger justification, however, might have been found in very
+recent precedents. In 1745 the ministers had brought over six
+thousand Dutch troops to re-enforce the army of the Duke of
+Cumberland, and their act had been subsequently approved by
+Parliament. And in 1756, at the commencement of the seven years'
+war, when the loss of Minorca had led to such a distrust of our
+fleets that a French invasion was very generally apprehended, both
+Houses presented addresses to George II., begging him to bring over
+some Hanoverian regiments; and, in the course of the next year,
+other addresses to thank him for compliance with their
+entreaty.</p>
+<p>Looking at the strict law of the question, few lawyers doubt
+that the expression "this kingdom" in the Bill of Rights includes
+the entire dominions of the crown, or that that great statute was
+undoubtedly intended to protect the privileges of all their
+inhabitants, whether within the four seas or in foreign
+settlements. But it also seems that the clause against raising and
+keeping on foot a standing army without the consent of Parliament
+was not more violated by keeping a mixed garrison in Gibraltar and
+Port Mahon than garrisons consisting of native soldiers only; and
+undoubtedly the keeping of an armed force in both these fortresses
+had been sanctioned by Parliament. Nor could the colonel of a
+foreign regiment in garrison under the command of a British
+governor be fairly said to be in an office of great military trust.
+So far, therefore, the charge against the ministry may be thought
+to have failed. But the accusation of having transgressed the
+clause which prohibits "the introduction of foreign troops into
+this kingdom without the previous consent of Parliament on any
+pretence whatever," must, on the other hand, be regarded as proved.
+And, indeed, Lord North himself may be taken to have shown some
+consciousness that it was so, since he justified his conduct in
+omitting to procure that previous consent by the necessity of the
+case, by the plea that, as Parliament was in vacation, the time
+which would have been consumed in waiting for its sanction would
+have neutralized the advantage desired from the employment of the
+Hanoverians, since the regiments which they were to replace at
+Gibraltar and Port Mahon could not, after such delay, have reached
+America in time to be of service; and since he also consented
+eventually to ask Parliament for an Act of Indemnity, the preamble
+of which affirmed the existence of doubts as to the legality of the
+step which had been taken. And the fate of this act afforded a
+still more striking proof of the divisions in the ministry, since,
+after Lord North himself had proposed it in the House of Commons,
+and it had been passed there by a large majority, it was rejected
+in the House of Lords, where his own colleagues, Lord Gower, Lord
+Suffolk, and Lord Weymouth, spoke and voted against it as needless,
+because, in their judgment, no doubt of the state of the law on the
+subject could exist.</p>
+<p>From a statesman-like point of view, the employment of the
+Hanoverians seems abundantly defensible, if force were still to be
+employed to bring back the Colonists to their obedience. The
+circumstance of their being subjects of our sovereign in his other
+character of Elector of Hanover, clearly distinguished it from the
+hiring of the Hessian and Brunswick mercenaries, which has been
+deservedly condemned. And, as the entire number fell short of two
+thousand,[<a href="#note-55">55</a>] Lord Shelburne's expression of
+fear for the liberties and religion of Englishmen was an absurd
+exaggeration. Moreover, the warm approval which, less than twenty
+years before, Parliament had given to the introduction of a far
+larger body of the same troops into England itself, justified the
+anticipation that a similar sanction would now be cheerfully given.
+That sanction&mdash;which, indeed, might have been thought to be
+invited by the announcement of the measure in the King's
+speech&mdash;was undoubtedly requisite. And, if it was, a Bill of
+Indemnity for having acted without it was equally necessary. But,
+as has been seen in the last chapter, for an administration, on
+urgent occasions, to take action on its own responsibility, and
+then to apply for indemnity, is a course in strict harmony with the
+practice of the constitution; and if in this instance the ministers
+are in any respect blamable, their error would seem to have been
+limited to their abstaining from instantly calling Parliament
+together to sanction their act, and being contented to wait for the
+ordinary time of the Houses meeting.</p>
+<p>The war, therefore, went on. The assertion of their independence
+by the Colonies divided, and, so far, weakened, the advocates of
+their cause in Parliament, one section of whom, led by Lord
+Chatham, regarded any diminution of our dominion as not only
+treasonable, but ruinous; on the other hand, it procured them the
+alliance of France and Spain. But it cannot be said that either of
+these incidents produced any practical effect on the result of the
+war. Lord Chatham's refusal to contemplate their independence could
+not retard its establishment; and the alliance of France and Spain,
+which brought nothing but disaster to those countries, could not
+accelerate it by a single moment. For nearly six years the war
+continued with alternations of success, the victories gained by the
+British arms being the more numerous, the triumphs of the Americans
+being incomparably the more important, involving as they did the
+surrender of two entire armies, the latter of which, that of Lord
+Cornwallis, in 1781, did, in fact, terminate the war, and with the
+war the existence of the ministry which had conducted it. A
+singularly rapid succession of new administrations ensued&mdash;so
+rapid that the negotiations for peace which the first, that of Lord
+Rockingham, opened, were not formally completed till the
+third,[<a href="#note-56">56</a>] known as the Coalition Ministry,
+was on the point of dismissal. It would be beside our purpose to
+enter into the details of the treaty which constituted the United
+States, as they were now called, a nation by our formal recognition
+of their independence. Even in that recognition, which was the most
+important article of the treaty, no constitutional principle was
+involved, though it affords the only instance in our history which
+can seem to throw a doubt on our inheritance of that capacity for
+government which the Roman poet claimed as, in ancient times, the
+peculiar attribute of his own countrymen. It presents the only
+instance of a loss of territory peopled by men who came of our
+blood, and who still spoke our language. It was a stern and severe
+lesson; and yet, fraught with discredit and disaster as it was, it
+nevertheless bore fruit in a later age which we may be excused for
+regarding as an example of the generally predominating influence of
+sober practical sense in our countrymen, when not led away by the
+temporary excitement of passion, as shown in our capacity to take
+home to ourselves and profit by the teachings of experience. The
+loss of the American Colonies was caused by the submission of the
+Parliament and nation to men of theory rather than of practice;
+ideologists, as Napoleon called them; doctrinaires, to use the
+modern expression; men who, because Parliament had an abstract
+right of universal legislation, regarded it as a full justification
+for insisting on its exercise, without giving a thought to the
+feelings, or prejudices, or habits of those who might be affected
+by their measures. Abstractedly considered, Lord Chatham and Lord
+Camden were undoubtedly wrong in denying the power of Parliament to
+tax the Colonies; but there was better judgment in their counsels,
+though founded on false premises, than in those of Grenville and
+Townsend, though theirs was the more correct view of the
+constitutional power of legislation. The two peers were wrong in
+their principle; the two Chancellors of the Exchequer were unwise
+in their application of their principle; and the practical error
+was the more disastrous one.</p>
+<p>It is now generally admitted that the true statesman-like course
+toward the Colonies was that adopted by Lord Rockingham and his
+colleagues in 1765&mdash;to avoid weakening the supreme power of
+Parliament by any disavowal of the right to tax but to avoid
+imperilling the sovereign authority of the King by a novel exertion
+of it. As much of our common English law is made up of precedent,
+so, in a still greater degree, are our feelings and ideas of our
+rights and privileges regulated by precedent. And we lost America
+because in 1764 and 1767 neither minister nor Parliament took men's
+feelings and prejudices into account. The loss of the United
+States, therefore, was a lesson not undeserved; and by our
+statesmen since that day it has been taken in the right spirit of
+profiting by its teaching as a guide to their own conduct. Since
+that day the enterprise of our people has planted our flag in
+regions far more distant, and has extended the dominion of our
+sovereign over provinces far more extensive than those which we
+then lost. And on some of the administrations of the present reign
+the duty has fallen of framing schemes of government for those new
+acquisitions, as also for some of those previously possessed. In
+how different a spirit from that which actuated the early ministers
+of George III.[<a href="#note-57">57</a>] those to whom the task
+was committed by Queen Victoria applied themselves to their task
+may be seen in a maxim laid down by the present Lord Grey, when he
+presided at the Colonial Office (1846-1852), that "the success of
+free institutions in any country depends far less upon the
+particular form of those institutions than upon the character of
+the people on whom they are conferred." But how he and others in
+the same office carried out that principle must be reserved for a
+later chapter.</p>
+<p>Besides the numerous motions which were brought forward by the
+Opposition respecting the continuance and conduct of the war, there
+were several also which were indirectly prompted by it. The
+Opposition claimed to be on this subject not only the champions of
+the real interests of the nation, but also its spokesmen, who
+expressed the opinions and feelings of all the thinking and
+independent portion of the people. That their efforts were
+overborne they attributed to the subservience of the Parliament to
+the ministers, and of the ministers to the crown.[<a href=
+"#note-58">58</a>] And consequently several motions were made by
+members of that party, the object of which was, in one way or
+another, to diminish what they regarded as the undue influence of
+the crown. In one instance, and that the most successful, a direct
+denunciation of that influence was employed, but the earlier and
+more frequent proposals were directed to the purification of the
+House of Commons, and to the strengthening of its independence. It
+is remarkable that of these the two which related to a subject of
+which the Commons are usually most especially and most rightly
+jealous, the interference of peers in elections, had the worst
+fortune. In 1780 complaints were made and substantiated that the
+Duke of Bolton and the Duke of Chandos (who was also
+Lord-lieutenant of the county) had exerted themselves actively in
+the last election for Hampshire. And, in support of motions that
+these peers "had been guilty of a breach of the privileges of the
+House, and an infringement of the liberties and privileges of the
+Commons of Great Britain," a case was adduced in which Queen Anne
+had dismissed the Bishop of Worcester from the office of Almoner
+for similar interference. Nor did Lord Nugent, a relative of the
+Duke of Chandos, deny the facts alleged; on the contrary, he avowed
+them, and adopted a line of defence which many must have thought an
+aggravation of the charge, since it asserted that to prevent such
+interference was impossible, and therefore the House would but
+waste its time in trying. However, on this occasion the House took
+the view which he thus suggested to it, postponing all farther
+consideration of the matter for four months; and the charge the
+Duke of Bolton was shelved in a somewhat similar manner.</p>
+<p>Even had these peers and such practices been censured with the
+very greatest severity, the censures could have had but a very
+limited effect. But it was on measures of a wider scope, embracing
+what began to be called a Reform of Parliament, that the more
+zealous members of the Opposition placed their chief reliance. As
+far as our records of the debates can be trusted, Lord Chatham, ten
+years before, had given the first hint of the desirableness of some
+alteration of the existing system. On one occasion he denounced the
+small boroughs as "the rotten part of the constitution," thus
+originating the epithet by which they in time came to be generally
+described; but more usually he disavowed all idea of disfranchising
+them, propounding rather a scheme for diminishing their importance
+by a large addition to the county members. However, he never took
+any steps to carry out his views, thinking, perhaps, that it was
+not in the Upper House that such a subject should be first
+broached. But he had not been long in the grave, when a formal
+motion for a reform of a different kind was brought forward by one
+of the members for the City of London, Alderman Sawbridge,[<a href=
+"#note-59">59</a>] who, in May, 1780, applied for leave to bring in
+"a bill for shortening the duration of Parliaments." His own
+preference he avowed to be for annual Parliaments; but his
+suspicion that the House would think such a measure too sweeping
+had induced him to resolve to content himself with aiming at
+triennial Parliaments. As leave was refused, the bill proposed to
+be introduced may, perhaps, be thought disentitled to mention here,
+were it not that the circumstance that proposals for shortening the
+duration of Parliaments are still occasionally brought forward
+seems to warrant an account of a few of the arguments by which
+those who took the leading parts in the debate which ensued
+resisted it. The minister, Lord North, declared that the Alderman
+had misunderstood the views of our ancestors on the subject; as
+their desire had been, not that Parliament should be elected
+annually, but that it should sit every year, an end which had now
+been attained. Fox, on the other hand, while avowing that hitherto
+he had always opposed similar motions, declared his wish now to see
+not only triennial but annual Parliaments, as the sole means of
+lessening the influence of the crown. "If any of his constituents
+were to ask him to what our present misfortunes were ascribable, he
+should say the first cause was the influence of the crown; the
+second, the influence of the crown; and the third, the influence of
+the crown." But it was replied by Burke, who usually exhausted
+every question he took in hand, that such a bill would rather tend
+to augment that influence, since "the crown, by its constant stated
+power, influence, and revenue, would be able to wear out all
+opposition at elections; that it would not abate the interest or
+inclination of ministers to apply that interest to the electors; on
+the contrary, it would render it more necessary to them, if they
+desired to have a majority in Parliament, to increase the means of
+that influence, to redouble their diligence, and to sharpen
+dexterity in the application. The whole effect of the bill would,
+therefore, be to remove the application of some part of that
+influence from the elected to the electors, and farther to
+strengthen and extend a court interest already great and powerful
+in boroughs. It must greatly increase the cost of a seat in
+Parliament; and, if contests were frequent, to many they would
+become a matter of expense totally ruinous, which no fortunes could
+bear. The expense of the last general election was estimated at
+&pound;1,500,000; and he remembered well that several agents for
+boroughs said to candidates, 'Sir, your election will cost you
+&pound;3000 if you are independent; but, if the ministry supports
+you, it may be done for &pound;2000, and even less.'" And he
+adduced the case of Ireland, where formerly, when "a Parliament sat
+for the King's life, the ordinary charge for a seat was
+&pound;1500; but now, when it sat for eight years, four sessions,
+the charge was &pound;2500 and upward." Such a change as was
+proposed would cause "triennial corruption, triennial drunkenness,
+triennial idleness, etc., and invigorate personal hatreds that
+would never be allowed to soften. It would even make the member
+himself more corrupt, by increasing his dependence on those who
+could best support him at elections. It would wreck the fortunes of
+those who stood on their own private means. It would make the
+electors more venal, and injure the whole body of the people who,
+whether they have votes or not, are concerned in elections."
+Finally, it would greatly impair the proper authority of the House
+itself. "It would deprive it of all power and dignity; and a House
+of Commons without power and without dignity, either in itself or
+its members, is no House of Commons for this constitution."</p>
+<p>The applicability of some of his arguments&mdash;those founded
+on the disorders at times of election&mdash;has been greatly
+diminished, if not destroyed, at the present day, by the limitation
+of the polling to a single day. The disfranchisement of the smaller
+boroughs has neutralized others; but the expense of a general
+election is not believed to have diminished, and that alone seems a
+strong objection to a system which would render them more frequent
+than they are at present. Mr. Sawbridge could not obtain the
+support of a third of his hearers.[<a href="#note-60">60</a>] But
+his notions had partisans in the other House who were not
+discouraged by such a division; and three weeks later the Duke of
+Richmond brought forward a Reform Bill on so large a scale that, as
+the "Parliamentary History" records, "it took him an hour and a
+half to read it," and which contained provisions for annual
+Parliaments and universal suffrage. But he met with even less favor
+than the Alderman, and his bill was rejected without a
+division.</p>
+<p>Still the subject was not allowed to rest. Even after Lord North
+had been replaced by Lord Rockingham, the demand for Parliamentary
+Reform was continued; the young Mr. Pitt making himself the
+mouth-piece of the Reformers, and founding a motion which he made
+in May, 1782, on "the corrupt influence of the crown; an influence
+which has been pointed at in every period as the fertile source of
+all our miseries; an influence which has been substituted in the
+room of wisdom, of activity, of exertion, and of success; an
+influence which has grown up with our growth and strengthened with
+our strength, but which, unhappily, has not diminished with our
+diminution, nor decayed with our decay." He brought forward no
+specific plan, but denounced the close boroughs, and asked
+emphatically whether it were "representation" for "some decayed
+villages, almost destitute of population, to send members to
+Parliament under the control of the Treasury, or at the bidding of
+some great lord or commoner." He, however, was defeated, though by
+the small majority of twenty. And it is remarkable that when, the
+next year, he revived the subject, developing a more precise
+scheme&mdash;akin to that which his father had suggested, of
+increasing the number of county members, and including provisions
+for the disfranchisement of boroughs which had been convicted of
+systematic corruption&mdash;he was beaten by a far larger
+majority,[<a href="#note-61">61</a>] the distinctness of his plan
+only serving to increase the numbers of his adversaries. A kinsman
+of Pitt's, Lord Mahon, made an equally futile attempt to diminish
+the expenses of elections, partly by inflicting very heavy
+penalties on parties guilty of either giving or receiving
+bribes,[<a href="#note-62">62</a>] and partly by prohibiting
+candidates from providing conveyances for electors; and more than
+one bill for disfranchising revenue-officers, as being specially
+liable to pressure from the government, and to prevent contractors
+from sitting in Parliament, was brought forward, but was lost, the
+smallness of the divisions in their favor being not the least
+remarkable circumstance in the early history of Reform. It was made
+still more evident that as yet the zeal for Reform was confined to
+a few, when, two years afterward, Pitt, though now invested with
+all the power of a Prime-minister, was as unable as when in
+opposition to carry a Reform Bill, which in more than one point
+foreshadowed the measure of 1832; proposing, as it did, the
+disfranchisement of thirty-six small boroughs, which were to be
+purchased of their proprietors nearly on the principle adopted in
+the Irish Union Act, and on the other hand the enfranchisement of
+copyholders; but it differed from Lord Grey's act in that it
+distributed all the seats thus to be obtained among the counties,
+with the exception of a small addition to the representatives of
+London and Westminster. However, his supporters very little
+exceeded the number who had divided with him in 1783, and Lord
+North, who led the Opposition in a speech denouncing any change,
+had a majority of seventy-four. After this second defeat, Pitt
+abandoned the question, at all events for the time; being
+convinced, to quote Earl Stanhope's description of his opinion on
+the subject, "that nothing but the pressure of the strongest
+popular feeling, such as did not then exist, could induce many
+members to vote against their own tenure of Parliament, or in fact
+against themselves."[<a href="#note-63">63</a>] What, perhaps,
+weighed with him more, on deciding to acquiesce in this vote as
+final, was the perception that as yet the question excited no
+strong interest out-of-doors; and when, a few years later, some who
+sought to become leaders of the people endeavored to raise an
+agitation on the subject, their teachings were too deeply infected
+with the contagion of the French Revolution to allow a wise ruler
+to think it consistent with his duty to meet them with anything but
+the most resolute discouragement.</p>
+<p>But, concurrently with the first of these motions for
+Parliamentary Reform, two more direct attacks on the royal
+influence, and on what was alleged to be the undue exertion of it,
+were made in the session of 1780. The first was made by Burke, who
+brought forward a measure of economical reform, demonstrating, in a
+speech of extraordinary power, a vast mass of abuses, arising from
+corrupt waste in almost every department of the state, and in every
+department of the royal household, without exception, and proposing
+a most extensive plan of reform, which dealt with royal dignities,
+such as the Duchy of Lancaster and the other principalities annexed
+to the crown; with the crown-lands, a great portion of which he
+proposed to sell; with the offices of the royal household, a
+sufficient specimen of the abuses on which was furnished by the
+statement, that the turnspit in the King's kitchen was a member of
+Parliament; and with many departments of state, such as the Board
+of Works and the Pay-office, etc. He was studiously cautious in his
+language, urging, indeed, that his scheme of reform would
+"extinguish secret corruption almost to the possibility of its
+existence, and would destroy direct and visible influence equal to
+the offices of at least fifty members of Parliament," but carefully
+guarding against any expressions imputing this secret corruption,
+this influence which it was so desirable to destroy, to the crown.
+But his supporters were less moderate; and Mr. Thomas Townsend
+declared that facts which he mentioned "contained the most
+unquestionable presumptive evidence of the influence of the crown;
+he meant the diverting of its revenues to purposes which dared not
+be avowed, in corrupting and influencing the members of both Houses
+of Parliament;" and he asserted that "the principle and objects of
+the bill were the reduction of the influence of the crown." The
+bill was not opposed by the ministers on its principle; but Lord
+North, even while consenting to its introduction, "did not pledge
+himself not to oppose it in some or other of its subsequent
+stages;" and, in fact, his supporters resisted it in almost every
+detail, some of them utterly denying the right of the House to
+interfere at all with the expenditure of the civil list; others
+contesting the propriety of alienating the crown-lands; and a still
+greater number objecting to the abolition of some of the offices
+which it was proposed to sweep away, such as that of the "third
+Secretary of State, or Secretary for the Colonies," that of
+"Treasurer of the Chamber," and others of a similar character. And,
+as the minister succeeded in defeating him on several, though by no
+means all, of these points, Burke at last gave up the bill, Fox
+warning the House at the same time that it should be renewed
+session after session, and boasting that even the scanty success
+which it had met with had been worth the struggle.</p>
+<p>The other direct attack was made by Mr. Dunning, who, perhaps,
+did not then foresee that he himself was destined soon to fill one
+of the offices which had come under the lash of Burke's sarcasm,
+and who a few days afterward, in moving that it was necessary to
+declare "that the influence of the crown had increased, was
+increasing, and ought to be diminished" rested no small portion of
+his argument on the treatment that Burke's bill had received. He
+affirmed that, though Lord North had declared that "the influence
+of the crown was not too great," the divisions on that bill, and on
+many other measures which had been under discussion, were
+irrefragable proofs of the contrary. He quoted Hume and Judge
+Blackstone as testifying to the existence and steady increase of
+that influence, and "could affirm of his own knowledge, and pledge
+his honor to the truth of the assertion, that he knew upward of
+fifty members in that House who always voted in the train of the
+noble lord in the blue ribbon,[<a href="#note-64">64</a>] but who
+reprobated and condemned, out of the House, the measures they had
+supported and voted for in it." Mr. T. Pitt even instanced "the
+present possession of office by Lord North as an indubitable proof
+of the enormous influence of the crown."</p>
+<p>It was not strange that Lord North opposed a resolution
+supported by such arguments with all the power of the government,
+basing his own opposition chiefly on the wisdom "of maintaining the
+rule long since established by Parliament, never to vote abstract
+propositions." But he presently saw that he was in a minority, and
+was forced to be content with adopting and carrying an amendment of
+Mr. Dundas, one of the members for Edinburgh, who flattered himself
+that by the insertion of <i>now</i> he converted a general
+assertion into a temporary declaration, which might at a future
+time be disavowed as no longer applicable. A majority of
+eighteen[<a href="#note-65">65</a>] affirmed the resolution; and
+when the mover followed it up by a second, declaring that "it is
+competent to this House to examine into and to correct abuses in
+the expenditure of the civil list revenues, as well as in every
+other branch of the public revenue, whenever it shall seem
+expedient to the wisdom of this House to do so," though the
+minister, with what was almost an appeal <i>ad misericordiam</i>,
+"implored the House not to proceed," he did not venture to take a
+division, and that resolution also, with one or two others designed
+to give instant effect to them, were adopted and reported by the
+committee to the House in a single evening.[<a href=
+"#note-66">66</a>] The first resolution did, in fact, embody a
+complaint, or at least an assertion, which the Rockingham party had
+constantly made ever since the close of the Marquis's first
+administration. In a speech which he had made only a few weeks
+before,[<a href="#note-67">67</a>] Lord Rockingham himself had
+declared that "it was early in the present reign promulgated as a
+court axiom that the power and influence of the crown alone was
+sufficient to support any set of men his Majesty might think proper
+to call to his councils." And Burke, in his "short account" of his
+administration of 1765, had not only imputed both its formation and
+its dismissal to the "express request" and "express command of
+their royal master," but in the sentence, "they discountenanced
+and, it is to be hoped, forever abolished, the dangerous and
+unconstitutional practice of removing military officers for their
+votes in Parliament," condemned with unmistakable plainness some
+acts of the preceding ministry which were universally understood to
+have been forced upon it by the King himself. General Conway had
+been deprived of the colonelcy of his regiment; Lord Rockingham
+himself, with several other peers, had been dismissed from
+Lord-lieutenancies, as a punishment for voting against the
+ministry; such dismissals being a flagrant attempt to put down all
+freedom of debate in Parliament, which of all its privileges is the
+one most essential to its usefulness, if not to its very existence.
+But, as Burke said, the practice had been abandoned, and the first
+resolution, therefore, as Lord North said, involved no practical
+result. It is the second resolution that confers a constitutional
+character and importance on this debate. And it is not too much to
+say that no vote of greater value had been come to for many years.
+It might have been considered almost as the assertion of a truism
+included in the power of granting supplies, to declare that the
+Parliament has the right and authority to examine into and correct
+abuses in the expenditure, if it had not been denied by more than
+one speaker on the ministerial side, though not by the
+Prime-minister himself. But that denial made the assertion of the
+right an imperative duty; for certainly the exclusive right of
+authorizing a levy of money would lose half its value, if
+unaccompanied by the other right of preventing the waste of the
+revenue thus raised.</p>
+<p>It may likewise be said that another principle of the
+parliamentary constitution is, by implication, contained in Mr.
+Dunning's second resolution, and that the words, "it is competent
+to this House to examine into and to correct abuses in the
+expenditure," were meant to imply a denial of the competency of the
+other House to institute, or even to share in, such an examination.
+Even if that were the object of its framer, it only coincided with
+the view of the peers themselves, a very considerable
+majority[<a href="#note-68">68</a>] of whom had, a few weeks
+before, rejected a motion made by Lord Shelburne for the
+appointment of "a committee of members of both Houses to examine
+without delay into the public expenditure," principally on the
+ground urged by the Secretary of State, Lord Stormont, and by
+several other peers, that "to inquire into, reform, and control the
+public expenditure" would be an improper interference with the
+privileges of the Commons; the Chief-justice, Lord Mansfield, even
+going the length of warning his brother peers that such
+interference might probably lead the Commons "to dispute in their
+turn the power of judicature in the last resort exercised by the
+peers." Lord Camden, on the contrary, affirmed, as a proposition
+which "no noble lord present would deny, that that House had a
+right to inquire so far as the disposal of public moneys came under
+their cognizance as a deliberative body." And in the Lower House
+itself, Burke, in his speech in favor of his Bill for Economical
+Reform, went even farther than Lord Camden, and blamed the House of
+Lords for rejecting Lord Shelburne's motion on such a ground. "They
+had gone," he said, "farther in self-denial than the utmost
+jealousy of the Commons could have required. A power of examining
+accounts, of censuring, correcting, and punishing the Commons had
+never, that he knew of, thought of denying to the Lords. It was
+something more than a century ago that the Commons had voted the
+Lords a useless body. They had now voted themselves so." And it
+would seem that the Lords themselves, to a certain extent,
+retracted this, their self-denying vote, when, before the end of
+the same session, they discussed Burke's Bill for Economical
+Reform, and passed it, though it was a money-bill, "containing
+extraneous enactments," and as such contravened one of their own
+standing orders which had been passed in the beginning of Queen
+Anne's reign, when the system of "tacking," as it was called, had
+excited great discontent, which was not confined to themselves. The
+propriety of rejecting the bill on that ground was vigorously urged
+by the only two lawyers who took part in the debate, the
+Chancellor, Lord Thurlow, and Lord Loughborough, whose object was
+avowedly thus to give a practical proof that the Lords "had not
+voted themselves useless." But even those who disregarded their
+advice fully asserted the right of the peers "to exercise their
+discretion as legislators." We have noticed this matter on a
+previous occasion. The privilege claimed by the Commons, both as to
+its origin and its principle, has been carefully examined by
+Hallam, who has pointed out that in its full exclusiveness it is
+not older than Charles II., since the Convention Parliament of 1660
+"made several alterations in undoubted money-bills, to which the
+Commons did not object."[<a href="#note-69">69</a>] And, though his
+attachment to Whig principles might have inclined him to take their
+part in any dispute on the subject, he nevertheless thinks that
+they have strained both "precedent and constitutional analogy" in
+their assertion of this privilege, which is "an anomaly that can
+hardly rest on any other ground of defence than such a series of
+precedents as establish a constitutional usage." The usage which
+for two centuries was established in this case by the good-sense of
+both parties clearly was, that the Lords could never originate a
+money-bill, nor insert any clause in one increasing or even
+altering the burden laid by one on the people, but that they were
+within their right in absolutely rejecting one. But such a right
+has a tendency to lapse through defect of exercise; and we shall
+hereafter see that "the disposition to make encroachments," which
+in this matter Hallam imputes to the Commons, has led them in the
+present reign to carry their pretensions to a height which at a
+former period had been practically ignored by the one House, and
+formally disclaimed by the other.</p>
+<p>It may be remarked that Mr. Dunning's success in carrying his
+first resolution did in itself, to a certain extent, disprove the
+truth of that resolution, since, if the influence of the crown had
+been such as he represented it, it must have been sufficient to
+insure its rejection. But that resolution, and a new statute, of
+which in a previous session he had been one of the principal
+promoters, are reckoned by Lord Stanhope as among the chief causes
+of the disgraceful riots of 1780. In the summer of 1778 he had
+seconded and supported with great eloquence the repeal of some of
+the penal statutes against the Roman Catholics which had been
+passed in the reign of William III. It was the first blow at that
+system of religious intolerance which for nearly a century had been
+one of the leading principles, as it had been also the chief
+disgrace, of the constitution; and it was passed with scarcely any
+opposition by both Houses. As, however, the statute which it
+repealed had been enacted before the Scotch Union, the repeal did
+not extend to Scotland, and it was necessary, therefore, to bring
+in a separate measure for that kingdom. But the intelligence that
+such a proceeding was in contemplation excited great wrath among
+the Scotch Presbyterians, who, in the hope of defeating it,
+established a Protestant Association for the defence of what they
+called the Protestant interest, and elected as its president Lord
+George Gordon, a young nobleman whose acts on more than one
+occasion gave reason to doubt the soundness of his intellect.
+Against any relaxation whatever of the restrictions on the Roman
+Catholics the Association sent up petitions to the House and to the
+King, couched in language the wildness of which was hardly
+consistent with the respect due to Parliament or to the sovereign.
+Apparently in the hope of mitigating its opposition, the Houses the
+next year passed an act, similar in principle, to relax some of the
+restrictions still imposed on Protestant dissenting ministers by
+some of the subscriptions which were required of them. But, as in
+the reign of Charles II., the Presbyterian hatred of the Roman
+Catholics was too uncompromising to be appeased in such a manner.
+And when Lord George found the House of Commons itself
+acknowledging the danger with which the constitution was threatened
+by the influence of the crown, he saw in their vote a justification
+for all his alarms, since he had adopted as one of his most settled
+opinions the belief that George III. was himself a Papist at heart;
+and, under the influence of this strange idea, he drew up a
+petition to Parliament which he invited all the members of the
+Association to accompany him to present. His summons was received
+with enthusiasm by his followers. The number who, in obedience to
+it, mustered in St. George's Fields, which he had appointed as the
+place of rendezvous, was not reckoned by any one at less than fifty
+thousand, and some calculations even doubled that estimate.
+Whatever the number may originally have been, it was speedily
+swelled by the junction of large bands of the worst characters in
+the metropolis, who soon began to display their strength by every
+kind of outrage. They commenced by attacking some of the Roman
+Catholic chapels, which they burnt; and, their audacity increasing
+at the sight of their exploits, they proceeded to assault the
+houses of different members of Parliament who had voted for the
+measures which had offended them. Because the Chief-justice, Lord
+Mansfield, had lately presided at a trial where a Roman Catholic
+had been acquitted, they sacked and burnt his house, and tried to
+murder himself. The magistrates, afraid of exposing themselves to
+the fury of such a mob, kept for the most part out of the way; and
+though the troops had been put under arms, and several regiments
+from the rural districts had been brought up to London in haste,
+the military officers were afraid to act without orders. Left to
+work their pleasure almost without resistance, the rioters attacked
+the different prisons, burnt Newgate and released all the
+prisoners, and made more than one attack on the Bank of England,
+where, however, fortunately the guard was strong enough to repel
+them. But still no active measures were taken to crush the riot.
+The belief was general that the soldiers might not act at all, or,
+at all events, not fire on rioters, till an hour after the Riot Act
+had been read and the mob had been warned to disperse; and no
+magistrate could be found to brave its fury by reading it. There
+seemed no obstacle to prevent the rioters from making themselves
+masters of the whole capital, had it not been for the firmness of
+the King himself, who, when all the proper authorities failed,
+showed himself in fact as well as in name the Chief Magistrate of
+the kingdom.[<a href="#note-70">70</a>] He summoned a Privy
+Council, and urged the members to adopt instant measures of
+repression; and, when some of the ministers seemed to waver, he put
+the question himself to the Attorney-general whether the
+interpretation put on the Riot Act, which seemed to him
+inconsistent with common-sense, were justified by the law.
+Wedderburn unhesitatingly replied that it was not; that "if a mob
+were committing a felony, as by burning dwelling-houses, and could
+not be prevented by other means, the military, according to the law
+of England, might and ought to be immediately ordered to fire upon
+them, the reading of the Riot Act being wholly unnecessary under
+such circumstances."[<a href="#note-71">71</a>] The King insisted
+on this opinion being instantly acted on; a proclamation was
+issued, and orders were sent from the Adjutant-general's office
+that the soldiers were to act at once without waiting for
+directions from the civil magistrates. A few hours now sufficed to
+restore tranquillity. The Chief-justice, in his place in the House
+of Lords, subsequently declared Wedderburn's opinion, and the
+orders given in reliance upon it, to be in strict conformity with
+the common law, laying down, as the principle on which such an
+interpretation of the law rested, the doctrine that in such a case
+the military were acting, "not as soldiers, but as citizens; no
+matter whether their coats were red or brown, they were legally
+employed in preserving the laws and the constitution;"[<a href=
+"#note-72">72</a>] and Wedderburn, who before the end of the year
+became Chief-justice of the Common Pleas, repeated the doctrine
+more elaborately in a charge from the Bench. It was a lesson of
+value to the whole community. It was quite true that the
+constitution placed the army in a state of dependence on the civil
+power. But, when that doctrine was so misunderstood as to be
+supposed to give temporary immunity to outrage, it was most
+important that such a misconstruction should be corrected, and that
+it should be universally known that military discipline does not
+require the soldier to abstain from the performance of the duty
+incumbent on every citizen, the prevention of crime.</p>
+<p>Notes:</p>
+<p><a name="note-33" id="note-33">
+<!-- Note Anchor 33 --></a>[Footnote 33: It is worth while to
+preserve the amount, if for no other reason, for the contrast that
+the expenditure and resources of the kingdom a hundred years ago
+present to those of the present day. The supply required in 1764
+was in round numbers &pound;7,712,000; in 1755, before the war
+broke out, &pound;4,073,000, and even that included a million for
+the augmentation of the army and navy. In 1761, when the war was at
+its height, the sum voted was &pound;19,616,000.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-34" id="note-34">
+<!-- Note Anchor 34 --></a>[Footnote 34: The report in the
+"Parliamentary History," xvi., 37, says: "This act (the Stamp Act)
+passed the Commons almost without debate; two or three members
+spoke against it, but without force or apparent interest, except a
+vehement harangue from Colonel Barr&eacute; (date, March 6,
+1765)."]</p>
+<p><a name="note-35" id="note-35">
+<!-- Note Anchor 35 --></a>[Footnote 35: Lord Stanhope ("History of
+England," v., 131) quotes a letter of Dr. Franklin to one of his
+friends in America, in which, after deploring the impossibility of
+preventing the act from being passed, he expresses a hope that
+"frugality and industry will go a great way toward indemnifying
+us." And he complied with Mr. Grenville's request to select a
+person to act as Distributor of Stamps in Pennsylvania whom he
+thought likely to be generally acceptable.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-36" id="note-36">
+<!-- Note Anchor 36 --></a>[Footnote 36: These statements and
+arguments of Franklin are taken from different parts of his
+examination before the House of Commons, as preserved in the
+"Parliamentary History," xvi., 137-160.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-37" id="note-37">
+<!-- Note Anchor 37 --></a>[Footnote 37: In the Assembly of
+Virginia, one of the members&mdash;Patrick Henry&mdash;after
+declaiming with bitterness against the supposed arbitrary measures
+of the present reign, exclaimed, "Caesar had his Brutus, Charles I.
+his Oliver Cromwell, and George III.&mdash;" A cry of "Treason!"
+was uttered. The Speaker called Mr. Henry to order, and declared he
+would quit the chair unless he were supported by the House in
+restraining such intemperate speeches.&mdash;Adolphus, <i>History
+of England</i>, i., 188.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-38" id="note-38">
+<!-- Note Anchor 38 --></a>[Footnote 38: On this point the law has
+been affirmed by a judge of high reputation to be still what Lord
+Rockingham and his colleagues asserted. In 1868, on the trial of
+Governor Eyre for an indictment arising out of disturbances in
+Jamaica, Judge Blackburne laid it down "that, although the general
+rule is that the Legislative Assembly has the sole right of
+imposing taxes in the colony, yet, when the Imperial Legislature
+chooses to impose taxes, according to the rule of English law they
+have a <i>right</i> to do it."]</p>
+<p><a name="note-39" id="note-39">
+<!-- Note Anchor 39 --></a>[Footnote 39: See his speech on American
+taxation in April, 1774.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-40" id="note-40">
+<!-- Note Anchor 40 --></a>[Footnote 40: The chief divisions were:
+in the Commons, 275 to 167; in the Lords, 105 to 71.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-41" id="note-41">
+<!-- Note Anchor 41 --></a>[Footnote 41: "History of England," vol.
+v., c. xlv., p. 218, ed. 1862.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-42" id="note-42">
+<!-- Note Anchor 42 --></a>[Footnote 42: "Lives of the
+Chancellors," c. cxliii., life of Lord Camden.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-43" id="note-43">
+<!-- Note Anchor 43 --></a>[Footnote 43: Every political student
+will recollect Burke's description of it as "a cabinet so variously
+inlaid, such a piece of diversified mosaic, such a tessellated
+pavement without cement&mdash;here a bit of black stone, there a
+bit of white&mdash;patriots and courtiers, King's friends and
+republicans, Whigs and Tories, treacherous friends and open
+enemies," etc.&mdash;<i>Speech on American Taxation</i>.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-44" id="note-44">
+<!-- Note Anchor 44 --></a>[Footnote 44: In a debate in the year
+1776, on some measures adopted for the conduct of the war, the Duke
+of Grafton said: "In that year (1767), when the extraordinary
+expenses incurred on account of America were laid before the House
+of Commons, the House rose as one man and insisted that that
+country should contribute to the burdens brought on by the military
+establishment there, and a motion was made for bringing in a bill
+for that purpose. I strenuously opposed the measure, as big with
+the consequences it has since, unfortunately, produced. I spoke to
+my friends upon the occasion, but they all united in the opinion
+that the tide was too strong to expect either to stem or turn it,
+so as to prevent whatever might be offered in that shape from
+passing into a law. Finding that all my efforts would be vain, I
+was compelled to submit, but was resolved, as far as lay in my
+power, to prevent the effect; and, while I gave way, to do it in
+such a manner as would cause the least harm. I accordingly proposed
+the tea-duty as the most palatable; because, though it answered the
+main purpose of those with whom taxation was a favorite measure, it
+was doing America an immediate benefit, for I procured the shilling
+a pound duty to be taken off, and threepence to be laid on in lieu
+thereof; so that, in fact, it was ninepence a pound saved to
+America. However, the attempt was received in America as I expected
+it would be&mdash;it immediately caused disturbances and universal
+dissatisfaction."&mdash;<i>Parliamentary History</i>, xviii.,
+134.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-45" id="note-45">
+<!-- Note Anchor 45 --></a>[Footnote 45: This unpopularity had been
+aggravated by another measure which was among the last acts of Mr.
+Grenville's ministry. The Mutiny Act in the Colonies was renewed
+for two years at a time, and, at its renewal in the spring of 1765,
+a clause was added which required the Colonists to furnish the
+troops with "fire, candles, vinegar, salt, bedding, utensils for
+cooking, and liquors, such as beer, cider, and rum." The Assemblies
+of several States passed resolutions strongly condemning this new
+imposition; but, as the dissatisfaction did not lead to any overt
+acts of disturbance, it seems to have been unnoticed in England at
+the time, or the clause would probably have been repealed by Lord
+Rockingham; and eventually the Assembly of New York seems to have
+withdrawn its objections to it, presenting an address to Sir H.
+Moore, the Governor, in which "they declared their intention of
+making the required provision for the troops."&mdash;Lord E.
+Fitzmaurice, <i>Life of Lord Shelburne</i>, ii., 61.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-46" id="note-46">
+<!-- Note Anchor 46 --></a>[Footnote 46: The "Memoirs of Judge
+Livingstone" record his expression of opinion as early as 1773,
+that "it was intolerable that a continent like America should be
+governed by a little island three thousand miles distant."
+"America," said he, "must and will be independent." And in the
+"Memoirs of General Lee" we find him speaking to Mr. Patrick Henry,
+who in 1766 had been one of the most violent of all the denouncers
+of the English policy (see <i>ante</i>, <a href="#note-37">p.
+63</a>), of "independence" as "a golden castle in the air which he
+had long dreamed of."]</p>
+<p><a name="note-47" id="note-47">
+<!-- Note Anchor 47 --></a>[Footnote 47: See the whole speech,
+"Parliamentary History," xvi., 853. Many of the taxes he denounced
+as so injurious to the British manufacturers, "that it must
+astonish any reasonable man to think how so preposterous a law
+could originally obtain existence from a British Legislature."]</p>
+<p><a name="note-48" id="note-48">
+<!-- Note Anchor 48 --></a>[Footnote 48: The division was: for the
+amendment, 142; against it, 204.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-49" id="note-49">
+<!-- Note Anchor 49 --></a>[Footnote 49: The words of the
+"preamble," on which Burke dwelt in 1774, were: "Whereas it is
+expedient that a revenue should be raised in your Majesty's
+dominions in America for making a more certain and adequate
+provision for defraying the charge of the administration of justice
+and support of civil government in such provinces where it shall be
+found necessary, and toward farther defraying the expenses of
+defending, protecting, and securing: the said dominions, be it
+enacted," etc.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-50" id="note-50">
+<!-- Note Anchor 50 --></a>[Footnote 50: "Memoirs and
+Correspondence of Jefferson." Quoted by Lord Stanhope, "History of
+England," vi., 14.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-51" id="note-51">
+<!-- Note Anchor 51 --></a>[Footnote 51: At Lexington, April 19,
+1775.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-52" id="note-52">
+<!-- Note Anchor 52 --></a>[Footnote 52: Lord Stanhope, however,
+has reason on his side when he calls the words of this petition
+"vague and general," though "kindly and respectful;" and when he
+points to the language of extreme bitterness against England
+indulged in by Franklin at the very time that this petition was
+voted. He, however, expresses a belief that even then "the progress
+of civil war might have been arrested," which seems doubtful. But
+it is impossible not to agree with his lordship in condemning the
+refusal by the ministry to take any notice of the petition, on the
+ground that the Congress was a self-constituted body, with no claim
+to authority or recognition, and one which had already sanctioned
+the taking up arms against the King.&mdash;<i>History of
+England</i>, vi., 93, 95, 105.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-53" id="note-53">
+<!-- Note Anchor 53 --></a>[Footnote 53: It is probable, however,
+that the greater part of the Hanoverian soldiers were
+Protestants.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-54" id="note-54">
+<!-- Note Anchor 54 --></a>[Footnote 54: Lord Campbell, who, in his
+"Life of Lord Bathurst," asserts that the legality of the measure
+turns upon the just construction of the Act of Settlement, adduces
+Thurlow's language on this subject as "a proof that he considered
+that he had the privilege which has been practised by other
+Attorney-generals and Chancellors too, in debate, of laying down
+for law what best suited his purpose at the moment." It does not
+seem quite certain that the noble and learned biographer has not
+more than once in these biographies allowed himself a similar
+license in the description of questions of party politics.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-55" id="note-55">
+<!-- Note Anchor 55 --></a>[Footnote 55: In the debates on the
+subject it was stated that the number of Hanoverians quartered in
+the two fortresses was nineteen hundred, and the number of British
+troops left in them was two thousand. Moreover, as has been already
+remarked, though Lord Shelburne spoke of arming Roman Catholics, it
+is probable that the Hanoverians were mostly Protestants.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-56" id="note-56">
+<!-- Note Anchor 56 --></a>[Footnote 56: The Preliminary or
+Provisional Articles, as they were called, of which the Definitive
+Treaty was but a copy, were signed at Paris, November 30, 1782,
+during Lord Shelburne's administration. But the Definitive Treaty
+was not signed till the 3d of September of the following year,
+under the Coalition Ministry, which was turned out a few weeks
+afterward.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-57" id="note-57">
+<!-- Note Anchor 57 --></a>[Footnote 57: We shall see in a <a href=
+"#CH4">subsequent chapter</a> that even in this reign of George
+III. Pitt laid down the true principles of our legislation for the
+colonies in his bill for the better government of Canada.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-58" id="note-58">
+<!-- Note Anchor 58 --></a>[Footnote 58: An admirably reasoned
+passage on the influence of the crown, especially in the reigns of
+the two first Hanoverian Kings, will be found in Hallam,
+"Constitutional History," c. xvi., vol. iii., p. 392, ed.
+1832.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-59" id="note-59">
+<!-- Note Anchor 59 --></a>[Footnote 59: The "Parliamentary
+History" shows that he had brought forward the same motion before
+1780; since Lord Nugent, who replied to him, said "the same motion
+had been made for some years past, and had been silently decided
+on." From which it seems that it was never discussed at any length
+till May 8, 1780.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-60" id="note-60">
+<!-- Note Anchor 60 --></a>[Footnote 60: On the division the
+numbers were: for the motion, 90; against it, 182.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-61" id="note-61">
+<!-- Note Anchor 61 --></a>[Footnote 61: The division in 1782 was:
+161 to 141; in 1783, 293 to 149.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-62" id="note-62">
+<!-- Note Anchor 62 --></a>[Footnote 62: How systematic and open
+bribery was at this time is shown by an account of Sheridan's
+expenses at Stafford in 1784, of which the first item is&mdash;248
+burgesses, paid &pound;5 5s. each, &pound;1302.&mdash;Moore's
+<i>Life of Sheridan</i>, i., 405.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-63" id="note-63">
+<!-- Note Anchor 63 --></a>[Footnote 63: "Life of Pitt," i.,
+359.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-64" id="note-64">
+<!-- Note Anchor 64 --></a>[Footnote 64: Lord North was a Knight of
+the Garter, the only commoner, except Sir R. Walpole, who received
+that distinction in the last century, and the latest, with the
+exception of Lord Castlereagh. on whom it has been conferred.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-65" id="note-65">
+<!-- Note Anchor 65 --></a>[Footnote 65: 233 to 315.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-66" id="note-66">
+<!-- Note Anchor 66 --></a>[Footnote 66: It is perhaps worth
+pointing out, as a specimen of the practical manner in which
+parliamentary business was transacted at that time, that this great
+debate&mdash;in which (the House being in committee) Mr. Dunning
+himself spoke three times, and Lord North, Mr. T. Pitt, Mr. Fox,
+the Speaker (Sir F. Norton), the Attorney-general, General Conway,
+Governor Pownall, the Lord-advocate, and several other members took
+part&mdash;was concluded by twelve o'clock.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-67" id="note-67">
+<!-- Note Anchor 67 --></a>[Footnote 67: February 8, 1780, on Lord
+Shelburne's motion for an inquiry into the public
+expenditure.&mdash;<i>Parliamentary History</i>, xx., 1346.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-68" id="note-68">
+<!-- Note Anchor 68 --></a>[Footnote 68: 101 to 55.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-69" id="note-69">
+<!-- Note Anchor 69 --></a>[Footnote 69: "Constitutional History,"
+iii., 43.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-70" id="note-70">
+<!-- Note Anchor 70 --></a>[Footnote 70: His language is said to
+have been that "there was at all events one Magistrate in the
+kingdom who would do his duty."&mdash;Lord Stanhope, <i>History of
+England</i>, vii., 48.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-71" id="note-71">
+<!-- Note Anchor 71 --></a>[Footnote 71: "Lives of the Lord
+Chancellors," c. clxvii.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-72" id="note-72">
+<!-- Note Anchor 72 --></a>[Footnote 72: Lord Stanhope's "History
+of England," vii, 56.]</p>
+<hr />
+<a name="CH4" id="CH4"><!-- CH4 --></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER IV.</h2>
+<p class="blockquote">Changes of Administration.&mdash;The
+Coalition Ministry.&mdash;The Establishment of the Prince of
+Wales.&mdash;Fox's India Bill.&mdash;The King Defeats it by the
+Agency of Lord Temple.&mdash;The Ministry is Dismissed, and
+Succeeded by Mr. Pitt's Administration.&mdash;Opposition to the New
+Ministry in the House of Commons.&mdash;Merits of the Contest
+between the Old and the New Ministry.&mdash;Power of
+Pitt.&mdash;Pitt's India Bill.&mdash;Bill for the Government of
+Canada.&mdash;The Marriage of the Prince of Wales to Mrs.
+Fitzherbert.&mdash;The King becomes Deranged.&mdash;Proposal of a
+Regency.&mdash;Opinions of Various Writers on the Course
+adopted.&mdash;Spread of Revolutionary Societies and
+Opinions.&mdash;Bills for the Repression of Sedition and
+Treason.&mdash;The Alien Act.&mdash;The Traitorous Correspondence
+Act.&mdash;Treason and Sedition Bills.&mdash;Failure of some
+Prosecutions under them.</p>
+<p>The occurrences of the next year brought the question of the
+influence of the crown into greater prominence. Lord Rockingham's
+administration, unfortunately, came to a premature termination by
+his death at the beginning of July. With a strange arrogance, Fox
+claimed the right of dictating the choice of his successor to the
+King, making his pretensions the more unwarrantable by the
+character of the person whom he desired to nominate, the Duke of
+Portland, who, though a man of vast property and considerable
+borough influence, was destitute of ability of any kind, and had
+not even any of that official experience which in some situations
+may at times compensate or conceal the want of talent.[<a href=
+"#note-73">73</a>] The King preferred Lord Shelburne, a statesman
+whose capacity was confessedly of a very high order, who had more
+than once been Secretary of State,[<a href="#note-74">74</a>] and
+who had been recognized as the leader of what was sometimes called
+the Chatham section of the Whigs, ever since the death of the great
+Earl. Indeed, if George III. had been guided by his own wishes and
+judgment alone, he would have placed him at the Treasury, in
+preference to Lord Rockingham, three months before. But, during the
+last three months, jealousies had arisen between him and Fox, his
+colleague in office, who charged him with concealing from him the
+knowledge of various circumstances, the communication of which he
+had a right to require. It was more certain that on one or two
+points connected with the negotiations with the United States there
+had been divisions between them, and that the majority of the
+cabinet had agreed with Lord Shelburne. Lord Shelburne, therefore,
+became Prime-minister,[<a href="#note-75">75</a>] and Fox, with
+some of his friends, resigned; Fox indemnifying himself by a
+violent philippic against "those men who were now to direct the
+counsels of the country," and whom he proceeded to describe as "men
+whom neither promises could bind nor principles of honor could
+secure; who would abandon fifty principles for the sake of power,
+and forget fifty promises when they were no longer necessary to
+their ends; who, he had no doubt, to secure themselves in the power
+which they had by the labor of others obtained, would strive to
+strengthen it by any means which corruption could
+procure."[<a href="#note-76">76</a>]</p>
+<p>Fox at once went into what even those most disposed to cherish
+his memory admit to have been a factious opposition. He caballed
+with the very men to whom he had hitherto been most vehemently
+opposed for the sole object of expelling Lord Shelburne from
+office. And when, at the beginning of the session of 1783, the
+merits of the preliminary articles of peace which had been
+provisionally concluded with the United States came under
+discussion, though the peers approved of them, in the House of
+Commons he defeated the ministers in two separate
+divisions,[<a href="#note-77">77</a>] and thus rendered their
+retention of office impossible. He had gained this victory by
+uniting with Lord North and a portion of the Tory party whom, ever
+since his dismissal from office in 1774, he had been unwearied in
+denouncing, threatening Lord North himself with impeachment. And he
+now used it to compel the King to intrust the chief office in the
+government to the very man whom his Majesty had refused to employ
+in such an office six months before.</p>
+<p>The transactions of the next twelve months exhibit in a striking
+light more than one part of the practical working of our
+monarchical and parliamentary constitution, not only in its
+correspondence with, but, what is more important to notice, in its
+occasional partial deviations from, strict theory. The theory has
+sometimes been expressed in the formula, "The King reigns, but does
+not govern." But, like many another terse apophthegm, it conveys an
+idea which requires some modification before it can be regarded as
+an entirely correct representation of the fact; and the King
+himself, especially if endowed with fair capacity and force of
+character, imbued with earnest convictions, and animated by a
+genuine zeal for the honor and welfare of his kingdom, will be
+likely to dwell more on the possible modifications than on the
+rigid theory. Even those who insist most on the letter of the
+theory will not deny that, if the King has not actual power, he has
+at least great influence; and the line between authority and
+influence is hard to draw. One of George the Third's earliest
+ministers had explained to his Majesty that the principle of the
+constitution was, "that the crown had an undoubted right to choose
+its ministers, and that it was the duty of subjects to support
+them, unless there were some very strong and urgent reasons to the
+contrary."[<a href="#note-78">78</a>] And such a doctrine was too
+much in harmony with the feelings of George III. himself not to be
+cordially accepted. For George III. was by no means inclined to be
+a <i>Roi fain&eacute;ant</i>. No sovereign was ever penetrated with
+a more conscientious desire to do his duty to his people.
+Conscious, perhaps, that his capacity was rather solid than
+brilliant, he gave unremitting attention to the affairs of the
+nation in every department of the government; and, perhaps not very
+unnaturally, conceived that his doing so justified him, as far as
+he might be able, in putting a constraint on his ministers to carry
+out his views. Thus, he had notoriously induced Lord North to
+persevere in the late civil war in America long after that minister
+had seen the hopelessness of the contest; and it was, probably,
+only the knowledge of the strength of his feelings on that subject,
+and of his warm attachment to that minister, that caused the
+Parliament so long to withstand all the eloquence of the advocates
+of peace, and the still stronger arguments of circumstances. He
+might fairly think that he had now greater reason to adhere to his
+own judgment; for Fox's recommendation of the Duke of Portland in
+preference to Lord Shelburne was an act not only of unwarrantable
+presumption, but of inconceivable folly, since there was no
+comparison between the qualifications of the two men; and the
+coalition by which, six months afterward, he had, as it were,
+revenged himself for the rebuff, and had driven Lord Shelburne from
+office, was, as the King well knew, and as even Fox's own friends
+did not conceal from themselves, almost universally condemned
+out-of-doors.[<a href="#note-79">79</a>] To this combination,
+therefore, his Majesty tried every expedient to escape from
+yielding. And when Pitt's well-considered and judicious refusal of
+the government left him no alternative but that of submission to
+Fox's dictation, it would hardly have been very unnatural if his
+disposition and attitude toward a ministry which had thus forced
+itself upon him had been those attributed to him by Lord John
+Russell, of "an enemy constantly on the watch against it."[<a href=
+"#note-80">80</a>] But for some time that was not the impression of
+the ministers themselves. In July, when they had been in office
+more than three months, Fox admitted that he had never behaved
+toward them as if he were displeased with them, and that he had no
+project of substituting any other administration for the present
+one.[<a href="#note-81">81</a>] And his temperate treatment of them
+was the more remarkable, because a flagrant blunder of Burke (who
+filled the post of Paymaster), in reinstating some clerks who had
+been dismissed by his predecessor for dishonesty, had manifestly
+weakened the ministry in the House of Commons;[<a href=
+"#note-82">82</a>] while in another case, in which the King had
+clearly in no slight degree a personal right to have his opinion
+consulted and his wishes accepted by them as the guide for their
+conduct, the establishment to be arranged for the Prince of Wales,
+whose twenty-first birthday was approaching, Fox persuaded the
+Parliament to settle on the young Prince an allowance of so large
+an amount that some even of his own colleagues disliked it as
+extravagant;[<a href="#note-83">83</a>] while the King himself
+reasonably disapproved both of the amount and of the mode of giving
+it, the amount being large beyond all precedent, and the fact of
+its being given by Parliament rendering the Prince entirely
+independent of his parental control, of which his conduct had given
+abundant proof that he stood greatly in need.</p>
+<p>That he presently changed his line of behavior toward them was
+caused by their introduction of a bill which he regarded as aimed
+in no small degree at his own prerogative and
+independence&mdash;the celebrated India Bill, by which, in the
+November session, Fox proposed to abrogate all the charters which
+different sovereigns had granted to the East India Company, to
+abolish all vested rights of either the Company or individuals, and
+to confer on a board of seven persons, to be named by Parliament,
+the entire administration of all the territories in any way
+occupied by the Company. It was at once objected to by the
+Opposition in the House of Commons, now led by Mr. Pitt, as a
+measure thoroughly unconstitutional, on the twofold ground that
+such an abrogation of formally granted charters, and such an
+extinction of vested rights, was absolutely without precedent; and
+also that one real, if concealed, object of the bill was to confer
+on the ministers who had framed and introduced it so vast an amount
+of patronage as would render them absolute masters of the House of
+Commons, and indirectly, therefore, of the King himself, who would
+be practically disabled from ever dismissing them. That such a
+revocation of ancient charters, and such an immovable establishment
+of an administration, were inconsistent with the principles of the
+constitution, was not a position taken up by Pitt in the heat of
+debate, but was his deliberate opinion, as may be fairly inferred
+from his assertion of it in a private letter[<a href=
+"#note-84">84</a>] to his friend the Duke of Rutland. It may,
+however, be doubted whether the epithet "unconstitutional" could be
+properly applied to the bill on either ground. There is, indeed, a
+certain vagueness in the meaning, or at all events in the frequent
+use of this adjective. Sometimes it is used to imply a violation of
+the provisions of the Great Charter, or of its later development,
+the Bill of Rights; sometimes to impute some imagined departure
+from the principles which guided the framers of those enactments.
+But in neither sense does it seem applicable to this bill. To
+designate the infringement or revocation of a charter by such a
+description would be to affirm the existence of a right in the
+sovereign to invest a charter, from whatever motive it may
+originally have been granted, with such a character of
+inviolability or perpetuity that no Parliament should, on ever such
+strong grounds of public good, have the power of interfering with
+it. And to attribute such a power to the crown appears less
+consistent with the limitations affixed to the royal prerogative by
+the constitution, than to regard all trusts created by the crown as
+subject to parliamentary revision in the interests of the entire
+nation. On the second ground the description seems even less
+applicable. An arrangement of patronage is a mere matter of detail,
+not of principle. For the minister to propose such an arrangement
+as should secure for himself and his party a perpetual monopoly of
+power and office might be grasping and arrogant; for Parliament
+(and Parliament consists of the sovereign and the peers, as well as
+of the House of Commons) to assent to such an arrangement might be
+short-sighted and impolitic; but it is not clear that either the
+minister in proposing such an enactment, or the Parliament in
+adopting it, would be violating either the letter or the spirit of
+the constitution. Every member of the Governing Board was to be
+appointed by the Parliament itself; and, though unquestionably Fox
+would have the nomination, and though he could reckon on the
+support of the majority in the House of Commons for those whom he
+might select, still it was a strictly constitutional machinery that
+he was putting in motion.</p>
+<p>A measure, however, may be very objectionable without being
+unconstitutional, and such a view of the India Bill the progress of
+the debates in the House of Commons disposed the King to take of
+it. In the House of Peers Lord Thurlow described the bill as one to
+take the crown off his head and place it on that of Mr. Fox; and,
+even without adopting that description to its full extent, the King
+might easily regard the bill as a very unscrupulous attempt to
+curtail his legitimate authority and influence. He became most
+anxious to prevent the bill from being presented to him for his
+royal assent. And it was presently represented to him that the
+knowledge of his desire would probably induce the Lords to reject
+it. Among the peers who had attacked the bill on its first
+introduction into their House was Earl Temple, whose father had
+taken so prominent a part in the negotiations for the formation of
+a new ministry in 1765, and who had himself been Lord-lieutenant of
+Ireland under Lord Shelburne's administration. But he had not
+thought it prudent to divide the House against its first reading,
+and felt great doubts as to his success in a division on the
+second, unless he could fortify his opposition by some arguments as
+yet untried. He had no difficulty in finding a willing and
+effective coadjutor. Since the retirement of Lord Bute from court,
+no peer had made himself so personally acceptable to the King as
+Lord Thurlow, who had been Lord Chancellor during the last four
+years of Lord North's administration, and, in consequence, as it
+was generally understood, of the earnest request of George III.,
+had been allowed to retain the seals by Lord Rockingham, and
+afterward by Lord Shelburne. What special attraction drew the King
+toward him, unless it were some idea of his honesty and attachment
+to the King himself&mdash;on both of which points subsequent events
+proved his Majesty to be wholly mistaken&mdash;it is not very easy
+to divine; but his interest with the King at this time was
+notorious, and equally notorious was the deep resentment which he
+cherished against Fox and Lord North, of whom, as he alleged, the
+former had proscribed and the latter had betrayed him. To him,
+therefore, Lord Temple now applied for advice as to the best mode
+of working on the King's mind, and, with his assistance, drew up a
+memorial on the character of the India Bill, on its inevitable
+fruits if it should pass (which it described as an extinction of
+"more than half of the royal power, and a consequent disabling of
+his Majesty for the rest of his reign"), and on the most effectual
+plan for defeating it; for which end it was suggested that his
+Majesty should authorize some one to make some of the Lords
+"acquainted with his wishes" that the bill should be
+rejected.[<a href="#note-85">85</a>]</p>
+<p>George III. eagerly adopted the suggestion, and drew up a brief
+note, which he intrusted to Lord Temple himself, and which stated
+that "his Majesty allowed Earl Temple to say that whoever voted for
+the India Bill was not only not his friend, but would be considered
+by him as his enemy. And, if these words were not strong enough,
+Earl Temple might whatever words he might deem stronger and more to
+the purpose."[<a href="#note-86">86</a>]</p>
+<p>Lord Temple lost no time in availing himself of the permission
+thus granted him; and, as it was by no means his object to keep the
+transaction secret, his conduct was made the subject of severe
+comment by the Prime-minister himself the next time that the bill
+was mentioned in the Upper House. The Duke of Portland, indeed,
+professed to have learned it only from common report, and to hope
+that the report was unfounded, since, were it true, "he should be
+wanting in the duty he owed to the public as a minister if he did
+not take the opportunity of proposing a measure upon it to their
+lordships that would prove that they felt the same jealousy, the
+same detestation, the same desire to mark and stigmatize every
+attempt to violate the constitution as he did." Lord Temple, in
+reply, abstained from introducing any mention of the King's
+opinions or wishes, but avowed plainly that he had used his
+privilege as a peer to solicit an interview with his Majesty, and
+that at that interview "he had given his advice. What that advice
+had been he would not then say; it was lodged in the breast of his
+Majesty, nor would he declare the purport of it without the royal
+consent, or till he saw a proper occasion. But, though he would not
+declare affirmatively what his advice to his sovereign was, he
+would tell their lordships negatively what it was not. It was not
+friendly to the principle and objects of the bill."[<a href=
+"#note-87">87</a>] The debate lasted till near midnight. Of the
+speakers, a great majority declared against the bill; and, on the
+division, it was rejected by a majority of nineteen.[<a href=
+"#note-88">88</a>] This took place on the 15th of December. On the
+18th, as the ministers had not resigned&mdash;not regarding a
+single defeat in the Upper House as a necessary cause for such a
+step&mdash;the King sent messengers to them to demand their
+resignation, and the next day it was publicly announced in the
+House of Commons that Pitt had accepted the office of
+Prime-minister.</p>
+<p>But Fox, who had anticipated the dismissal of himself and his
+colleagues, was by no means inclined to acquiesce in it, or to
+yield without a struggle; and on the 17th one of his partisans in
+the House of Commons, Mr. Baker, one of the members for
+Hertfordshire, brought forward some resolutions on the subject of
+the late division in the House of Lords. He professed to rest them
+solely on rumors, but he urged that "it was the duty of that House
+to express its abhorrence even of that rumor," since by such an
+action as was alleged "that responsibility of ministers which was
+the life of the constitution would be taken away, and with it the
+principal check that the public had upon the crown." And he urged
+"the members of that House, as the guardians of the constitution,
+to stand forward and preserve it from ruin, to maintain that
+equilibrium between the three branches of the Legislature, and that
+independence without which the constitution could no longer exist,"
+and with this view to resolve "that to report any opinion, or
+pretended opinion, of his Majesty upon any bill or other proceeding
+depending in either House of Parliament, with a view to influence
+the votes of the members, is a high crime and misdemeanor,
+derogatory to the honor of the crown, a breach of the fundamental
+privileges of Parliament, and subversive of the constitution of the
+country." It was opposed by Pitt, chiefly on the ground that Mr.
+Baker only based the necessity for such a resolution on common
+report, which he, fairly enough, denied to be a sufficient
+justification of it; and partly on the undoubted and "inalienable
+right of peers, either individually or collectively, to advise his
+Majesty, whenever they thought the situation of public affairs made
+such a step an essential part of their duty." But it was supported
+by Lord North as "necessary on constitutional principles," since
+the acts so generally reported and believed "affected the freedom
+of debate;" and by Fox, who declared that the action which was
+reported, if true, "struck at the great bulwark of our liberties,
+and went to the absolute annihilation, not of our chartered rights
+only, but of those radical and fundamental ones which are paramount
+to all charters, which were consigned to our care by the sovereign
+disposition of Nature, which we cannot relinquish without violating
+the most sacred of all obligations, to which we are entitled, not
+as members of society, but as individuals and as men; the right of
+adhering steadily and uniformly to the great and supreme laws of
+conscience and duty; of preferring, at all hazards and without
+equivocation, those general and substantial interests which members
+have sworn to prefer; of acquitting themselves honorably to their
+constituents, to their friends, to their own minds, and to that
+public whose trustees they were, and for whom they acted." He
+avowed his conviction that rumor in this instance spoke truth, and,
+affirming that "the responsibility of ministers is the only pledge
+and security the people of England possesses against the infinite
+abuses so natural to the exercise of royal powers," argued that, if
+"this great bulwark of the constitution were once removed, the
+people would become in every respect the slaves and property of
+despotism. This must be the necessary consequence of secret
+influence." He argued that the sole distinction between an absolute
+and a limited monarchy was that the sovereign in one is a despot,
+and may do as he pleases, but that in the other he is himself
+subjected to the laws, and consequently is not at liberty to advise
+with any one in public affairs who is not responsible for that
+advice, and that the constitution has clearly directed his negative
+to operate under the same wise restrictions. Mr. Baker's resolution
+was carried by a large majority; but, as we have seen, did not
+deter the King from dismissing the ministry.</p>
+<p>The conduct of George III. in this transaction has been
+discussed by writers of both parties with such candor that the Tory
+historian, Lord Stanhope, while evidently desirous to defend it by
+implication, passes a slight censure on it in the phrase that "the
+course pursued by the King was most unusual, and most extreme, and
+most undesirable to establish as a precedent;"[<a href=
+"#note-89">89</a>] while, on the other hand, so rigid a Whig as
+Lord Campbell urges in his favor "that if it be ever excusable in a
+King of England to cabal against his ministers, George III. may
+well be defended for the course he now took, for they had been
+forced upon him by a factious intrigue, and public opinion was
+decidedly in his favor."[<a href="#note-90">90</a>] But to those
+who regard not the excuse which previous provocation may be
+conceived in some degree to furnish to human infirmity, but only
+the strict theory and principle of the constitution on which the
+doctrine of the responsibility of the ministers and the consequent
+irresponsibility of the sovereign rests, Lord Campbell's
+conditional justification for the communication made through Lord
+Temple will hardly appear admissible. We cannot be sure how far Mr.
+Grenville's "Diary" is to be trusted for transactions in which he
+was not personally concerned, or for conversations at which he was
+not present; but in giving an account[<a href="#note-91">91</a>] of
+some of the occurrences of the spring of 1766, while Lord
+Rockingham was Prime-minister, we find him relating a conversation
+between the King and Lord Mansfield on the ministerial measure for
+conciliating the American Colonies by the repeal of the Stamp Act,
+combined, however, with an assertion of the <i>right</i> to tax.
+"He (Lord Mansfield) took notice of the King's name having been
+bandied about in a very improper manner; to which the King
+assented, saying he had been very much displeased at it, as
+thinking it unconstitutional to have his name mentioned as a means
+to sway any man's opinion in any business which was before
+Parliament; and that all those who approached him knew that to be
+his sentiment. Lord Mansfield said he differed from his Majesty in
+that opinion, for that, though it would be unconstitutional to
+endeavor by his Majesty's name to carry questions in Parliament,
+yet where the lawful rights of the King and Parliament were to be
+asserted and maintained, he thought the making his Majesty's
+opinion in support of those rights to be known was very fit and
+becoming." The line here alleged to have been drawn by the great
+Chief-justice, between proclaiming the King's opinion in support of
+rights, but withholding it in the case of measures, is, perhaps,
+too fine to be perceptible by ordinary intellects. But however the
+King may have understood the judge, it is clear that the doctrine
+thus asserted does not justify, but condemns, such an act as the
+communication of the King's opinion and wishes in the case under
+consideration. If it "would be unconstitutional to endeavor by his
+Majesty's name to carry questions in Parliament," it must be at
+least equally so to use his name to defeat them. And the case is
+infinitely stronger, if the measure to be defeated be one which has
+been introduced by his ministers. For there can be no doubt
+whatever that, so long as they are his ministers, they are entitled
+to his full and complete support on every question; alike in their
+general policy and on each separate measure. When he can no longer
+give them that support, which the very act of conferring their
+offices on them promised them, his only legitimate and becoming
+course is to dismiss them from their offices, and to abide the
+judgment of Parliament and the nation on that act. Thus William IV.
+acted in the autumn of 1834; and thus George III. himself acted at
+the end of the month of which we are speaking. But to retain them
+in their offices, and to employ an unofficial declaration of his
+dissent from them to defeat their policy, is neither consistent
+with the straightforward conduct due from one gentleman to another,
+nor with the principle on which the system of administration, such
+as prevails in this country, is founded.</p>
+<p>As has been already mentioned, the King at once dismissed the
+Coalition Ministry. Mr. Pitt accepted the conduct of affairs, and
+by so doing accepted the responsibility for all the acts of the
+King which had conduced to his appointment. Lord John Russell, who
+in his "Memorials and Correspondence of Fox" has related and
+examined the whole transaction at considerable though not
+superfluous length, while blaming the prudence, and in some points
+the propriety, of Fox's conduct, at the same time severely censures
+Pitt as "committing a great fault in accepting office as the price
+of an unworthy intrigue," and affirms that "he and his colleagues
+who accepted office upon the success of this intrigue placed
+themselves in an unconstitutional position."[<a href=
+"#note-92">92</a>] This seems to be a charge which can hardly be
+borne out. In dismissing his former ministry, the King was clearly
+acting within his right; and, if so, Pitt was equally within his in
+undertaking the government. The truer doctrine would seem to be,
+that, in so undertaking it, he assumed the entire responsibility
+for the dismissal of his predecessors,[<a href="#note-93">93</a>]
+and left it to the people at large, by the votes of their
+representatives, to decide whether that dismissal were justified,
+and whether, as its inevitable consequence, his acceptance of
+office were also justified or not. The entire series of
+transactions, from the meeting of Parliament in November, 1783, to
+its dissolution in the following March, may be constitutionally
+regarded as an appeal by the King from the existing House of
+Commons to the entire nation, as represented by the constituencies;
+and their verdict, as is well known, ratified in the most emphatic
+manner all that had been done. And we may assert this without
+implying that, if the single act of empowering Lord Temple to
+influence the peers by the declaration of the King's private
+feeling had been submitted by itself to the electors, they would
+have justified that. The stirring excitement of the three months'
+contest between the great rivals led them to pronounce upon the
+transaction as a whole, and to leave unnoticed what seemed for the
+moment to be the minor issues&mdash;the moves, if we may borrow a
+metaphor from the chess-table, which opened the game; and it may be
+observed that, though, on the 17th of December, Pitt resisted Mr.
+Baker's resolution with his utmost energy, in the numerous debates
+which ensued he carefully avoided all allusion to Lord Temple's
+conduct, or to the measure which had led to the dismissal of his
+predecessors, farther than was necessary for the explanation of the
+principles of his own India Bill. It may even be surmised that, if
+he had been inclined to recognize Lord Temple's interference as
+warrantable, the breach between that peer and himself, which
+occurred before the end of the week, would not have taken place,
+since it seems nearly certain that the cause of that breach was a
+refusal on the part of Pitt to recommend his cousin for promotion
+in the peerage, a step which, at such a moment, would have had the
+appearance of an approval of his most recent deed,[<a href=
+"#note-94">94</a>] but which he could hardly have refused, if it
+had been done with his privity. The battle, as need hardly be told,
+was first fought among the representatives of the people in the
+House of Commons; for there was only one occasion on which the
+opinion of the Lords was invited, when they declared in favor of
+Pitt by a decisive majority.[<a href="#note-95">95</a>] But in the
+Lower House the contest was carried on for more than two months
+with extraordinary activity and ability, by a series of resolutions
+and motions brought forward by the partisans of the coalition, and
+contested by the youthful minister. In one respect the war was
+waged on very unequal terms, Pitt, who had been but three years in
+Parliament, and whose official experience could as yet only be
+counted by months, having to contend almost single-handed against
+the combined experience and eloquence of Lord North, Fox, and
+Burke. Fortunately, however, for him, their own mismanagement soon
+turned the advantage to his side. They were too angry and too
+confident to be skilful, or even ordinarily cautious. The leaders
+on both sides made professions in one respect similar; they both
+alike denied that a desire of office influenced either their
+conduct or their language (a denial for which Pitt's refusal of the
+Treasury, a year before, gained him more credit than could be
+expected by Fox after his coalition with Lord North), and both
+alike professed to be struggling for the constitution alone, for
+some fundamental principle which each charged his antagonist with
+violating; Fox on one occasion even going so far as, in some
+degree, to involve the King himself in his censures, declaring not
+only that "the struggle was, in fact, one between Pitt himself and
+the constitution," but that it was also one "between liberty and
+the influence of the crown," and "between prerogative and the
+constitution;" and that "Pitt had been brought into power by means
+absolutely subversive of the constitution."[<a href=
+"#note-96">96</a>] But no act of which he thus accused the minister
+or the King showed such a disregard of the fundamental principle of
+the constitution of Parliament as was exhibited by Fox himself
+when, in the very first debate after the Christmas recess, he
+called in question that most undoubted prerogative of the crown to
+dissolve the Parliament, and, drawing a distinction which had
+certainly never been heard of before, declared that, though the
+King had an incontestable right to dissolve the Parliament after
+the close of a session, "many great lawyers" doubted whether he had
+such a right in the middle of a session, a dissolution at such a
+period being "a penal" one. Professing to believe that an immediate
+dissolution was intended, he even threatened to propose to the
+House of Commons "measures to guard against a step so inimical to
+the true interests of the country," and made a more direct attack
+than ever on the King himself, by the assertion of a probability
+that, even if Pitt did not contemplate a dissolution, his royal
+master might employ "secret influence" to overrule him, and might
+dissolve in spite of him,[<a href="#note-97">97</a>] an imputation
+which Lord North, with a strange departure from his customary
+good-humor, condescended to endorse.[<a href="#note-98">98</a>]
+There could be no doubt that both the doubt and the menace were of
+themselves distinct attacks on the constitution; and they were,
+moreover, singularly impolitic and inconsistent with others of the
+speaker's arguments, since, if the nation at large approved of his
+views and conduct, a dissolution&mdash;which would have placed the
+decision in its hands&mdash;would have been the very thing he
+should most have desired. On another evening, though he admitted as
+a principle that the sovereign had the prerogative of choosing his
+ministers, he not only sought to narrow the effect of that
+admission by the assertion that "to exercise that prerogative in
+opposition to the House of Commons would be a measure as unsafe as
+unjustifiable,"[<a href="#note-99">99</a>] but to confine the right
+of deciding the title of the ministers to confidence to the
+existing House of Commons. He accused Pitt of "courting the
+affection of the people, and on this foundation wishing to support
+himself in opposition to the repeated resolutions of the House
+passed in the last three weeks." Had he confined himself to urging
+the necessity of the ministers and the House of Commons being in
+harmony, even though such a mention of the House of Commons by
+itself were to a certain extent an ignoring of the weight of the
+other branches of the Legislature, he would have only been
+advancing a doctrine which is practically established at the
+present day, since there has been certainly more than one instance
+in which a ministry has retired which enjoyed the confidence of
+both the sovereign and the House of Lords, because it was not
+supported by a majority in the House of Commons. But when he
+proceeded to make it a charge against the minister that he trusted
+to the good-will of the people to enable him to disregard the
+verdict of the House of Commons, he forgot that it was only as
+representing the people that the House had any right to pronounce a
+verdict; and that, if it were true that the judgment of the people
+was more favorable to the minister than that of the House of
+Commons, the difference which thus existed was a condemnation of
+the existing House, and an irresistible reason for calling on the
+constituencies to elect another.</p>
+<p>Pitt, therefore, had no slight advantage in defending himself
+against so rash an assailant. "He did not shrink," he said, "from
+avowing himself the friend of the King's just prerogative," and in
+doing so he maintained that he had a title to be regarded as the
+champion of the people not less than of the crown. "Prerogative had
+been justly called a part of the rights of the people, and he was
+sure it was a part of their rights which they were never more
+inclined to defend, of which they were never more jealous, than at
+that hour."[<a href="#note-100">100</a>] And he contended that
+Fox's objections to a dissolution betrayed a consciousness that he
+had not the confidence of the nation. At last, when the contest had
+lasted nearly two months, Fox took the matter into his own hands,
+and, no longer putting his partisans in the front of the battle, on
+the 1st of March he himself moved for an address to the King, the
+most essential clause of which "submitted to his Majesty's royal
+consideration that the continuance of an administration which did
+not possess the confidence of the representatives of the people
+must be injurious to the public service." ... And, therefore, that
+"his Majesty's faithful Commons did find themselves obliged again
+to beseech his Majesty that he would be graciously pleased to lay
+the foundation of a strong and stable government by the previous
+removal of his present ministers." In the speech with which he
+introduced this address he put himself forward as especially the
+champion of the House of Commons. He charged the Prime-minister
+with an express design "to reduce the House to insignificance, to
+render it a mere appendage to the court, an appurtenance to the
+administration." He asserted the existence of a systematic "design
+to degrade the House, after which there was not another step
+necessary to complete the catastrophe of the constitution." And on
+this occasion he distinguished the feelings of the King from those
+which influenced the minister, affirming his confidence "that the
+King's heart had no share in the present business."[<a href=
+"#note-101">101</a>]</p>
+<p>Pitt, on the other hand, in reply, affirmed that he was called
+on by duty "to defend the rights of the other branches of the
+Legislature; the just and constitutional prerogative of the
+sovereign," upon which the Opposition was seeking to encroach,
+without even having shown a single reason to justify such invasion.
+He freely admitted that, if the House of Commons or either of the
+other branches of the Legislature "disapproved of an administration
+on proper grounds, it would not be well for that administration to
+retain office." But in the present instance he contended that "no
+ground for disapprobation had been shown." The existing
+administration "had, in fact, by an unaccountable obstinacy and
+untowardness of circumstances, been deprived of all opportunity" of
+showing its capacity or its intentions. "If any accusations should
+be made and proved against it, if any charges should be
+substantiated, it would, indeed be proper for the ministers to
+resign; and if, in such a case he were afterward to continue in
+office, he would suffer himself to be stigmatized as the champion
+of prerogative, and the unconstitutional supporter of the
+usurpation of the crown. But till this period arrived, he should
+reckon it his duty to adhere to the principles of the constitution,
+as delivered to us by our ancestors; to defend them against
+innovation and encroachment, and to maintain them with firmness."
+"The constitution of this country," he presently added, "is its
+glory; but in what a nice adjustment does its excellence consist!
+Equally free from the distractions of democracy and the tyranny of
+monarchy, its happiness is to be found in its mixture of parts. It
+was this mixed government which the prudence of our ancestors
+devised, and which it will be our wisdom to support. They
+experienced all the vicissitudes and distractions of a republic;
+they felt all the vassalage and despotism of a simple monarchy.
+They abandoned both; and, by blending each together, extracted a
+system which has been the envy and admiration of the world. This
+system it is the object of the present address to defeat and
+destroy. It is the intention of this address to arrogate a power
+which does not belong to the House of Commons; to place a negative
+on the exercise of the prerogative, and to destroy the balance of
+power in the government as it was settled at the Revolution."</p>
+<p>Fox had urged that our history afforded no example of a ministry
+retaining office after the House of Commons had passed a resolution
+condemning it. Pitt, in reply, urged that our history equally
+failed to furnish any instance of a ministry having been called on
+to retire without any misconduct being alleged against them. And
+the result of the division showed that his arguments and his
+firmness were producing an impression on the House, for, though he
+was again defeated, the majority against him (only twelve) was far
+smaller than on any previous division.[<a href="#note-102">102</a>]
+A week later, this feeling in his favor was shown still more
+decidedly, when Fox, on moving for a fresh address, or, as he
+termed it, a representation to the King that the House had received
+his Majesty's reply to their address "with surprise and
+affliction," he could only carry it by a single vote.[<a href=
+"#note-103">103</a>] And this division closed the struggle. Fox
+made no farther effort. Before the end of the month the Parliament
+was dissolved, and the general election which ensued sent to the
+House a majority to support the ministers which Pitt was fairly
+warranted in claiming as the full justification of the course which
+he had pursued.</p>
+<p>On a review of the whole of this extraordinary transaction, or
+series of transactions, it is impossible to avoid regarding the
+issue of the struggle as an all-important element in the case, and
+a test almost decisive of the correctness of conduct of the rival
+leaders. We may leave out of the question the action of the King in
+his communication to Lord Temple, which, although sanctioned by the
+great legal authority of Lord Thurlow, we are, for reasons already
+given, compelled to regard as unconstitutional, but for which Mr.
+Pitt was only technically responsible; having, indeed, made himself
+so by his subsequent acceptance of office, but having had no
+previous suspicion of the royal intentions. Similarly, we may
+dismiss from our consideration the merits or demerits of Fox's
+India Bill, the designs which were imputed to its framers, or the
+consequences which, whether intended or not by them, were predicted
+as certain to flow from it. And we may confine ourselves to the
+question whether, in the great Parliamentary struggle which ensued,
+and which lasted for more than three months,[<a href=
+"#note-104">104</a>] the doctrines advanced by Mr. Fox, and the
+conduct pursued by him, were more or less in accordance with the
+admitted rules and principles of the constitution.</p>
+<p>These doctrines may be reduced to two: the first a declaration
+that no minister is justified in retaining office any longer than
+he is sustained in it by the favorable judgment of the
+representatives of the people. Taken by itself, this, but for one
+consideration, might be pronounced the superfluous assertion of a
+truism; superfluous, because it is obvious that a House of Commons
+hostile to a minister can compel his resignation by obstructing all
+his measures. And Pitt himself recognized this as fully as Fox,
+though we may hardly agree with him that the Opposition was bound
+to allow him time to develop his policy, and to bring forward his
+various measures, before it pronounced an opinion adverse to them.
+In 1835, when Sir R. Peel first met Parliament after his acceptance
+of office, consequent on the King's dismissal of Lord Melbourne's
+ministry, the Opposition encountered and defeated him twice in the
+first week of the session&mdash;on the choice of a Speaker, and on
+the address, though the latter had been framed with the most
+skilful care to avoid any necessity for objection; but no attempt
+was made by him to call in question the perfect right of Lord J.
+Russell and his followers in the House to choose their own time and
+field of battle. But there is one farther consideration, that the
+authority belonging to the judgment of the House of Commons depends
+on that judgment being not solely its own, but the judgment also of
+the constituencies which have returned it, and whose mouth-piece it
+is; and also that the House is not immortal, but is liable to be
+sent back to those constituencies, to see whether they will ratify
+the judgment which their representatives have expressed; whether,
+in other words, their judgment be the judgment of the nation also.
+This farther consideration was, in fact, Pitt's plea for resisting
+the majorities which, through January and February, so repeatedly
+pronounced against him. And in determining to appeal to the
+constituencies, as the court of ultimate resort, he was clearly
+within the lines of the constitution.</p>
+<p>It follows that Fox, in protesting against a dissolution, in
+threatening even to take steps to prevent it, was acting in
+self-evident violation of all constitutional principle and
+precedent. He was denying one of the most universally acknowledged
+of the royal prerogatives. The distinction which he endeavored to
+draw between a dissolution at the close of a session and one in the
+middle of it, had manifestly no validity in law or in common-sense.
+The minister had a clear right to appeal from the House of Commons
+to the people, and one equally clear to choose his own time for
+making that appeal. The appeal was made, the judgment of the nation
+was pronounced, and its pronouncement may be, and indeed must be,
+accepted as a sufficient justification, in a constitutional point
+of view, of Pitt's conduct both in accepting and retaining office.
+If he retained it for three months, in opposition to the voice of
+the existing House of Commons, he could certainly allege that he
+was retaining it in accordance with the deliberate judgment of the
+nation.</p>
+<p>And this is the verdict of a modern statesman, a very careful
+student of the theory of our Parliamentary constitution, and one
+whom party connection would notoriously have inclined to defend the
+line taken by Mr. Fox, had it been possible to do so. Indeed, he
+may be said to show his bias in that statesman's favor when he
+affirms that he would have been right in moving a resolution of
+censure on Pitt for "his acceptance of office," which he presently
+calls the result of "the success of a court intrigue,"[<a href=
+"#note-105">105</a>] and, without a particle of evidence to justify
+the imputation, affirms to "have been prepared beforehand with much
+art and combination." But <i>amicus Fox, sed magis arnica
+veritas</i>; and though he thus passes censure on Pitt, where the
+facts on which he bases it are at least unproved, on those points
+as to which the facts are clear and certain he condemns Fox
+altogether, affirming that his "attempt to show that the crown had
+not the prerogative of dissolving Parliament in the middle of a
+session had neither law nor precedent in its support."[<a href=
+"#note-106">106</a>] And he proceeds to lay down, with great
+clearness and accuracy, "the practice as well as the theory of our
+mixed government," which is, that "when two of the powers of the
+state cannot" agree, and the business of the state is stopped, the
+only appeal is to the people at large. Thus, when in the reign of
+Queen Anne the House of Lords and the House of Commons fulminated
+resolutions at each other, a dissolution cleared the air and
+restored serenity. If no case had occurred since the Revolution of
+a quarrel between the crown and the House of Commons, the cause is
+to be sought in the prudence with which every sovereign who had
+reigned since that event had wielded his constitutional authority.
+If George III. had been wanting in that prudence, it did not follow
+that he was debarred from the right of appealing to the people. Any
+other doctrine would invest the House of Commons, elected for the
+ordinary business of the state, with a supreme power over every
+branch of it. This supreme power must rest somewhere; according to
+our constitution it rests in the common assent of the realm,
+signified by the persons duly qualified to elect the members of the
+House of Commons; and Lord Russell, in thus expounding his ideas on
+this subject, was undoubtedly expressing the view that ever since
+the transactions of which we have been speaking has been taken of
+the point chiefly in dispute. Since that day there has been more
+than one instance of Parliament being dissolved in the middle of a
+session; but, though the prudence of the different ministers who
+advised such dissolutions may, perhaps, have been
+questioned&mdash;nay, though in one memorable instance it was
+undoubtedly a penal dissolution in the fullest sense of the
+word[<a href="#note-107">107</a>]&mdash;no one has ever accused the
+sovereign's advisers of seducing him into an unconstitutional
+exercise of his prerogative.</p>
+<p>Pitt was now Prime-minister, with a degree of power in
+Parliament and of popularity out-of-doors that no former minister,
+not even his own father, had ever enjoyed. As such, by the
+confession of one who was certainly no friendly critic,[<a href=
+"#note-108">108</a>] "he became the greatest master of
+Parliamentary government that has ever existed." His administration
+may be regarded as a fresh starting-point in the history of the
+country, as the inauguration of the principle of steady amendment,
+improvement, and progress, in place of the maxims which had guided
+all his predecessors since the Revolution, of regarding every thing
+as permanently settled by the arrangements made at that time, and
+their own duty, consequently, as binding them to keep everything in
+its existing condition. But, of all the ministers recorded in our
+annals, there is not one so greatly in advance of his time as Pitt;
+and from the very outset of his ministerial career he applied
+himself, not only to the removal or correction of admitted abuses
+or defects, but, in cases where the fault, being in our general
+system of policy, had been less conspicuous, to the establishment
+of new principles of action which have been the rules of all
+succeeding statesmen. He was not, indeed, the first raiser of the
+question of Parliamentary Reform, but he was the first to produce
+an elaborate scheme with that object, parts of which, such as the
+suppression of the smaller boroughs and the enfranchisement of
+places which had gradually become more important, have been leading
+features of every subsequent bill on the subject. He was the first
+to propose the removal of those political disabilities under which
+the Roman Catholics labored, which no one before him had regarded
+as consistent with the safety of the state, and to which he
+sacrificed office. He was the first to conceive the idea of
+developing our national industries and resources by commercial
+treaties with other nations, even choosing for his essay-piece a
+treaty with a country with which our relations for nearly five
+hundred years had been almost uninterruptedly hostile, and which
+Fox, in the heat of his opposition, objected even to consider in
+any other light than that of an enemy. He laid the foundation for
+all subsequent legislation connected with our colonies in his Bill
+for the Government of Canada; and he established a system for the
+government of our Indian dependencies on so statesman-like a
+principle, that all subsequent administrations concurred in
+upholding it, till subsequent events compelled the abolition of all
+the share in the government of the country previously possessed by
+the Company.</p>
+<p>A great writer of the past generation,[<a href=
+"#note-109">109</a>] who in some respects has done full justice to
+his genius and political virtue, has, however (partly, it can
+hardly be doubted, from regarding himself as a follower of his
+great rival, Fox), contrasted his capacity as a War-minister with
+that of his father, drawing a comparison on this point very
+disadvantageous to the son. We need not stop to examine how far the
+praises which he bestows on Lord Chatham's talents as a planner of
+military operations are deserved; but it may very fairly be
+contended that the disparaging views of Pitt's military policy
+which he has advanced are founded solely on what is in this as well
+as in many other instances a most delusive criterion, success. It
+is true, unquestionably, that in the campaigns of 1793-4-5 against
+the French revolutionists, while he took upon this country the
+entire burden of the naval war, on land he contented himself with
+playing a secondary part, and employing a comparatively small force
+(which, however, doubled that which his father had sent to
+Minden),[<a href="#note-110">110</a>] for the success of the
+military operations trusting chiefly to the far stronger Austrian
+and Prussian divisions, under the command of Prince Coburg and the
+Duke of Brunswick, to which the British regiments were but
+auxiliaries. It is true, also, that the result of their operations
+was unfortunate, and that the German generals proved wholly unable
+to contend with the fiery and more skilful impetuosity of Jourdan
+and Pich&eacute;gru. But the question is not whether Pitt's
+confidence in the prowess of his allies was misplaced, but whether
+he had not abundant reason to justify him in entertaining it. And,
+to judge fairly on this point, we must recollect the reputation
+which for the last forty years the Austrian and Prussian armies had
+enjoyed. The result of the seven years' war had established the
+renown of the Prussians, and the Duke of Brunswick was understood
+to be a favorite pupil of the Great Frederic. The same war had
+shown that the Austrians were not very unequal to the Prussians;
+while the reputation of the French troops had fallen to the lowest
+ebb, the most memorable event in their annals during the same war
+being the rout of Rosbach, when 60,000 of them fled before Frederic
+and 22,000. At the breaking out of the Revolution, it might be said
+that De Bouille was the only French general of the slightest
+reputation, and since the sad journey to Varennes he had been an
+exile from his country. And, though again in 1803 Pitt once more
+trusted for success on land to Continental alliances, not only does
+he deserve admiration for the diplomatic talent with which he
+united Austria, Prussia, and Russia against France, but it can
+hardly be doubted that confederacy would have been triumphant, had
+not the incompetent vanity of Alexander ruined all its prospects by
+his rash disregard at Austerlitz of the experienced warnings of his
+own staff.[<a href="#note-111">111</a>]</p>
+<p>The new form of government which he established for India, and
+to which allusion has been made, has lost the greater part of its
+importance in the eyes of the present generation, from the
+more-recent abolition of the political authority of the East India
+Company, though of some of the principles which he avowed he had
+taken for his guides it is worth while to preserve the record; with
+such clearness, as well as statesman-like wisdom, do they affirm
+the objects which every one should keep in view who applies himself
+to legislation for distant dependencies where the privileges and
+interests of foreign fellow-subjects are to be regarded with as
+jealous a solicitude as those of our own countrymen. These objects
+may be briefly described as being the reconciling the vested and
+chartered interests of the Company with the legitimate authority of
+the King's government; for, though Pitt admitted that "state
+necessity" might occasionally be allowed as a valid reason for the
+abrogation of a charter, he affirmed that nothing short of such
+absolute necessity could excuse such a measure, and he relied on
+the previous history of the Company to prove the fallacy of an
+observation that had sometimes been made, that commercial companies
+could not govern empires. There were three interests to be
+considered: that of the native Indians, that of the Company, and
+that of this country; and the problem to be solved was, "how to do
+the most good to India and to the East India Company with the least
+injury to our constitution." Some of his remarks contained
+unavoidable allusions to Fox's bill of the previous year, since
+some of the provisions of his bill were entirely opposite to those
+which Fox had framed, the most material point of difference being
+the character of the Board of Control which he proposed to
+establish. Fox, as has been seen, had proposed to make the
+commissioners to be appointed under his bill irremovable for
+several years, whatever changes might take place in the home
+government; an arrangement which the opposers of the bill suspected
+of being designed to prevent any change in the home government from
+taking place. Pitt, on the other hand, laid down as one of his
+leading principles that "the board could not be permanent, that it
+must be subordinate to the administration of the day, and that
+permanency would be in itself a deviation from the principles of
+the constitution, and would involve the board in contradictions to
+the executive government that could not fail to be attended with
+great public inconvenience. An institution to control the
+government of India must be either totally independent of the
+government of this country or subordinate to it." "The board was to
+consist of none but privy councillors," and instead of the vast
+amount of patronage which was to have been created by the bill of
+1783, this board was "to create no increase of officers nor to
+impose any new burdens." ... "The first and leading ideas would be,
+to limit the subsisting patronage;" ... and so little was Pitt
+covetous to engross that which did and must continue to subsist,
+that he left even "the officers of the government of Bengal to the
+nomination of the Court of Directors, subject only to the negative
+of the crown; and the Court of Directors was also to have the
+nomination of the officers of all the subordinate governments,
+except only of the commander-in-chief, who, for various reasons,
+must remain to be appointed by the crown." Another very important
+part of the arrangement was, that "gradation and succession were to
+be the general rule of promotion," a regulation which of itself
+would be "a forcible check upon patronage, and tend greatly to its
+reduction." The governor of Bengal was to be the governor-general
+of the whole country, the governors of Madras and Bombay being
+subordinate to him; and each governor was to be assisted by a
+council of three members, of whom the commander of the forces was
+to be one.</p>
+<p>The spirit in which a law or a government is administered is
+commonly of greater practical importance than the words in which
+the regulation or the system is framed or defined; and Pitt,
+therefore, concluded his speech by laying down a few "clear and
+simple principles as those from which alone a good government could
+arise. The first and principal object would be to take care to
+prevent the government from being ambitious and bent on conquest.
+Commerce was our object, and, with a view to its extension, a
+pacific system should prevail, and a system of defence and
+conciliation. The government there ought, therefore, in an especial
+manner, to avoid wars, or entering into alliances likely to create
+wars." It was not to forget "to pay a due regard to self-defence,
+or to guard against sudden hostilities from neighboring powers,
+and, whenever there was reason to apprehend attack, to be in a
+state of preparation. This was indispensably necessary; but
+whenever such circumstances occurred, the executive government in
+India was not to content itself with acting there as the
+circumstances of the case might require; it was also to send
+immediate advice home of what had happened, of what measures had
+been taken in consequence, and what farther measures were intended
+to be pursued; and a tribunal was to be established to take
+cognizance of such matters." The system of taking presents from the
+natives was to be absolutely prohibited, a regulation which he
+hoped would "tend effectually to check private corruption;" and,
+lastly, it was proposed to establish a court of criminal judicature
+for the trial in England of certain classes of delinquents after
+their return from India. The Judges of the court were to be men of
+the highest character; they were to be chosen by ballot, some being
+taken from the bench of judges, some from each House of Parliament.
+And they were "not to be tied down to strict rules of evidence, but
+to be upon their oaths to give their judgments conscientiously, and
+to pronounce such judgment as the common law would warrant." Such a
+tribunal he admitted to be an innovation; but, "unless some new
+process were instituted, offences shocking to humanity, opposite to
+justice, and contrary to every principle of religion and morality,
+must continue to prevail, unchecked, uncontrolled, and
+unrestrained, and the necessity of the case outweighed the risk and
+the hazard of the innovation."</p>
+<p>These were the general outlines of the constitution which in
+1784 the Parliament established for India, and the skill with which
+it was adapted to the very peculiar character of the settlements to
+be governed is sufficiently proved by the fact that it was
+maintained with very little alteration equally by Whig and Tory
+administrations for three-quarters of a century, till the great
+convulsion of the Mutiny compelled an entire alteration in the
+system, and the abolition of the governing powers of the Company,
+as we shall have occasion to relate in a subsequent chapter. The
+principles which Pitt had laid down as the guiding maxims for the
+governors; the avoidance of ambitious views of conquest, the
+preservation of peace, and the limitation of the aims of the
+government to the encouragement and extension of commerce, were not
+equally adhered to. Undoubtedly, in some instances, the wars in
+which, even during Pitt's too short lifetime, the Indian government
+was engaged, came under his description of wars which were
+justifiable on the ground of self-defence&mdash;wars undertaken for
+the preservation of what had been previously won or purchased,
+rather than for the acquisition of new territories at the expense
+of chiefs who had given us no provocation. But for others, though
+professedly undertaken with a view only of anticipating hostile
+intentions, the development of which might possibly be reserved for
+a distant future, it is not easy to find a similar justification;
+and it may be feared that in more than one case governors-general,
+conscious of great abilities, have been too much inclined to adopt
+the pernicious maxim of Louis XIV., that the aggrandizement and
+extension of his dominions is the noblest object which a ruler of
+nations can have in view. Yet, though unable on strictly moral
+grounds to justify all the warlike enterprises which make up so
+large a part of our subsequent Indian history, it is impossible,
+probably, for even the most rigid moralist to avoid some feelings
+of national pride in the genius of our countrymen, who in the short
+space of a single century have built up an empire of a magnitude
+unequalled even by the Caesars, and have governed and still are
+governing it in so wise and beneficent a spirit, and with such a
+display of administrative capacity, that our rule is recognized as
+a blessing by the great majority of the nations themselves, as a
+protection from ceaseless intestine war, from rapine, and that
+worst of tyrannies, anarchy, which was their normal condition
+before Clive established our supremacy at Plassy, and into which
+they would surely and speedily fall back, if our controlling
+authority were to be withdrawn.</p>
+<a name="canadaconst" id="canadaconst"></a>
+<p>India was not the only British settlement for which the growth
+of our empire compelled Pitt to devise a constitution. The year
+which saw his birth had also seen the conquest of Canada from the
+French; and in 1774 a system of government for the new province had
+been established which it is sufficient here to describe as one,
+which differed but little from a pure despotism, the administration
+being vested in a governor and Legislative Council, every member of
+which was to be nominated by the crown. But the working of this act
+had from the first proved very unsatisfactory, and had become more
+so as the population increased by the influx of fresh settlers from
+Great Britain, and also from the United States, here many of those
+who in the recent civil war had adhered the connection with the
+mother country had been exposed to constant malice and
+ill-treatment, and had preferred crossing the border and obtaining
+lands in Canada to returning to England. Pitt recognized the evil,
+and undertook to remedy it and in 1791 he introduced a bill to
+establish a constitution for Canada, which a recent historian
+describes as "remarkable, as recognizing for the first time the
+wise and generous principle of independent colonial institutions,
+which has since been fully developed in every dependency of the
+British crown capable of local self-government."[<a href=
+"#note-112">112</a>] One peculiar difficulty in framing such a
+constitution arose from the circumstance of the old French
+colonists, who greatly outnumbered the settlers of British blood,
+being attached to the Roman Catholic religion; while the British
+settlers were nearly, or perhaps all, Protestant, though of
+different denominations. The difficulty was, indeed, lessened by
+the circumstance that the French dwelt in Quebec and the district
+between that city and the mouth of the St. Lawrence, and that the
+English had for the most part betaken themselves to the more inland
+region. And this local separation of the two races the minister now
+took for his guide in the arrangement which he devised. The most
+important feature in it was the division of the province into two
+parts, as Upper and Lower Canada, and the establishment of a
+distinct local Legislature for each division, a House of Assembly
+being created in each, and a Council, so as, in Pitt's words, "to
+give both divisions the full advantages of the British
+constitution." The Assemblies were to have the power of taxation
+(so that there was no room left for such perverse legislation by a
+British Parliament as had lately cost its sovereign the United
+States). The act of <i>habeas corpus</i> was extended to the
+province (a privilege which no one of French blood had ever enjoyed
+before); the tenure of land was to be the socage[<a href=
+"#note-113">113</a>] tenure so long and happily established in
+England. Complete religious toleration was established, and a
+certain proportion of land was allotted in Upper Canada, as a
+provision for a Protestant clergy, and the foundation of an
+ecclesiastical establishment. So great was Pitt's desire to
+complete the resemblance between the colony and Great Britain, that
+he even contemplated the creation of an aristocracy, by the
+introduction of a provision enabling the King to grant hereditary
+colonial titles, the possession of which should include hereditary
+seats in the provincial Council. The two latter clauses were
+opposed by Fox, and the latter of them, though sanctioned by
+Parliament, was never carried out in practice. But Fox, bitter as
+he was at this time in his general opposition to the government,
+agreed cordially in the general principles of the bill, avowing his
+conviction that "the only method of retaining distant colonies with
+advantage is to enable them to govern themselves," so that each
+party in the British Parliament is entitled to a share of the
+credit for this pattern of all subsequent colonial
+constitutions&mdash;Pitt for the original genius for organization
+which his contrivance of all the complicated details of the measure
+displayed, and Fox for his frank adoption of the general principle
+inculcated by his rival, even while differing as to some of the
+minor details of the measure. During these years the country was
+increasing in prosperity, and the minister was daily rising in
+credit; more powerful and more popular than the most successful or
+the most brilliant of his predecessors. But during these same years
+two great constitutional difficulties had arisen, one of which,
+indeed, the deep sense which both parties felt of the danger of
+investigating it shelved almost as soon as it was seen; but the
+other of which, besides the importance which it derived from the
+degree in which it involved the principle of the supreme authority
+of Parliament, and brought under discussion even that which
+regulates the succession to the crown, imperilled the existence of
+the ministry, and threatened a total change in both the domestic
+and foreign policy of the nation.</p>
+<p>The Prince of Wales, who had come of age in the summer of 1783,
+had at once begun to make himself notorious for the violence of his
+opposition to his father's ministers, carrying the openness of his
+hostility so far as, during the Westminster election to drive about
+the streets with a carriage and all his servants profusely
+decorated with Fox's colors; and, still more discreditably, by most
+unmeasured profligacy of all kinds. The consequence was that he
+soon became deeply involved in debt, so deeply that, in 1787, a
+member of Fox's party gave notice of his intention to move that the
+Parliament should pay his debts and increase his income. Pitt,
+without specifying his reasons, avowed that he should feel it his
+duty to oppose any grant of such a character; but another member of
+Parliament, Mr. Rolle, one of the members for Devonshire, being
+trammelled by no such feeling of responsibility, expressed a
+similar resolution in language which contained an allusion
+perfectly understood on both sides of the House. He said that "the
+question thus proposed to be brought forward went immediately to
+affect our constitution in Church and State." And every one knew
+that he was referring to a report which had recently become
+general, that the Prince was married to a Roman Catholic lady of
+the name of Fitzherbert. No direct notice was taken of this
+allusion at the moment, Fox himself, who had the chief share of the
+Prince's confidence, being accidentally absent; but a day or two
+afterward he referred to Rolle's speech with great indignation,
+declaring that it referred to a "low, malicious calumny" which had
+no foundation whatever, and "was only fit to impose on the lowest
+order of persons." Being pressed as to the precise force of his
+assertion, and being asked whether it meant more than that under
+the existing laws, such as the Royal Marriage Act, there had been
+no marriage, because there could have been no <i>legal</i>
+marriage, he declared that he meant no such evasion, but that no
+marriage ceremony, legal or illegal, had ever taken place; and
+farther, that in saying this he was speaking on the direct
+authority of the Prince himself. No more degrading act stains the
+annals of British royalty. For the fact was true&mdash;the very
+next evening Fox learned the deceit which the Prince had practised
+on him from a gentleman who had been one of the witnesses to the
+marriage, which had been solemnized by a Protestant clergyman
+fifteen months before.[<a href="#note-114">114</a>] And his
+indignation was such that for some time afterward he abstained from
+all interference in the Prince's affairs; while the language held
+by the Prince's other confidant, Mr. Sheridan, was so evasive as to
+betray a consciousness that whatever had occurred would not bear
+the light of day; so that there were very few to whom the truth or
+falsehood of the report was a subject of interest who felt any
+uncertainty on the subject.</p>
+<p>It may, probably, be regarded as fortunate for the peace of the
+kingdom that the Prince, who eventually became King George IV.,
+left behind him no issue from his marriage with the Princess, the
+failure of heirs of his body thus removing any temptation to raise
+the question whether he had not himself forfeited all right to
+succeed to the throne by his previous marriage to a Roman Catholic.
+A clause of the Bill of Rights provides that any member of the
+royal family who should marry a Roman Catholic (with the exception
+of the issue of princesses who may be the wives of foreign princes)
+shall by that marriage be rendered incapable of inheriting the
+crown of England. And though the Royal Marriage Act (which, as we
+have seen, had been recently passed) had enacted that no marriage
+of any member of the royal family contracted without the consent of
+the reigning sovereign should be valid, it by no means follows that
+an invalidity so created would exempt the contractor of a marriage
+with a Roman Catholic, which as an honorable man he must be
+supposed to have intended to make valid, from the penalties enacted
+by the Bill of Rights. It is a point on which the most eminent
+lawyers of the present day are by no means agreed. The spirit of
+the clause in that bill undoubtedly was, that no apparent or
+presumptive heirs to the crown should form a matrimonial connection
+with any one who should own allegiance to a foreign power, and that
+spirit was manifestly disregarded if a prince married a Roman
+Catholic lady, even though a subsequent law had enacted a
+conditional invalidity of such a marriage. We may find an analogy
+to such a case in instances where a man has abducted a minor, and
+induced her to contract a marriage with himself. The lady may not
+have been reluctant; but the marriage has been annulled, and the
+husband has been criminally prosecuted, the nullity of the marriage
+not availing to save him from conviction and punishment. A bigamous
+marriage is invalid, but the bigamist is punished. And, apart from
+any purely legal consideration, it may be thought that public
+policy forbids such a construction of law as would make the
+illegality or invalidity of an act (and all illegal acts must be
+more or less invalid) such a protection to the wrong-doer as would
+screen him from punishment.</p>
+<p>Whatever may be the judgment formed on the legal aspect and
+merits of the case, the conduct of the Prince could not fail to
+give the great body of the people, justly jealous at all times of
+their national adherence to truthfulness and honesty, a most
+unfavorable impression of his character. As has been already
+mentioned, Fox was so indignant at having been made the instrument
+to assure the Parliament and the nation of a falsehood, that he for
+a time broke off all communication with him.[<a href=
+"#note-115">115</a>] Yet a singular caprice of fortune, or, it
+would be more proper to say, a melancholy visitation of Providence,
+before the end of the following year led Fox to carry his
+championship of the same Prince who had so abused his confidence to
+the length of pronouncing the most extravagant eulogies on his
+principles, and on his right to the confidence and respect of the
+nation at large. In the autumn of 1788 the King fell into a state
+of bad health, which in no long time affected his mind, and, by the
+middle of November, had so deranged his faculties as to render him
+incapable of attending to his royal duties, or, in fact,
+transacting any business whatever. Parliament was not sitting, but
+its re-assembling had been fixed for the 4th of December, and
+before that day arrived the King's illness had assumed so alarming
+a character, and it appeared so unsafe to calculate on his
+immediate recovery, that the minister summoned a Privy Council, the
+summons being addressed to the members of the Opposition as well as
+to his own followers, to receive the opinions of the physicians in
+attendance on his Majesty, as a necessary foundation for the
+measures which he conceived it to be his duty to propose to
+Parliament. Those opinions were, that it was almost certain that
+the disease would not be permanent, though no one could undertake
+to fix its duration with the least appearance of probability. And,
+as the royal authority could not be left in abeyance, as it were,
+for an uncertain period, it was indispensable to appoint a Regent
+to conduct the affairs of the kingdom till the King should,
+happily, be once more in a condition to resume his functions.</p>
+<p>In considering the line of conduct adopted in this emergency by
+Pitt and his great rival Fox, Pitt has one manifest advantage on
+his side, that it is impossible to attribute the course which he
+took to any personal motive, or any desire for the retention of
+official power; while it is equally impossible to doubt that Fox
+was in no slight degree,[<a href="#note-116">116</a>] and that Lord
+Loughborough, the prince's chief adviser on points of law, was
+wholly influenced by the hope of supplanting the ministry. Pitt had
+never the least doubt that on the establishment of the Regency he
+should be dismissed, and was prepared to return to the Bar. But his
+knowledge of the preference which the Prince entertained for his
+rival did not lead him to hesitate for a single moment as to the
+propriety of placing him in a situation to exercise that
+preference. On the reassembling of Parliament, he at once took what
+he conceived to be the proper parliamentary course of proceeding;
+at his suggestion committees in both Houses were appointed to take
+a formal examination of the royal physicians; and, when those
+committees had reported that the King was for the present incapable
+of discharging his royal functions, though likely at some future
+period to be able to resume them, he moved the House of Commons to
+appoint another committee, to search for "precedents of such
+proceedings as might have been taken in the case of the personal
+exercise of the royal authority being prevented or interrupted by
+infancy, sickness, or infirmity, with a view to provide for the
+same." 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[<a href=
+"#note-117">117</a>] of the kingdom.</p>
+<p>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. He instantly replied that to assert an
+inherent indefeasible right in the Prince of Wales, or any one
+else, independently of the decision of the two Houses, fell little
+short of treason to the constitution; but, at the same time, to
+prevent any one pretending to misconceive his intentions, he
+allowed it to be seen with sufficient plainness that, when once the
+right of Parliament to appoint the Regent had been established, he
+should agree in the propriety of conferring that office on the
+Prince of Wales. The committee was appointed; but, even before it
+could report the result of its investigations, the doctrine
+advanced by Fox had been the subject of discussion in the House of
+Lords, where Lord Camden, who had presided over the meeting of the
+Privy Council a few days before, on moving for the appointment of a
+similar committee of peers, had taken occasion to declare that, if
+Fox had made such an assertion as rumor imputed to him, it was one
+which had no foundation in "the common law of the kingdom." He had
+never read nor heard of such a doctrine. Its assertors might raise
+expectations not easily laid, and might involve the country in
+confusion. And he contended, as Pitt had done in the Commons, that
+its assertion was a strong argument in favor of the appointment of
+a committee, that it might be at once seen whether it were
+warranted by any precedent whatever. The reports of the two
+committees bore out Fox's statement, that no precedent entirely
+applicable to the case before them had ever occurred. But by this
+time Fox had learned that the argument which he had founded on it
+was in the highest degree unpalatable both to Parliament and to the
+nation; and for a moment he sought to modify it by an explanation
+that, though he had claimed for the Prince "the naked right, he had
+not by that expression intended to maintain that that right could
+be reduced into possession without the consent of Parliament;" an
+explanation not very reconcilable to common sense, since, if a
+right were inherent and indefeasible, Parliament could not, without
+absolute tyranny, refuse to sanction its exercise; and, in fact,
+his coadjutor, Sheridan, on the very same evening, re-asserted his
+original doctrine in, if possible, still more explicit terms,
+warning the minister "of the danger of provoking the Prince to
+assert his right," while a still greater man (Burke) declared that
+"the minister had taken up an attitude on the question tantamount
+to that of setting himself up as a competitor to the Prince." Such
+inconsiderate violence gave a great advantage to Pitt, one of whose
+most useful characteristics as a debater was a readiness and
+presence of mind that nothing could discompose. He repelled such
+menaces and imputations with an equally lofty scorn, and, after a
+few necessary preliminaries, brought forward a series of
+resolutions, one of which declared the fact of the sovereign's
+illness, and consequent incapacity; a second affirmed it to be the
+right and duty of the two Houses of Parliament to provide the means
+for supplying the defect in the royal authority; and a third
+imposed on the Houses the task of deciding on the mode in which the
+royal assent necessary to give their resolutions the authority of
+law should be signified. It was impossible to object to the first;
+but the second was stubbornly contested by the Opposition, the
+chiefs of the Coalition Ministry once more fighting side by side;
+though Lord North contented himself with arguing that the
+affirmation of the right and duty of Parliament was a needless
+raising of a disputable point, and moving, therefore, that the
+committee should report progress, as the recognized mode of
+shelving it. Fox, however, carried away by the heat of debate,
+returned to the assertion of the doctrine of absolute right,
+overlooking his subsequent modification of it, and again gave Pitt
+the advantage, by condescending to impugn his motives for proposing
+the resolution, as being inspired, not by a zeal for the
+constitution, but by a consciousness that he did not deserve the
+confidence of the Prince, and, therefore, anticipated his instant
+dismissal by the Regent. The re-affirmation of the Prince's
+inherent right was, indeed, necessary to Fox as the foundation for
+the objections which he took to other parts of Pitt's scheme. For
+the minister, while admitting to its full extent the irresistible
+claim which the Prince of Wales possessed to the preference of
+Parliament for the Regency, proposed at the same time to impose
+certain limitations on his exercise of the authority, so long as
+there was a reasonable hope of his royal father's recovery. He was
+not to have the power to create peerages, nor to alienate the
+property of the crown, nor to grant offices in reversion; and, as
+the Queen was to have the care of his Majesty's person, she also
+was to have the appointment of all the offices in the royal
+household. Fox, on the other hand, objected with extreme
+earnestness to the impropriety of imposing any limitations whatever
+on the power of the Regent; and then the question whether the
+Prince was to derive his right to the Regency from the authority of
+Parliament, or from his natural position and inalienable preceding
+right as his father's heir, became one of practical importance. If
+the Parliament had the right to confer authority, it had clearly
+the right to limit the authority it conferred. If the Prince had an
+indefeasible right to the Regency, independently of the will of
+Parliament, then Parliament could have no pretence to limit or
+restrain the exercise of an authority which in no degree flowed
+from itself. Fox, indeed, took another objection to the imposing of
+limitations to the authority to be intrusted to the Regent,
+contending that this would be to create a power unknown to the
+constitution&mdash;a person in the situation of King without regal
+power. But, not to mention precedents drawn from the reigns of
+Edward III., Richard II., and Henry VI., in the twenty-fourth year
+of the very last reign, George II., on the death of his son, the
+father of the present King, had enjoined the Parliament to provide
+for the government, in the case of his own death, while the heir
+was still a minor, recommending to them the appointment of the
+Princess Dowager of Wales as Regent, "with such powers and
+limitations as might appear expedient." And, in conformity with his
+desire, the Parliament had appointed the Princess Regent, with a
+Council of Regency to assist her; and had enacted that "several
+portions of the regal power" should be withheld from the Regent, if
+she could not obtain the consent of the Council thus
+appointed.[<a href="#note-118">118</a>]</p>
+<p>This part of the case was so plain, that when, after the
+different resolutions proposed by Pitt had been adopted in both
+Houses, Fox insisted that, instead of proceeding by a bill to
+create a Regency, and to appoint the Prince of Wales Regent, the
+only course which could be adopted with propriety would be to
+present an address to the Prince, to entreat him to assume the
+government, he failed to induce the House to agree with him; and
+finally, as if he were determined to find a battle-field in every
+clause, he made a vigorous resistance to the expedient by which
+Pitt proposed that the formal royal assent which was necessary to
+make the bill law should be given. Fox, on one occasion, had gone
+the length of denying that the two Houses had any right to be
+regarded as a Parliament while the King, an essential part of
+Parliament, was incapacitated. But such an objection could have had
+no force, even in the mind of him who raised it, since the
+proceedings of the two Convention Parliaments of 1660 and 1689
+labored under a similar defect; and yet their acts had been
+recognized as valid, and ratified by subsequent Parliaments. And
+now, in reference to the expedient proposed by the minister, that
+the two Houses should empower and authorize the Lord Chancellor to
+affix the Great Seal to the bill, Burke, with great, but for him
+not unusual, violence, denounced both the proposal and the
+Chancellor, declaring that such a step would be the setting up of a
+phantom of sovereignty, a puppet, an idol, an idiot, to which he
+disclaimed all allegiance. A more perilous amendment was one
+proposed to another clause by Mr. Rolle, enacting that if the
+Regent should marry a Roman Catholic his authority should cease.
+Since the Bill of Rights, as we have seen, forbade a sovereign to
+marry a Roman Catholic without incurring the forfeiture of his
+crown, it was evidently reasonable that the same restriction should
+be imposed on every Regent; but it was hard at the moment
+altogether to dissociate such a clause from the discussions of the
+preceding year; and Mr. Rolle endeavored to give the clause a more
+pointed meaning by an amendment to enact that the forfeiture should
+be incurred by the mere celebration of any marriage ceremony,
+whether the marriage thus performed were legal and valid or not.
+His amendment, however, was unanimously rejected. The bill was
+passed without alteration by the House of Commons; the Prince,
+while protesting in an elaborate and most able letter, drawn up for
+him by Burke, against the restrictions imposed by the bill,
+nevertheless consented to sacrifice his own judgment to the general
+good of the kingdom, and to accept the authority, limited as it
+was. And by the middle of February the bill was sent up to the
+House of Lords. There Lord Camden had charge of it, and his
+position as a former Chancellor gave irresistible weight to his
+opinion that the mode proposed to give the final sanction to the
+bill was strictly in accordance with the spirit and practice of the
+constitution. The point with which he dealt was the previous one,
+how Parliament, which was to pass the bill, was to be opened, for,
+"circumstanced as it was, Parliament could not at present take a
+single step." The law, as he put it, declared that the King must be
+present, either in person or by a representative. When he could not
+attend personally, the legal and constitutional process was to
+issue letters-patent under the Great Seal. In the present dilemma,
+therefore, he recommended that the two Houses should direct
+letters-patent to be issued under the Great Seal, authorizing
+commissioners to open Parliament in the name of his Majesty. He
+"must use the liberty to say that those who treated this proposal
+with ridicule were ignorant of the laws of their country. A fiction
+it might be termed, but it was a fiction admirably calculated to
+preserve the constitution, and, by adopting its forms, to preserve
+its substance." The authority of the Great Seal he explained to be
+such that, "even if the Lord Chancellor, by caprice, put it to any
+commission, it could not afterward be questioned;" and he adduced a
+precedent of a very similar character to the course now proposed,
+which occurred "at the commencement of the reign of Henry VI.,
+when, the sovereign being an infant of nine months old, the Great
+Seal was placed in his hand, and it was supposed to be given to him
+by the Master of the Rolls, whereupon many commissions were sealed
+by it, and the government was carried on under its authority." That
+precedent, he reminded the peers, had been followed as recently as
+the year 1754, when, during an illness of George II., Lord
+Chancellor Hardwicke affixed the Great Seal to a commission for
+opening a session of Parliament. And, finally, he concluded by
+moving, "That it is expedient and necessary that letters-patent for
+opening the Parliament should pass under the Great Seal."[<a href=
+"#note-119">119</a>] The motion was carried, and Parliament was
+opened in accordance with it; and, if it had been necessary, the
+same expedient would have sufficed to give the requisite assent to
+the Regency Bill, a necessity which was escaped by the fortunate
+recovery of the royal patient, which was announced by his medical
+advisers a day or two before that fixed for the third reading of
+the bill in the House of Lords.</p>
+<p>Though the question was thus left undetermined for the moment,
+it was revived twenty-two years afterward, when the same sovereign
+was attacked by a recurrence of the same disease, and the existing
+ministry, then presided over by Mr. Perceval, brought forward a
+Regency Bill almost identical with that which on this occasion had
+been framed by Mr. Pitt; and the Opposition, led by Lord Grey and
+Sir Samuel Romilly, raised as nearly as possible the same
+objections to it which were now urged by Fox and his adherents. The
+ministerial measure was, however, again supported by considerable
+majorities; so that the course proposed by Mr. Pitt on this
+occasion may be said to have received the sanction of two
+Parliaments assembled and sitting under widely different
+circumstances; and may, therefore, be taken as having established
+the rule which will be adopted if such an emergency should,
+unfortunately, arise hereafter. And indeed, though the propriety of
+Pitt's proposals has, as was natural, been discussed by every
+historical and political writer who has dealt with the history of
+that time, there has been a general concurrence of opinion in favor
+of that statesman's measure. Lord John Russell, while giving a
+document, entitled "Materials for a Pamphlet," in which he
+recognizes the handwriting of Lord Loughborough, and which
+"contains the grounds of the opinion advanced by him, and adopted
+by Mr. Fox, that, from the moment the two Houses of Parliament
+declared the King unable to exercise his royal authority, a right
+to exercise that authority attached to the Prince of Wales," does
+not suppress his own opinion of the "erroneousness of this or any
+other doctrine that attributes to any individual or any constituted
+authority existing in the state a strict or legal right to claim or
+to dispose of the royal authority while the King is alive, but
+incapable of exercising it."[<a href="#note-120">120</a>]</p>
+<p>The only writer, as far as I am aware, who advocates the
+opposite view is Lord Campbell, who, after quoting the speech of
+Lord Camden, from which extracts have been made, comments on it,
+and on the whole transaction, in the following terms: "From the
+course then adopted and carried through, I presume it is now to be
+considered part of our constitution that if ever, during the
+natural life of the sovereign, he is unable by mental disease
+personally to exercise the royal functions, the deficiency is to be
+supplied by the two Houses of Parliament, who, in their
+<i>discretion</i>, will probably elect the heir-apparent Regent,
+under such restrictions as they may please to propose, but who may
+prefer the head of the ruling faction, and at once vest in him all
+the prerogatives of the crown. On the two occasions referred to in
+the reign of George III., the next heir being at enmity with the
+King and his ministers, this was considered the loyal and courtly
+doctrine; and, from its apparent advancement of the rights of
+Parliament, there was no difficulty in casting odium on those who
+opposed it. But I must avow that my deliberate opinion coincides
+with that of Burke, Fox, and Erskine, who pronounced it to be
+unsupported by any precedent, and to be in accordance with the
+principles of the Polish, not the English, monarchy. The two Houses
+of Parliament would be the proper tribunal to pronounce that the
+sovereign is unable to act; but then, as if he were naturally as
+well as civilly dead, the next heir ought of right to assume the
+government as Regent, ever ready to lay it down on the sovereign's
+restoration to reason, in the same way as our Lady Victoria would
+have returned to a private station if, after her accession, there
+had appeared posthumous issue of William IV. by his queen. It is
+easy to point out possible abuses by the next heir as Regent, to
+the prejudice of the living sovereign; but there may be greater
+abuses of the power of election imputed to the two Houses, whereby
+a change of dynasty might be effected. I conceive, therefore, that
+the Irish Parliament[<a href="#note-121">121</a>] in 1789 acted
+more constitutionally in acknowledging the <i>right</i> of the next
+heir, in scouting the fiction of a commission or royal assent from
+the insane sovereign, and in addressing the Prince of Wales to take
+on himself the government as Regent."</p>
+<p>Though the sneers at the possibility of Parliament preferring
+"the head of the ruling faction" to the heir-apparent be hardly
+consistent with the impartial candor which is one of the most
+imperative duties of an historical critic, and though the allusion
+to the principles of the Polish monarchy be not very intelligible,
+yet no one will refuse to attach due weight to the deliberate
+opinion of one who won for himself so high a professional
+reputation as Lord Campbell. But, with all respect to his legal
+rank, we may venture to doubt whether he has not laid down as law,
+speaking as a literary man and an historian, a doctrine which he
+would not have entertained as a judge. For, if we consider the
+common law of the kingdom, it is certain that, in the case of
+subjects, if a man becomes deranged, his next heir does not at once
+enter on his property "as if he were naturally as well as civilly
+dead." And if, as in such cases is notoriously the practice, the
+Court of Chancery appoints a guardian of the lunatic's property,
+analogy would seem to require that the Houses of Parliament, as the
+only body which can possibly claim authority in such a matter,
+should exercise a similar power in providing for the proper
+management of the government to that which the law court would
+exercise in providing for the proper management of an estate; and
+that, therefore, the principles of constitutional[<a href=
+"#note-122">122</a>] statesmanship, which is deeply interested in
+upholding the predominant authority of Parliament, must justify the
+assertion of the ministers that the two Houses had the entire and
+sole right to make regulations for the government of the kingdom
+during the incapacity of the sovereign; and that the next heir,
+even when a son of full age, can have no more right to succeed to
+his father's royal authority in his lifetime than, if that father
+were a subject, he would have to succeed to his estate.</p>
+<p>The opposite doctrine would seem to impugn the legality of the
+whole series of transactions which placed William and Mary on the
+throne. The admission of an indefeasible right of the heir-apparent
+would have borne a perilous resemblance to a recognition of that
+divine right, every pretension to which the Revolution of 1688 had
+extinguished. If, again, as Fox and his followers at one time
+endeavored to argue, the Houses in 1789 had no right to the name or
+power of a Parliament, because the King had no part in their
+meetings, the convention that sat a century before (as, indeed, was
+admitted) was certainly far less entitled to that name or power,
+for it had not only never been called into existence by a King, but
+was assembled in direct defiance of the King. Similarly, it is
+admitted that the body which invited Charles II. to return and
+resume his authority was equally destitute of the validity which
+could only be given by a royal summons. Yet both these bodies had
+performed actions of greater importance than that which was looked
+for from this Parliament. The one had abolished the existing and
+usurping government, and restored to his kingdom a King who had
+been long an exile. The other had, as it were, passed sentence on
+the existing sovereign, on grounds which confessedly will not bear
+a strict examination, and had conferred the crown on a prince who
+had no hereditary claim to the title. The justification of both
+acts was necessity. <i>Salus regni suprema Lex</i>. And the
+necessity was clearly more urgent in the present case than in
+either of the preceding instances. For, unless the Parliament
+interfered to create an authority, there was absolutely none in
+existence which was capable of acting. It should also be remembered
+that this Parliament of 1789, though not opened for the session by
+the King, had been originally elected in obedience to his order,
+and had been prorogued by his proclamation to the day of
+meeting;[<a href="#note-123">123</a>] and, though the opening of a
+session by a speech from the throne is the usual form for the
+commencement of its proceedings, it may be doubted whether it be so
+indispensable a part of them that none of their acts are valid
+without it.</p>
+<p>The breaking out of the French Revolution, and the degree in
+which, in spite of all its atrocities and horrors, the
+revolutionary spirit for a time infected a large party in England,
+prevented Pitt from reviving the plan of Reform which he had framed
+with such care and genius for organization, and in which, though
+defeated in Parliament, both before and after he became minister,
+he had hitherto continued to cherish the hope of eventually
+succeeding. But when clubs and societies, where the most
+revolutionary and seditious doctrines were openly broached, were
+springing up in London and other large towns, and unscrupulous
+demagogues by speeches and pamphlets were busily disseminating
+theories which tended to the subversion of all legitimate
+authority, he not unnaturally thought it no longer seasonable to
+invite a discussion of schemes which would be supported in many
+quarters only, to quote his own words, "as a stepping-stone to
+ulterior objects, which they dared not avow till their power of
+carrying them into effect should be by this first acquisition
+secured." But the alarm which the spread of revolutionary ideas
+excited in his mind was displayed, not only passively in this
+abstention from the advocacy of measures the expediency of which
+must at all times in some degree depend on the tone of their
+introduction, but also in active measures of repression, some of
+which were not, indeed, unwarranted by precedent, but others of
+which can hardly be denied to have been serious inroads on the
+constitution, infringements of the freedom of opinion and
+discussion to which all Englishmen are entitled, and one of which
+was, to say the least, a very perilous extension of a law already
+sufficiently severe, the statute of treason. If the French had been
+content with the overthrow of their own government and
+institutions, much as we should have lamented the indiscriminate
+rashness and abhorred the atrocities with which their design was
+carried out, we should still have adhered to the unquestionable
+maxim, that no nation is justified in interfering in the internal
+affairs of another. But the Jacobin and Girondin demagogues, who
+had now the undisputed sway in Paris, did not limit their views to
+their own country, but openly declared themselves the enemies of
+all established governments in every country; and the Convention
+passed a formal resolution in which they proffered "fraternity and
+assistance" to every people which might be inclined to rise against
+their governments. Their resolutions were officially communicated
+to the sympathizing societies in England, and emissaries were
+secretly encouraged to cross the Channel in the hope of gaining
+converts. Nor were their exertions barren. Two men were convicted
+in Scotland of a plot to seize Edinburgh Castle, to massacre the
+garrison, to imprison the judges, and to rise in arms to compel the
+government to a change of policy. In London the King was fired at
+on his way to open Parliament, and on his return his carriage was
+attacked by a furious mob, and was only protected from serious
+injury by a troop of the Life Guards. Such outrages proved the
+existence of a new danger, against which no previous government had
+ever been called on to provide, and such as, in the opinion of the
+cabinet, could only be met by novel measures of precaution.</p>
+<p>The first was directed against the foreign propagators of
+revolution. The resolutions of the Convention had been promulgated
+in November, 1792; and at the meeting of Parliament in December,
+Lord Grenville, as Foreign Secretary of State, introduced in the
+House of Lords an alien bill, to enable the government to deal in a
+summary manner with any foreign visitors whose conduct or character
+might seem to call for its interference. It provided that all
+foreigners who had arrived in the kingdom since the preceding
+January should give in a statement of their names and residences;
+that any one who should arrive in future should furnish an account
+of his name, his station in life, and his object in visiting
+England; that the King, by proclamation, order in Council, or
+sign-manual, might direct all foreigners to reside in such
+districts as might be thought suitable; that no one might quit the
+residence in which he first settled without a passport; and that
+the Secretary of State might order any suspected foreigner to quit
+the kingdom instantly.</p>
+<p>The act was to be in operation for twelve months, and Lord
+Grenville, in introducing it, though he admitted it to be a measure
+of "rather a novel nature," explained at the same time that it was
+so far from being new in the powers which it gave, that Magna
+Charta distinctly recognized "the power and right of the crown to
+prevent foreigners from entering or residing within the realm." All
+that was really new was the defining of the manner in which that
+power should be exercised, since it had been so rarely needed that
+doubts might exist as to the proper mode of putting it in action.
+The bill, which was adopted in both Houses by large majorities, is
+remarkable, among other circumstances, from the fact that its
+discussion furnished the first instance of a public display of the
+difference between the two sections of the Opposition, subsequently
+described by Burke in one of his most celebrated pamphlets as the
+Old and New Whigs; those whom he called the Old Whigs (the Duke of
+Portland, Sir Gilbert Elliott, Mr. Windham, not to mention Burke
+himself) earnestly supporting it, while Lord Lansdowne, Mr. Fox,
+Mr. Sheridan, and Mr. Grey resisted it with equal zeal. Lord
+Lansdowne took the ground that it was a suspension of the <i>Habeas
+Corpus</i> Act; while Fox and Grey denounced it, in more general
+terms, as a measure "utterly irreconcilable with the principles of
+the constitution," Mr. Grey apparently referring chiefly to the
+power given by the bill to the Secretary of State to send any
+foreigners from the country, which he described as "making the bill
+a measure of oppression, giving power for the exercise of which no
+man was responsible." Sir Gilbert Elliott's answer was singularly
+ingenious. He did not deny that the bill conferred additional power
+on the crown, though not more than was justified by existing
+circumstances; but he maintained that the right of giving
+extraordinary powers to the crown on occasions was so far from
+being inconsistent with the principles of the constitution, that to
+grant extraordinary powers in extraordinary emergencies was a part
+of it essential to the character of a free government. If such
+powers were at all times possessed by the crown, its authority
+would be too great for a free government to co-exist with it; but
+if such could not be at times conferred on the crown, its authority
+would be too small for its own safety or that of the people.</p>
+<p>The arguments of the ministers were, no doubt, greatly
+recommended, both to the Parliament and the people in general, by
+the notoriety of the fact that foreign agents were in many of our
+large towns busily, and not unsuccessfully, engaged in propagating
+what were known as Jacobin doctrines. But, even without that aid,
+it was clear that every government must, for the common good of
+all, be at times of extraordinary emergency invested with the power
+of suspending laws made for ordinary circumstances. And what would
+be an intolerable evil, if the supreme magistrate took upon himself
+to exercise it, ceases to be one when the right to exercise it is
+conferred by the nation itself in Parliament. If the bill did, as
+was argued, suspend the <i>Habeas Corpus</i> Act, that statute had
+been enacted by Parliament, and therefore for Parliament, in a case
+of necessity, to suspend its operation was clearly within the
+spirit of the constitution.</p>
+<p>The bills affecting our own fellow-subjects were still more
+warmly contested. One was known as the Traitorous Correspondence
+Bill, which, according to Lord Campbell, was suggested by Lord
+Loughborough, who had lately become Lord Chancellor. The old law of
+high-treason, enacted in the reign of Edward III., had been in
+effect greatly mitigated by later statutes, which had made acts to
+which that character was imputed more difficult of proof, by a
+stricter definition of what was admissible evidence, and other
+safeguards; and the practice of the courts had by degrees
+practically reduced the list of treasons enumerated in the old law,
+indictments for many of the offences contained in it forbearing to
+assert that the persons accused had incurred the penalty of
+high-treason. But this new bill greatly enlarged the catalogue. It
+made it high-treason to hold any correspondence with the French, or
+to enter into any agreement to supply them with commodities of any
+kind, even such as were not munitions of war, but articles of
+ordinary merchandise, or to invest any money in the French Funds;
+and it enacted farther that any person who, by "any writing,
+preaching, or malicious and advised speaking," should encourage
+such designs as the old statute of Edward made treasonable, should
+be liable to the penalties of high-treason.</p>
+<p>Another bill was designed to check the growing custom of holding
+public meetings, by providing that no meeting, the object of which
+was to consider any petition to the King or Parliament, or to
+deliberate on any alleged grievance, should be held without those
+who convened it, and who must be householders, giving previous
+notice of it by public advertisement; and empowering any two
+justices of the peace, at their own discretion, to declare any such
+meeting an unlawful assembly, and to disperse it by force, if, from
+the subjects discussed, the language held, or any special
+circumstances, they should regard it as dangerous.</p>
+<p>Fox, and those who still adhered to him, resisted almost every
+clause of these different bills. They maintained that one of the
+most fundamental maxims of law "in every country calling itself
+free was, that property was in the highest degree entitled to the
+protection of the law; and, if so, that the right of disposing of
+it or investing it in any manner must be considered under the same
+protection;" that any interference "with ordinary commercial
+transactions was equally repugnant to the spirit of the
+constitution;" and, taking a practical view of the question, they
+warned the minister that such rigorous enactments imposing such
+extreme penalties would defeat their own end; for "it was a general
+and true maxim, that excess of punishment for a crime brings
+impunity along with it; and that no jury would ever find a verdict
+which would doom a fellow-creature to death for selling a yard of
+cloth and sending it to France." They protested, too, against
+inflicting on words, whether written or spoken, penalties which had
+hitherto been confined to overt acts. And the clauses conferring
+power on magistrates to prevent or disperse public meetings
+encountered still more vehement opposition; Fox insisting, with
+great eloquence, that "public meetings for the discussion of public
+subjects were not only lawful, but agreeable to the very essence of
+the constitution; that, indeed, to them, under that constitution,
+most of the liberties which Englishmen now enjoyed were
+particularly owing." The people, he maintained, had a right to
+discuss their grievances. "They had an inalienable right to
+complain by petition, and to remonstrate to either House of
+Parliament, or to the King; and to make two magistrates, who might
+be strong partisans, irresponsible judges whether anything said or
+done at a meeting had a tendency to encourage sedition, was to say
+that a free constitution was no longer suitable to us." Pitt
+justified these measures, partly on the ground of the special and
+unprecedented danger of the times, as proved by the late attempt on
+the King's life, and partly by the open avowal of republican
+doctrines made at the meetings of different societies; partly,
+also, on the temporary character of the measures, since in each
+bill a period was fixed after which its operation should expire.
+And he argued, farther, that, as many of the actions specified in
+these bills as seditious or treasonable were by many lawyers
+considered capable of being reached by statutes already existing,
+though not universally understood, it was "humane, not cruel, to
+remove doubts, and to prevent men from being ensnared by the
+ambiguity of old laws."</p>
+<p>And in May, 1794, he brought in another bill, founded on the
+report of a secret committee which, in compliance with a royal
+message, the House of Commons had appointed to investigate the
+proceedings and objects of certain societies which were known to
+exist in different parts of the kingdom. In obedience to a
+Secretary of State's warrant, founded on sworn informations, their
+books and papers had been seized, and, having been sealed up, were
+now laid before the House, with the report of the committee that
+they proved that several of the societies which they named had,
+ever since the end of the year 1791, been uniformly pursuing a
+settled design for the subversion of the constitution; one society,
+in particular, having approved a plan for assembling a Convention,
+in imitation of the French Assembly sitting under that title, in
+order to overturn the established government, and to wrest from the
+Parliament the power which the constitution placed in its
+hands.</p>
+<p>To prevent the dissemination of such principles, and to defeat
+such schemes, Pitt now asked leave to bring in a bill to empower
+his Majesty&mdash;acting, of course, through the Secretary of
+State&mdash;to secure and detain such persons as he should suspect
+of conspiring against the King's person and government. He admitted
+that the power which he thus proposed to confer amounted to a
+suspension of the <i>Habeas Corpus</i> Act in every part of the
+United Kingdom; nor did he deny that it was an unusually strong
+measure, but he contended that it was one justified by absolute
+necessity, by the manifest danger of such a conspiracy as the
+committee had affirmed to exist to the tranquillity of the nation
+and the safety of the government.</p>
+<p>Fox, it may almost be said as a matter of course, opposed the
+introduction of any such measure; but his opposition was hardly
+marked by his usual force of argument. He was hampered by the
+impossibility of denying either the existence of the societies
+which the committee and the minister had mentioned, or the
+dangerous character of some of their designs; but he objected to
+the measures of repression which were proposed, partly on the
+absence of all attempts at concealment on the part of the promoters
+of these societies, partly on the contemptible character of the
+Convention which it was designed to summon, and the impossibility
+that such an assembly should have the slightest influence. He even
+made their avowed hostility to the constitution a plea for a
+panegyric on that constitution, and on the loyal attachment to it
+evinced by the vast majority of the people; and from that he
+proceeded to found a fresh argument against the proposed measure,
+contending that it made a fatal inroad on that very constitution
+which was so highly valued by the whole nation. He described it as
+a measure "of infinitely greater mischief than that which it
+proposed to remedy, since it would give the executive authority
+absolute power over the personal liberty of every individual in the
+kingdom." He did not deny that a similar measure had been enacted
+under William III., again in 1715, and again in 1745; but he
+contended that "the present peril bore no resemblance to the
+dangers of those times. This measure went to overturn the very
+corner-stone of the constitution, and if it passed, there was an
+end of the constitution of England." The bill was passed in both
+Houses by very large majorities.[<a href="#note-124">124</a>] It
+was originally enacted for six months only, but was from time to
+time renewed till the end of the century.</p>
+<p>If we take a general survey of all these measures together, as
+parts of one great defensive scheme for the preservation of the
+public tranquillity and the general safety of the empire, it may,
+probably, be thought that, though undoubtedly suspensions of the
+constitution, they are not open to the charge of being
+unconstitutional, since they were enacted, not only for the welfare
+of the people, but with their consent and concurrence, legitimately
+signified by their representatives in Parliament. It is scarcely
+consistent with sound reason to contend that the <i>habeas
+corpus</i>, which had been enacted by Parliament, could not be
+suspended by the authority which had enacted it; that the
+constitution, which exists for the benefit of the people, could not
+be suspended by the people; or to deny, if it was in appearance
+transgressed by these enactments, that it was yet transgressed by
+strictly constitutional acts, by the decision of the Parliament, to
+whose power the constitution prescribes no limits.</p>
+<p>But it is not sufficient that in this point of view these
+measures may have been defensible. In judging of their
+statesmanship, it is almost equally to be considered whether they
+were expedient and politic, whether the emergency or necessity were
+such as to justify such rigorous methods of repression. It was
+fairly open to doubt whether some of them, and especially the
+Traitorous Correspondence and the Seditious Meetings Bills, did not
+treat as treasonable acts which did not go beyond sedition, and
+whether so to treat them were not to invest them with an importance
+which did not belong to them. And on this part of the question the
+general judgment has, we think, been unfavorable to the government;
+and it has been commonly allowed that the Chancellor, whose advice
+on legal subjects the Prime-minister naturally took for his guide,
+gave him impolitic counsel. In fact, it is well known that these
+two acts, to a great extent, failed in their object through their
+excessive severity, several juries having refused to convict
+persons who were prosecuted for treason, who would certainly not
+have escaped had they only been indicted for sedition; and it is
+deserving of remark that these two bills were not regarded with
+favor by the King himself, if the anecdote&mdash;which seems to
+rest on undeniable authority&mdash;be true, that he expressed
+satisfaction at the acquittal of some prisoners, on the ground that
+almost any evil would be more tolerable than that of putting men to
+death "for constructive treason." It must therefore, probably, be
+affirmed that these two acts, the Treason Act and the Seditious
+Meetings Act, went beyond the necessity of the case; that they were
+not only violations of the constitution&mdash;which, when the
+measures are temporary, as these were, are not always
+indefensible&mdash;but that they were superfluous, unjust, and
+impolitic; superfluous, when they proposed to deal with acts
+already visitable with punishment by the ancient laws of the
+kingdom; unjust, when they created new classes of offences; and
+impolitic, as exciting that kind of disapproval of the acts of
+government which in many minds has a tendency to excite a spirit of
+discontent with and resistance to legitimate authority. And,
+indeed, it must be inferred that such was the light in which these
+measures were regarded by a statesman who in his general policy was
+proud to acknowledge himself Mr. Pitt's pupil, as he was also the
+most skilful and successful of his more immediate successors.
+Twenty-five years afterward the distress caused by the reaction
+inevitably consequent on the termination of twenty years of war
+produced a political excitement scarcely inferior to that with
+which Pitt had now to deal, and seditious societies and meetings
+scarcely less formidable; but, as we shall see, Lord Liverpool,
+taking warning, perhaps, from the mistake into which Mr. Pitt was
+led on this occasion, though compelled to bring forward new and
+stern measures of repression, and even to suspend the <i>Habeas
+Corpus</i> Act for a time, kept strictly within the lines of
+constitutional precedent, and was careful to avoid confounding
+sedition with treason.</p>
+<p>Notes:</p>
+<p><a name="note-73" id="note-73">
+<!-- Note Anchor 73 --></a>[Footnote 73: He had been
+Lord-chamberlain in Lord Rockingham's administration of 1765. He
+was now Lord-lieutenant of Ireland.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-74" id="note-74">
+<!-- Note Anchor 74 --></a>[Footnote 74: In Lord Chatham's or the
+Duke of Grafton's ministry of 1766, and in the later administration
+of Lord Rockingham.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-75" id="note-75">
+<!-- Note Anchor 75 --></a>[Footnote 75: It may be convenient to
+take this opportunity of pointing out that, in this administration,
+Lord Shelburne altered the old, most unreasonable, and inconvenient
+arrangement by which the departments of the two Secretaries of
+State were distinguished by the latitude, and called Northern and
+Southern. By a new division, one took charge of the home affairs,
+the other of the foreign affairs. And in 1794 a third Secretary was
+added for War, who, by a very singular arrangement, which continued
+till very recently, had charge also of the colonies. But, in the
+year 1855, the Colonial-office was intrusted to a separate
+minister; and in 1858 a fifth Secretary of State, that for India,
+was added, on the transfer of the government of that country from
+the East India Company to the Crown. When there were only two
+Secretaries of State, the rule was that one should sit in each
+House. At present it is not <i>necessary</i> that more than one
+should be a peer, though it is more usual for two to be members of
+the Upper House. And it is usual also for the Under-secretaries to
+be members of the House to which the Chief-secretaries do not
+belong, though this rule is not invariably observed.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-76" id="note-76">
+<!-- Note Anchor 76 --></a>[Footnote 76: "Parliamentary History,"
+xxiii., 163.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-77" id="note-77">
+<!-- Note Anchor 77 --></a>[Footnote 77: The divisions were: 224 to
+208, and 207 to 190.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-78" id="note-78">
+<!-- Note Anchor 78 --></a>[Footnote 78: Lord Stanhope, quoting
+from an unpublished "Life of Lord Barrington," compiled by the
+Bishop of Durham (meaning, I suppose, Bishop Shute
+Barrington).&mdash;<i>History of England</i>, v., 174.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-79" id="note-79">
+<!-- Note Anchor 79 --></a>[Footnote 79: Even with the first flush
+of triumph, the night after the second defeat of Lord Shelburne in
+the House of Commons, Fox's great friend, Mr. Fitzpatrick, writes
+to his brother, Lord Ossory: "To the administration it is <i>cila
+mors</i>, but not <i>victoria loeta</i> to us. The apparent
+juncture with Lord North is universally cried out
+against."&mdash;Lord J. Russell's <i>Memorials and Correspondence
+of C.J. Fox</i>, ii., 18.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-80" id="note-80">
+<!-- Note Anchor 80 --></a>[Footnote 80: Lord J. Russell's
+"Memorials and Correspondence of C.J. Fox," ii., 90.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-81" id="note-81">
+<!-- Note Anchor 81 --></a>[Footnote 81: <i>Ibid</i>., p. 118.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-82" id="note-82">
+<!-- Note Anchor 82 --></a>[Footnote 82: In one division (161 to
+137) they had only a majority of twenty-four.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-83" id="note-83">
+<!-- Note Anchor 83 --></a>[Footnote 83: In a letter to Lord
+Northington (Lord-lieutenant of Ireland), dated July 17, Fox
+himself mentions that not one of his colleagues, except the Duke of
+Portland and Lord Keppel (First Lord of the Admiralty), approved of
+it.&mdash;<i>Memoirs of Fox</i>, ii., 116.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-84" id="note-84">
+<!-- Note Anchor 84 --></a>[Footnote 84: November 22 he writes to
+the Duke of Rutland: "The bill ... is, I really think, the boldest
+and most unconstitutional measure ever attempted, transferring at
+one stroke, in spite of all charters and compacts, the immense
+patronage and influence of the East to Charles Fox, in or out of
+office."&mdash;Stanhope's <i>Life of Pitt</i>, i., 140.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-85" id="note-85">
+<!-- Note Anchor 85 --></a>[Footnote 85: The whole paper is given
+by the Duke of Buckingham, "Courts and Cabinets of George III," i.,
+288, and quoted by Lord Russell in his "Memorials and
+Correspondence of C. J. Fox," ii., 251. It is endorsed, "Delivered
+by Lord Thurlow, December 1, 1783. Nugent Temple."]</p>
+<p><a name="note-86" id="note-86">
+<!-- Note Anchor 86 --></a>[Footnote 86: "Life of Pitt," i., 148.
+Lord Stanhope does not pledge himself to these being "the exact
+words of this commission, but as to its purport and meaning there
+is no doubt." They are, however, the exact words quoted by Fox in
+his speech in support of Mr. Baker's resolutions on the
+17th.&mdash;<i>Parliamentary History</i>, xxiv., 207.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-87" id="note-87">
+<!-- Note Anchor 87 --></a>[Footnote 87: "Parliamentary History,"
+xxiv., 151-154.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-88" id="note-88">
+<!-- Note Anchor 88 --></a>[Footnote 88: 95 to 76. "Strange to say,
+one of the cabinet ministers, Lord Stormont, president of the
+council, formed part of the final majority against the
+bill."&mdash;<i>Life of Pitt</i>, ii., 154.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-89" id="note-89">
+<!-- Note Anchor 89 --></a>[Footnote 89: "Life of Pitt," i.,
+155.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-90" id="note-90">
+<!-- Note Anchor 90 --></a>[Footnote 90: "Lives of the
+Chancellors," c. clix. Lord Thurlow.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-91" id="note-91">
+<!-- Note Anchor 91 --></a>[Footnote 91: "The Grenville Papers,"
+iii., 374. It may, however, be remarked, as tending to throw some
+doubt on Mr. Grenville's statement, that Lord Campbell asserts that
+"Lord Mansfield, without entering into systematic opposition, had
+been much alienated from the court during Lord Rockingham's first
+administration."&mdash;<i>Lives of the Chief-justices</i>, ii.,
+468.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-92" id="note-92">
+<!-- Note Anchor 92 --></a>[Footnote 92: Vol. ii., pp.
+229-232.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-93" id="note-93">
+<!-- Note Anchor 93 --></a>[Footnote 93: It will be seen hereafter
+that this doctrine was admitted in the fullest degree by Sir Robert
+Peel in the winter of 1884, when he admitted that his acceptance of
+office made him alone responsible for the dismissal of Lord
+Melbourne, though, in fact, he was taken entirely by surprise by
+the King's act, being in Italy at the time.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-94" id="note-94">
+<!-- Note Anchor 94 --></a>[Footnote 94: Lord John Russell, in his
+"Memorials of Fox" (ii., 253), affirms that "Lord Temple's act was
+probably known to Pitt;" but Lord Macaulay, in his "Essay on Pitt"
+(p. 326), fully acquits Pitt of such knowledge, saying that "he
+could declare, with perfect truth, that, if unconstitutional
+machinations had been employed, he was no party to them."]</p>
+<p><a name="note-95" id="note-95">
+<!-- Note Anchor 95 --></a>[Footnote 95: On Lord Effingham's
+motion, in condemnation of some of the proceedings of the Commons,
+which was carried February 4, 1784, by 100 to 53.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-96" id="note-96">
+<!-- Note Anchor 96 --></a>[Footnote 96: "Parliamentary History,"
+xxiv., 383-385&mdash;debate of January 20, 1784.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-97" id="note-97">
+<!-- Note Anchor 97 --></a>[Footnote 97: <i>Ibid</i>, p.
+283&mdash;January 12.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-98" id="note-98">
+<!-- Note Anchor 98 --></a>[Footnote 98: <i>Ibid</i>., pp.
+251-257.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-99" id="note-99">
+<!-- Note Anchor 99 --></a>[Footnote 99: "Parliamentary History,"
+xxiv., 478&mdash;February 2.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-100" id="note-100">
+<!-- Note Anchor 100 --></a>[Footnote 100: <i>Ibid</i>., p.
+663.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-101" id="note-101">
+<!-- Note Anchor 101 --></a>[Footnote 101: "Parliamentary History,"
+xxiv., 687, 695, 699.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-102" id="note-102">
+<!-- Note Anchor 102 --></a>[Footnote 102: The numbers were 201 to
+189. The week before, on Mr. Powys's motion for a united and
+efficient administration, the majority had been 20&mdash;197 to
+177. On a motion made by Mr. Coke, February 3, the majority had
+been 24&mdash;211 to 187. At the beginning of the struggle the
+majorities had been far larger&mdash;232 to 143 on Fox's motion for
+a committee on the state of the nation, January 12.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-103" id="note-103">
+<!-- Note Anchor 103 --></a>[Footnote 103: 191 to 190.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-104" id="note-104">
+<!-- Note Anchor 104 --></a>[Footnote 104: From December 19, when
+Pitt accepted office, to March 24, when the Parliament was
+dissolved.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-105" id="note-105">
+<!-- Note Anchor 105 --></a>[Footnote 105: "Memorials and
+Correspondence of C.J. Fox," by Earl Russell, ii., 229, 248.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-106" id="note-106">
+<!-- Note Anchor 106 --></a>[Footnote 106: <i>Ibid</i>., p.
+280.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-107" id="note-107">
+<!-- Note Anchor 107 --></a>[Footnote 107: That of April, 1831,
+after the defeat of the Government on General Gascoyne's
+amendment]</p>
+<p><a name="note-108" id="note-108">
+<!-- Note Anchor 108 --></a>[Footnote 108: Lord Macaulay,
+"Miscellaneous Essays," ii., 330.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-109" id="note-109">
+<!-- Note Anchor 109 --></a>[Footnote 109: Lord Macaulay, essay on
+William Pitt.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-110" id="note-110">
+<!-- Note Anchor 110 --></a>[Footnote 110: Alison ("History of
+Europe," xiii., 971) states the English force in the Netherlands in
+1794 at 85,000 men. Lord Stanhope calls the English at Minden
+10,000 or 12,000.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-111" id="note-111">
+<!-- Note Anchor 111 --></a>[Footnote 111: An eminent living writer
+(Mr. Leeky, "History of England," ii., 474) quotes with apparent
+approval another comparison between the father and son, made by
+Grattan, in the following words: "The father was not, perhaps, so
+good a debater as his son, but was a much better orator, a greater
+scholar, and a far greater man." The first two phrases in this
+eulogy may, perhaps, balance one another; though, when Mr. Lecky
+admits that "Lord Chatham's taste was far from pure, and that there
+was much in his speeches that was florid and meretricious, and not
+a little that would have appeared absurd bombast but for the
+amazing power of his delivery," he makes a serious deduction from
+his claim to the best style of eloquence which no one ever made
+from the speeches of his son. But Grattan's assertion that the man
+who, as his sister said of him, knew but two books, the
+"&AElig;neid" and the "Faerie Queene," was superior in scholarship
+to one who, with the exception of his rival, Fox, had probably no
+equal for knowledge of the great authors of antiquity in either
+House of Parliament, is little short of a palpable absurdity. We
+may, however, suspect that Grattan's estimate of the two men was in
+some degree colored by his personal feelings. With Lord Chatham he
+had never been in antagonism. On one great subject, the dispute
+with America, he had been his follower and ally, advocating in the
+Irish House of Commons the same course which Chatham upheld in the
+English House of Peers. But to Pitt he had been almost constantly
+opposed. By Pitt he and his party, whether in the English, or, so
+long as it lasted, in the Irish Parliament, had been repeatedly
+defeated. The Union, of which he had been the indefatigable
+opponent, and to which he was never entirely reconciled, had been
+carried in his despite; and it was hardly unnatural that the
+recollection of his long and unsuccessful warfare should in some
+degree bias his judgment, and prompt him to an undeserved
+disparagement of the minister by whose wisdom and firmness he had
+been so often overborne.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-112" id="note-112">
+<!-- Note Anchor 112 --></a>[Footnote 112: Massey's "History of
+England," iii., 447; <i>confer</i> also Green's "History of the
+English People," vol. iv.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-113" id="note-113">
+<!-- Note Anchor 113 --></a>[Footnote 113: Hallam ("Middle Ages,"
+ii., 386, 481), extolling the condition of "the free socage
+tenants, or English yeomanry, as the class whose independence has
+stamped with peculiar features both our constitution and our
+national character," gives two derivations for the name; one "the
+Saxon <i>soe</i>, which signifies a franchise, especially one of
+jurisdiction;" and the other, that adopted by Bracton, and which he
+himself prefers, "the French word <i>soc</i>, a ploughshare."]</p>
+<p><a name="note-114" id="note-114">
+<!-- Note Anchor 114 --></a>[Footnote 114: Lord Colchester's
+"Diary," i., 68, mentions that the officiating clergyman was Mr.
+Burt, of Twickenham, who received &pound;500 for his services. Lord
+John Russell ("Memorials and Correspondence of Fox," ii., 284-389)
+agrees in stating that the marriage was performed in the manner
+prescribed by the Common Prayer-book. Mr. Jesse, in his "Life of
+George III.," ii., 506, gathering, as the present writer can say
+from personal knowledge, his information from some papers left
+behind him by the late J.W. Croker, says: "The ceremony was
+performed by a Protestant clergyman, though in part, apparently,
+according to the rites of the Roman Catholic Church." Lord John
+Russell avoids discussing the question whether the marriage
+involved the forfeiture of the inheritance of the crown, an
+avoidance which many will interpret as a proof that in his opinion
+it did. Mr. Massey's language ("History of England," iii., 327)
+clearly intimates that he holds the same opinion.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-115" id="note-115">
+<!-- Note Anchor 115 --></a>[Footnote 115: Russell's "Life of Fox,"
+ii., 187.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-116" id="note-116">
+<!-- Note Anchor 116 --></a>[Footnote 116: Fox's private
+correspondence is full of anticipations that the Regent's first act
+will be to dismiss Pitt, and to make him minister. In a letter of
+December 15 he even fixes a fortnight as the time by which he
+expects to be installed; while Lord Loughborough, who was eager to
+possess himself of the Great Seal&mdash;an expectation in which,
+though well-founded, he would, as it proved, have found himself
+disappointed&mdash;was led by his hopes to give the Prince counsel
+of so extraordinary a nature that it is said that the ministers, to
+whose knowledge it had come, were prepared, if any attempt had been
+made to act upon it, or even openly to avow it, to send the learned
+lord to the Tower. ("Diary of Lord Colchester," i., 28.) In an
+elaborate paper which he drew up and read to the Prince at Windsor,
+he assured his Royal Highness, speaking as a lawyer, that "the
+administration of government devolved to him of right. He was bound
+by every duty to assume it, and his character would be lessened in
+the public estimation, if he took it on any other ground but right,
+or on any sort of compromise. The authority of Parliament, as the
+great council of the nation, would be interposed, not to confer but
+to declare the right. The mode of proceeding should be that in a
+short time his Royal Highness should signify his intention to act
+by directing a meeting of the Privy Council, when he should declare
+his intention to take upon himself the care of the state, and
+should at the same time signify his desire to have the advice of
+Parliament, and order it by proclamation to meet early for the
+despatch of business.... It is of vast importance in the outset
+that he should appear to act entirely of himself, and, in the
+conferences he must necessarily have, not to consult, but to listen
+and direct." The entire paper is given by Lord Campbell ("Lives of
+the Chancellors," c. clxx.).]</p>
+<p><a name="note-117" id="note-117">
+<!-- Note Anchor 117 --></a>[Footnote 117: Hume's account of this
+transaction is, that the Duke "desired that it might be recorded in
+Parliament that this authority was conferred on him from their own
+free motion, without any application on his part; ... and he
+required that all the powers of his office should be specified and
+defined by Parliament."]</p>
+<p><a name="note-118" id="note-118">
+<!-- Note Anchor 118 --></a>[Footnote 118: "Parliamentary History,"
+xxvii., 803&mdash;speech of Mr. Hardinge, one of the Welsh judges,
+and M.P. for Old Sarum.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-119" id="note-119">
+<!-- Note Anchor 119 --></a>[Footnote 119: I take this report, or
+abstract, of Lord Camden's speech from the "Lives of the
+Chancellors," c. cxlvii.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-120" id="note-120">
+<!-- Note Anchor 120 --></a>[Footnote 120: "Memorials of Fox," ii.,
+292.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-121" id="note-121">
+<!-- Note Anchor 121 --></a>[Footnote 121: The proceedings of the
+Irish Parliament on this occasion will be mentioned in the next
+chapter.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-122" id="note-122">
+<!-- Note Anchor 122 --></a>[Footnote 122: Mr. Hallam (iii., 144,
+ed. 1832) gives a definition of the term "unconstitutional" which
+seems rather singular: "By unconstitutional, as distinguished from
+'illegal,' I mean a novelty of much importance, tending to endanger
+the established laws." May not the term rather be regarded as
+referring to a distinct class of acts&mdash;to those at variance
+with the recognized <i>spirit</i> of the constitution or principles
+of government, with the preservation of the liberties of the
+people, as expressed or implied in the various charters, etc., but
+not forbidden by the express terms of any statute?]</p>
+<p><a name="note-123" id="note-123">
+<!-- Note Anchor 123 --></a>[Footnote 123: The entry in the
+"Parliamentary History," November 20, 1788, is: "Both Houses met
+pursuant to the last prorogation. Later meetings were in
+consequence of successive adjournments."]</p>
+<p><a name="note-124" id="note-124">
+<!-- Note Anchor 124 --></a>[Footnote 124: In the Commons by 183 to
+33; in the Lords by 119 to 11.]</p>
+<hr />
+<a name="CH5" id="CH5"><!-- CH5 --></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER V.</h2>
+<p class="blockquote">The Affairs of Ireland.&mdash;Condition of
+the Irish Parliament.&mdash;The Octennial Bill.&mdash;The Penal
+Laws.&mdash;Non-residence of the Lord-lieutenant.&mdash;Influence
+of the American War on Ireland.&mdash;Enrolment of the
+Volunteers.&mdash;Concession of all the Demands of
+Ireland.&mdash;Violence of the Volunteers.&mdash;Their
+Convention.&mdash;Violence of the Opposition in Parliament: Mr.
+Brownlow, Mr. Grattan, Mr. Flood.&mdash;Pitt's Propositions
+Fail.&mdash;Fitzgibbon's Conspiracy Bill.&mdash;Regency
+Question.&mdash;Recovery of the King.&mdash;Question of a
+Legislative Union.&mdash;Establishment of Maynooth
+College.&mdash;Lord Edward Fitzgerald.&mdash;Arguments for and
+against the Union.&mdash;It passes the Irish
+Parliament.&mdash;Details of the Measure.&mdash;General Character
+of the Union.&mdash;Circumstances which Prevented its
+Completeness.</p>
+<p>In describing the condition of Ireland and the feelings of its
+people, in the latter years of the reign of George II., Mr. Hallam
+has fixed on the year 1753 as that in which the Irish Parliament
+first began to give vent to aspirations for equality with the
+English Parliament in audible complaints; and the Irish House of
+Commons, finding the kingdom in the almost unprecedented condition
+of having "a surplus revenue after the payment of all charges,"
+took steps to vindicate that equality by a sort of appropriation
+bill.</p>
+<p>There were, however, three fundamental differences between the
+Parliaments of the two countries, which, above all others, stood in
+the way of such equality as the Irish patriots desired: the first,
+that by a law as old as the time of Henry VII., and called
+sometimes the Statute of Drogheda, from the name of the town in
+which it was first promulgated, and sometimes Poynings' Act, from
+the name of Sir Henry Poynings, the Lord-deputy at the time, no
+bill could be introduced into the Irish Parliament till it had
+received the sanction of the King and Privy Council in England; the
+second, that the Parliament lasted for the entire life of the King
+who had summoned it&mdash;a regulation which caused a seat in the
+House of Commons to be regarded almost as a possession for life,
+and consequently enormously increased the influence of the patrons
+of boroughs, some of whom could return a number of members such as
+the mightiest borough monger in England could never aspire to
+equal.[<a href="#note-125">125</a>] The third difference, of
+scarcely inferior importance, was, that the Parliament only sat in
+alternate years. But, though these arrangements suited the patrons
+and the members of the House of Commons, it was not strange that
+the constituencies, whose power over their representatives was
+almost extinguished by them, regarded them with less complacency,
+and, at the general election which was the consequence of the
+accession of George III., pledges were very generally exacted from
+the candidates that, if elected, they would endeavor to procure the
+passing of a septennial act like that which had been the law in
+England ever since the early years of George I. A bill with that
+object was introduced in 1761, and reported on not unfavorably as
+to its principle by the English law advisers to whom the Privy
+Council referred it. But, as if it had been designed to exemplify
+in the strongest possible manner the national propensity for making
+blunders, it contained one clause which rendered it not only
+impracticable but ridiculous. The clause provided that no member
+should take his seat or vote till his qualification had been proved
+before the Speaker in a full house. But the Speaker could not be
+chosen till the members had established their right of voting, so
+that the whole was brought to a dead-lock, and the bill, if passed,
+could never have been carried out.</p>
+<p>In the ministry of 1767, however&mdash;that of the Duke of
+Grafton and Lord Chatham&mdash;Lord Halifax was replaced at Dublin
+Castle by Lord Townsend, who, among his other good qualities,
+deserves specially honorable mention as the first Lord-lieutenant
+who made residence in Dublin his rule on principle; for till very
+lately non-residence had been the rule and residence the exception,
+a fact which is of itself a melancholy but all-sufficient proof of
+the absolute indifference to Irish interests shown by all classes
+of English statesmen. And under his government a bill for
+shortening Parliaments was passed, though it fixed the possible
+duration of each Parliament at eight years instead of seven, the
+variation being made to prevent a general election from being held
+at the same time in both countries, but, according to common
+belief, solely in order to keep up a mark of difference between the
+Irish and English Parliaments. And those who entertained this
+suspicion fancied they saw a confirmation of it in the retention of
+the regulation that the Irish Parliament should only sit in
+alternate years, a practice wholly inconsistent with any proper
+idea of the duties and privileges of a Parliament such as prevailed
+on this side of the Channel; since a Parliament whose sessions were
+thus intermittent could not possibly exercise that degree of
+supervision over the revenue, either in its collection or its
+expenditure, which is among its most important duties. And the
+continued maintenance of this practice must be regarded farther as
+a proof that the English legislators had not yet learned to
+consider Ireland as an integral part of the kingdom, entitled in
+every particular to equal rights with England and Scotland. Indeed,
+it is impossible for any Englishman to contemplate the history of
+the treatment of Ireland by the English legislators, whether Kings,
+ministers, or Parliaments, for more than a century and a half,
+without equal feelings of shame at the injustice and wonder at the
+folly of their conduct. Not only was Ireland denied freedom of
+trade with England (a denial as inconsistent not only with equity
+but also with common-sense as if Windsor had been refused free
+trade with London),[<a href="#note-126">126</a>] but Irish
+manufactures were deliberately checked and suppressed to gratify
+the jealous selfishness of the English manufacturers. Macaulay, in
+his zeal for the memory of William III., has not scrupled to
+apologize for, if not to justify, the measures deliberately
+sanctioned by that sovereign for the extinction of the Irish
+woollen manufactures, on the ground that Ireland was not a sister
+kingdom, but a colony; that "the general rule is, that the English
+Parliament is competent to legislate for all colonies planted by
+English subjects, and that no reason existed for considering the
+case of the colony in Ireland as an exception."[<a href=
+"#note-127">127</a>] There is, perhaps, no passage in his whole
+work less to his credit. But, if such was the spirit in which an
+English historian could write of Ireland in the latter half of this
+present century, it may, perhaps, diminish our wonder at the
+conduct of our legislators in an earlier generation.</p>
+<p>The penal laws on the subject of religion were also conceived
+and carried out in a spirit of extraordinary rigor and injustice.
+By far the larger portion of the Irish population still adhered to
+the Roman Catholic faith; but, as far as the negative punishment of
+restrictions and disabilities could go, its profession was visited
+as one of the most unpardonable of offences. No Roman Catholic
+could hold a commission in the army, nor be called to the Bar, nor
+practise as an attorney; and when it was found that a desire to
+devote themselves to the study of the law had led many gentlemen to
+acknowledge a conversion to Protestantism, a statute was actually
+passed to require them to prove their sincerity by five years'
+adherence to their new form of religion before they could be
+regarded as having washed off the defilement of their old heresy
+sufficiently to be thought worthy to wear a gown in the Four
+Courts. No Roman Catholic might keep a school; while a strange
+refinement of intolerance had added a statute prohibiting parents
+from sending their children to Roman Catholic Schools in a foreign
+country.</p>
+<p>And the manner in which the government was carried on was, if
+possible, worse even than the principle. The almost continual
+absence of the Lord-lieutenant inevitably left the chief management
+of the details in the hands of underlings, and the favor of the
+Castle was only to be acquired by the lowest time-serving, of which
+those who could influence elections, wealthy and high-born as they
+for the most part were, were not more innocent than the
+representatives. No support to government could be looked for from
+either peer or commoner unless it were purchased by bribes more or
+less open, which it was equally discreditable to ask and to grant;
+for one of the worst fruits of the system which had so long reigned
+throughout the island was the general demoralization of all
+classes. Mr. Fronde gives George III. himself the credit of being
+the first person who resolutely desired to see a change of the
+system, and to "try the experiment whether Ireland might not be
+managed by open rectitude and real integrity."[<a href=
+"#note-128">128</a>] But his first efforts were baffled by the
+carelessness or incompetency of the Viceroys, since it was
+difficult to find any man of ability who would undertake the
+office. And for some years things went on with very little change,
+great lords of different ranks having equally no object but that of
+controlling the Castle and engrossing the patronage of the
+government, and in not a few instances of also procuring large
+grants or pensions for themselves, each seeking to build up an
+individual influence which no Viceroy could ever have withstood,
+had they been united instead of being separated by mutual
+jealousies, which enabled him from time to time to play off one
+against the other.</p>
+<p>But the war with the North American Colonies, which broke out in
+1774, by some of its indirect consequences brought about a great
+change in the affairs of Ireland. The demand for re-enforcements to
+the armies engaged in America could only be met by denuding the
+British islands themselves of their necessary garrisons. No part of
+them was left so undefended as the Irish coast; and, after a time,
+the captains of some of the American privateers, learning how
+little resistance they had to fear, ventured into St. George's
+Channel, penetrated even into the inland waters, and threatened
+Carrickfergus and Belfast. In matters of domestic policy it was
+possible to procrastinate, to defer deciding on relaxations of the
+penal laws or the removal of trade restrictions, but to delay
+putting the country into a state of defence against an armed enemy
+for a single moment was not to be thought of; yet the government
+was powerless. Of the regular army almost every available man was
+in, or on his way to, America, and the most absolute necessity,
+therefore, compelled the Irish to consider themselves as left to
+their own resources for defence. It was as impossible to levy a
+force of militia as one of regular troops, for the militia could
+not be embodied without great expense; and the finances of the
+whole kingdom had been so mismanaged that money was as hard to
+procure as men. In this emergency several gentlemen proposed to the
+Lord-lieutenant to raise bodies of volunteers. The government,
+though reluctant to sanction the movement, could see no
+alternative, since the presence of an armed force of some kind was
+indispensable for the safety of the island. The movement grew
+rapidly; by the summer of 1779 several thousand men were not only
+under arms, but were being rapidly drilled into a state of
+efficiency, and had even established such a reputation for
+strength, that, when in the autumn the same privateers that had
+been so bold in Belfast Lough the year before reached the Irish
+coast, in the hope of plundering Limerick or Galway, they found the
+inhabitants of the district well prepared to receive them, and did
+not venture to attempt a descent on any part of the island. And,
+when the Parliament met in October, some of the members, who saw in
+the success that could not be denied to have attended their
+exertions an irresistible means of strengthening the rising
+pretensions of Ireland to an equality of laws and freedom with
+England, moved votes of thanks in both Houses to the whole body of
+Volunteers. They were carried by acclamation, and the Volunteers of
+the metropolis lined the streets between the Parliament House and
+the Castle when, according to custom, the members of the two Houses
+marched in procession to present their addresses to the
+Lord-lieutenant. Such a recognition of the power of this new force
+stimulated those members who claimed in a special degree the title
+of Friends of Ireland to greater exertion. A wiser government than
+that of Lord North would have avoided giving occasion for the
+existence of a force which the utter absence of any other had made
+masters of the situation. The Volunteers even boasted that they had
+been called into existence by English misgovernment. In the words
+of one of their most eloquent advocates, "England had sown her laws
+like dragons' teeth, and they had sprung up as armed men."</p>
+<p>Ireland began to feel that she was strong, and, not unnaturally
+desired to avail herself of that strength, which England now could
+not question, to put forward demands for concessions which in
+common fairness could not well be denied. In 1778, when Lord North,
+in the hope of recovering the allegiance of the North American
+Colonies, brought forward what he termed his conciliatory
+propositions, the Irish members began to press their demand that
+the advantages thus offered to the Americans should be extended to
+their own countrymen also; that the fact of the Irish not having
+rebelled should not be made a plea for treating them worse than
+those who had; and in the front of all their requests was one for
+the abolition of those unjust and vexatious duties which shackled
+their trade and manufactures. But the jealousy of the English and
+Scotch manufacturers was still as bitter, and, unhappily, still as
+influential, as it had proved in the time of William III. And, to
+humor the grasping selfishness of Manchester and Glasgow, Lord
+North met the demands of the Irish with a refusal of which every
+word of his speech on the propositions to America was the severest
+condemnation, and which he sought to mitigate by some new
+regulations in favor of the linen trade, to which the English and
+Scotch manufacturers made no objection, since they had no linen
+factories. The Irish, in despair, had recourse to non-importation
+agreements, of which the Americans had set the example, binding
+themselves not to import nor to use any articles of English or
+Scotch manufacture with which they could possibly dispense. And the
+result was, that Lord North yielded to fear what he had refused to
+justice, and the next year brought in bills to grant the Irish the
+commercial equality which they demanded. Some of the most
+oppressive and vexatious of the penal laws were also relaxed; and
+some restrictions which the Navigation Act imposed on commerce with
+the West Indies were repealed. But, strange to say, the English
+ministers still clung to one grievance of monstrous injustice, and
+steadily refused to allow judicial appointments to be placed on the
+same footing as in England, and to make the seat of a judge on the
+bench depend on his own good conduct, instead of on the caprice of
+a king or a minister.</p>
+<p>But the manifest reluctance with which the English government
+had granted this partial relief encouraged the demand for farther
+concessions. The Irish members, rarely deficient in eloquence or
+fertility of resource, had been lately re-enforced by a recruit of
+pre-eminent powers, whom Lord Charlemont had returned for his
+borough of Moy, Henry Grattan; and, led by him, began to insist
+that the remaining grievances, to the removal of which the nation
+had a right, would never be extinguished so long as the supreme
+power of legislation for the country rested with the English and
+Scotch Parliament; and that the true remedy was only to be found in
+the restoration to the Irish Parliament of that independence of
+which it had been deprived ever since the time of Henry VII. They
+were encouraged by the visibly increasing weakness of Lord North's
+administration. Throughout the year 1781 it was evidently tottering
+to its fall. And on the 22d of February, 1782, Grattan brought
+forward in the Irish House of Commons a resolution, intended, if
+carried, to lay the foundation of a bill, "that a claim of any body
+of men other than the King, Lords, and Commons of Ireland to bind
+this kingdom is unconstitutional, illegal, and a grievance." This
+resolution aimed at the abolition of Poynings' Act. Other
+resolutions demanded the abolition of the "powers exercised by the
+Privy Council under color of Poynings' Act," and a farther
+relaxation of the penal laws. So helpless did the government by
+this time feel itself, that the Attorney-general, who was its
+spokesman on this occasion, could not venture to resist the
+principle of these resolutions, but was contented to elude them for
+the time by objections taken to some of the details; and Grattan
+gave notice of another motion to bring the question to a more
+definite decision, which he fixed for the 16th of April.</p>
+<p>Before that day came Lord North's government had ceased to
+exist, and had been replaced by Lord Rockingham's, one most
+influential member of which was the most distinguished of living
+Irishmen, Mr. Burke, who, while in opposition, had always shown
+himself a warm supporter of the claims of his countrymen, and was
+not likely to have his ardor in the cause damped by being placed in
+a situation where he could procure a friendly hearing to his
+counsels. Once more they had increased their demands, requiring,
+besides the removal of the purely political grievances, a surrender
+of the right of appeal from the Irish to the English courts of law.
+But their new masters were inclined to grant everything which
+seemed requisite to the establishment of complete equality between
+the two kingdoms; and though the new ministry was dissolved in a
+few months by the premature death of its chief, he lived long
+enough to carry the repeal of Poynings' Act, the retention of which
+was now admitted to be not only senseless but mischievous, since
+the existence of a body invested with nominal dignity, but
+practically powerless, was calculated not only to provoke
+discontent, but to furnish a lever for agitation.</p>
+<p>The repeal was, however, nothing less than the establishment of
+an entirely new constitution in Ireland. The Irish Parliament, the
+meetings of which had hitherto been a mere form and farce, was
+installed in a position of absolute independence, to grant money or
+to make laws, subject to no other condition than that their
+legislation should be of a character to entitle it to the royal
+assent, a condition to which every act of the British Parliament
+was likewise and equally liable. "Unhappily, as an Irish patriotic
+writer exclaims on this occasion, it was written in the book of
+fate that the felicity of Ireland should be short-lived."[<a href=
+"#note-129">129</a>] And a similar shortness of existence was to be
+the lot of the separate independence of her Parliament. Even while
+framing instructions for the Lord-lieutenant, in his honest desire
+to inaugurate a system of just government for Ireland, George III.
+had warned him on no account to "summon a Parliament without his
+special command."[<a href="#note-130">130</a>] And, regarded by the
+light of subsequent events, it can hardly be denied that the
+prohibition displayed an accurate insight into the real
+difficulties of the country, and also into the character of the
+people themselves as the source of at least some of those
+difficulties. We ought not to judge its leaders too severely. A
+nation which has been long kept in bondage, and is suddenly
+presented with liberty, is hardly more able to bear the change than
+a man immured for years in a dark dungeon can at once endure the
+unveiled light of the sun; and independence had been granted to the
+Irish too suddenly for it to be probable that they would at once
+and in every instance exercise it wisely.</p>
+<p>All parties were to blame in different degrees. The first danger
+came from the Volunteers, who, flushed with self-importance, from
+the belief that it was the imposing show of their strength which
+had enabled the Parliament to extort Lord Rockingham's concession
+from the English Houses, now claimed to be masters of the
+Parliament itself. With the termination of the American war, and
+the consequent return of the English army to Europe, the reason for
+their existence had passed away. But they refused to be disbanded,
+and established a convention of armed delegates, to sit in Dublin
+during the session of Parliament, and to overawe the Houses into
+passing a series of measures which they prescribed, and which
+included a Parliamentary Reform Bill of a most sweeping character.
+On this occasion, however, the House of Commons acted with laudable
+firmness. Led by Mr. Fitzgibbon, a man of great powers, and above
+all suspicion of corruptibility, it spurned the dictation of an
+unauthorized body, and rejected the Reform Bill, avowedly on the
+ground of its being presented to it "under the mandate of a
+military congress;" and the Convention, finding itself powerless to
+enforce its mandates, dissolved.</p>
+<p>But the difficulties of the government were not over with the
+suppression of the Volunteer Convention. The Lord-lieutenant had a
+harder, because a more enduring, contest to encounter with the
+Parliament and the patrons of the boroughs. A single act of
+Parliament may substitute a new law for an old one; but no one
+resolution or bill has a magical power to extinguish long habits of
+jobbery and corruption. Members and patrons alike seemed to regard
+the late concessions as chiefly valuable on account of the
+increased value which it enabled them to place on their services to
+the government; and one cannot read without a feeling of shame that
+one or two of the bishops who were wont to be regarded as the
+proprietors of the seats for their diocesan cities, were not behind
+the most nameless lay boroughmongers in the resolution they evinced
+make a market of their support of the government. The consequence
+was that the government was unable to feel confident of its power
+to carry any measure except at a price that it was degrading to
+pay; while of those few members who were above all suspicion of
+personal corruption, many were so utterly wrong-headed, and had
+their minds so filled with unreasonable jealousy for what they
+called the honor and dignity of Ireland, and with a consequent
+distrust of England and of all Englishmen, that their honest folly
+was even a greater obstacle to wise and good government than the
+mean cunning of the others. There can hardly be a more striking
+proof of the difficulties to be overcome by a minister than is
+furnished by a speech made by a gentleman of the highest character,
+and of deservedly wide influence in the Northern counties, Mr.
+Brownlow, of Lurgan, one of the members for Armagh, which is quoted
+by Mr. Froude.[<a href="#note-131">131</a>]</p>
+<p>Pitt was painfully conscious of the commercial injustice with
+which hitherto Ireland had always been treated, and in the very
+first year of his administration he applied himself to the removal
+of the most mischievous of the grievances of which the Irish
+merchants complained, adopting to a great extent a scheme which had
+been put before him by one of the most considerable gentlemen of
+that body, which was based on the principle of equalization of
+duties in both countries. It is unnecessary here to enter into the
+details of the measure which he introduced into the House of
+Commons. He avowed it to be the commencement of a new system of
+government for Ireland, "a system of a participation and community
+of benefits, a system of equality and fairness, which, without
+tending to aggrandize one portion of the empire or to depress the
+other, should seek the aggregate interest of the whole; it was a
+substitute for the system which had hitherto been adopted of making
+the smaller country completely subordinate to and subservient to
+the greater, of making the smaller and poorer country a mere
+instrument for the advantage of the greater and wealthier one. He,
+therefore, proposed now to create a situation of perfect commercial
+equality, in which there was to be a community of benefits, and
+also to some extent a community of burdens." And he urged the House
+to "adopt that system of trade with Ireland that would tend to
+enrich one part of the empire without impoverishing the other,
+while it would give strength to both; that, like mercy, the
+favorite attribute of Heaven,</p>
+<p class="poetry">"'Is twice blessed&mdash;<br />
+It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.'"</p>
+<a name="brownlow" id="brownlow"></a>
+<p>It might, he said, be regarded as "a treaty with Ireland by
+which that country would be put on a fair, equal, and impartial
+footing with Great Britain, in point of commerce, with respect to
+foreign countries and our colonies." The community of burdens which
+his measure would impose on Ireland was this: that whenever the
+gross hereditary revenue of Ireland should exceed &pound;650,000
+(an amount considerably in excess of anything it had ever yet
+reached), the excess should be applied to the support of the fleet
+of the United Kingdom. It was, in fact, a burden that could have no
+existence at all until the Irish trade had become far more
+flourishing and productive than as yet it had ever been. Yet a
+measure conceived in such a spirit of liberality, and framed with
+such careful attention to the minutest interests of Irish trade,
+Mr. Brownlow did not hesitate to denounce as one "tending to make
+Ireland a tributary nation to Great Britain. The same terms," he
+declared, "had been held out to America, and Ireland had equal
+spirit with America to reject them." He even declared that "it was
+happy for Mr. Orde" (the Chief Secretary, who had introduced the
+measure into the Irish House of Commons) "that he was in a country
+remarkable for humanity. Had he proposed such a measure in a Polish
+Diet, he would not have lived to carry back an answer to his
+master. If," he concluded, "the gifts of Britain are to be
+accompanied with the slavery of Ireland, I will never be a slave to
+pay tribute; I will hurl back her gifts with scorn." Baffled by
+such frantic and senseless opposition, Pitt condescended to remodel
+his measure. In its new form it was not so greatly for the
+advantage of Ireland. He had been constrained to admit some
+limitation of his original liberality by the opposition which, it
+had met with in England also where Fox, at all times an avowed
+enemy of freedom of trade, had made himself the mouth-piece of the
+London and Liverpool merchants, who could not see, without the most
+narrow-minded apprehension, the monopoly of the trade with India
+and the West Indies, which they had hitherto enjoyed, threatened by
+the admission of Ireland to its benefits. And now a clause in the
+second bill, binding the Irish Parliament to reenact the Navigation
+Laws existing in England, called up an opposition from
+Grattan[<a href="#note-132">132</a>] as furious as that with which
+Mr. Brownlow had denounced the original measure. To demand the
+enactment of the English Navigation Law, he declared, was "a
+revocation of the constitution;" and his rival, Flood, in his zeal
+to emulate his popularity with the mob, surpassing him in
+vehemence, inveighed against the clause, as one intended to make
+the Irish Parliament a mere register of the English Parliament,
+"which it should never become". All the arguments brought forward
+in favor of the measure by the supporters of the
+government&mdash;arguments which, probably, no one would now be
+found to deny to have been unanswerable&mdash;failed to make the
+slightest impression on a House in which the chief object of each
+opponent of the ministry seemed to be to outrun his fellows in
+violence; and eventually the measure fell to the ground, and for
+fifteen years more Ireland was deprived of the advantages which had
+been intended for her.</p>
+<p>And even yet the danger from the Volunteers was not wholly
+extinguished. Though their Convention had been suppressed, its
+leaders had only changed their tactics. Under the guidance of a
+Dublin ironmonger, named Napper Tandy, they now proposed to convene
+a Congress, to consist, not, as before, of delegates from the
+Volunteer body, but of persons who should be representatives of the
+entire nation; and Tandy had even the audacity to issue circulars
+to the sheriffs of the different counties, to require them, in
+their official capacity, to summon the people to return
+representatives to this Congress. The Sheriff of Dublin, a man of
+the name of O'Reilly, obeyed the requisition; but Fitzgibbon, who,
+luckily, was now Attorney-general, instantly prosecuted him for
+abuse of his office. He was convicted, fined, and imprisoned, and
+his punishment deterred others from following his example. And a
+rigorous example had become indispensable, since it was known to
+the government that Tandy and some of his followers were acting in
+connection with French emissaries, and that their object was the
+separation of Ireland from England, and, in the minds of some of
+them, certainly the annexation of the country to France; indeed, on
+one occasion Fitzgibbon asserted in the House of Commons that he
+had seen resolutions inviting the French into the country. The
+government would gladly have established a militia to supersede the
+Volunteers, but the temper of the Irish Parliament, in its
+newly-acquired independence, rendered any such attempt hopeless;
+and Mr. Grattan, with a perversity of judgment which his warmest
+admirers must find it difficult to reconcile with statesmanship, if
+not with patriotism, even opposed with extreme bitterness a bill
+for the establishment of a police for Dublin, though he could not
+deny that there existed in the city an organized body of ruffians,
+who made not only the streets but even the dwelling-houses of the
+more orderly citizens unsafe, by outrages of the worst kind,
+committed on the largest scale&mdash;assaults, plunderings,
+ravishments, and murders. In the rural districts of the South the
+disturbances were so criminally violent, and so incessant, that the
+Lord-lieutenant was compelled to request the presence of some
+additional regiments from England, as the sole means of preserving
+any kind of respect for the law; and more than once the mobs of
+rioters showed themselves so bold and formidable, that the soldiers
+were compelled to fire in self-defence, and order was not restored
+but at the cost of many lives.</p>
+<p>Presently a Conspiracy Bill was passed, and gradually the
+firmness of the government re-established a certain amount of
+internal tranquillity. But shortly afterward a crisis arose which,
+more than the debates on the commercial propositions, or on the
+Volunteers, or on the police, showed how over-liberal had been the
+confidence of the English minister who had repealed Poynings' Act,
+and had bestowed independent authority on the Irish Parliament
+before the members had learned how to use it. We have seen how keen
+a contest was excited in the English Parliament by the deranged
+condition of the King's health in 1788, and the necessity which
+consequently arose for the appointment of a Regency. Grattan was in
+London at the time, where he had contracted a personal intimacy
+with Fox, and had been presented by him to the Prince of Wales,
+whose graciousness of manner, and profession of adherence to the
+Whig system of politics, secured his attachment to that party.
+Grattan was easily indoctrinated by Fox with his theory of the
+indefeasible claim of the Prince to the Regency as his birthright,
+and is understood to have promised that the Irish Parliament should
+adopt that view. The case was one which seemed unprovided for.
+There was no question but that the law enacted that the sovereign
+of England should also be the sovereign of Ireland. But no express
+law of either country contained any such stipulation respecting a
+Regent; and Grattan conceived that, in the absence of any
+pre-existing ordinance, it would be easy to contend that the Irish
+Parliament was the sole judge who the Regent should be, and on what
+terms he should exercise the royal authority.</p>
+<p>The Irish Parliament had been prorogued in 1787 to the 5th of
+February, 1789, the same day on which, after numerous examinations
+of the physicians in attendance on the royal patient, and after the
+passing of a series of resolutions enunciating the principles on
+which the government was proceeding, Pitt introduced the Regency
+Bill into the English House of Commons, being prepared to conduct
+it through both Houses with all the despatch that might be
+consistent with a due observance of all the forms of deliberation.
+Grattan's object was to anticipate the decision of the English
+Parliament, so as to avoid every appearance that the Irish
+Parliament was only following it; and he therefore proposed that
+the House of Commons should instantly vote an address to the
+Prince, requesting him to take upon himself the Regency of the
+kingdom of Ireland, by his own natural right as the heir of the
+crown; making sure not only that his advice would be taken by those
+whom he was addressing, but that the House of Lords would not
+venture to dissent from it.</p>
+<p>Fitzgibbon, as Attorney-general and spokesman of the government
+in the Commons, as a matter of course opposed such precipitate
+action, not only warning his hearers of the folly and danger of
+taking a step "which might dissolve the single tie which now
+connected Ireland with Great Britain," but explaining also the
+whole principle of the constitution of the two kingdoms, so far as
+it was a joint constitution, in terms which give his speech a
+permanent value as a summary of its principle and its character. He
+recalled to the recollection of the House the act of William and
+Mary, which declares "the kingdom of Ireland to be annexed to the
+imperial crown of England, and the sovereign of England to be by
+undoubted right sovereign of Ireland also;" and argued from this
+that Mr. Grattan's proposal was contrary to the laws of the realm
+and criminal in the extreme. "The crown of Ireland," as he told his
+hearers, "and the crown of England are inseparably united, and the
+Irish Parliament is totally independent of the British Parliament.
+The first of these positions is your security, the second your
+freedom, and any other language tends to the separation of the
+crowns or the subjection of your Parliament. The only security of
+your liberty is the connection with Great Britain; and gentlemen
+who risk breaking the connection must make up their minds to a
+union. God forbid I should ever see that day; but, if the day comes
+on which a separation shall be attempted, I shall not hesitate to
+embrace a union rather than a separation."</p>
+<p>He proceeded to show that, as the Irish Parliament had itself
+enacted that all bills which passed their two Houses should require
+the sanction of the Great Seal of England, they actually had no
+legal power to confer on the Prince of Wales such authority as
+Grattan advised his being invested with, whatever might be the form
+of words in which their resolution was couched. He pointed out,
+also, that if the Irish Parliament should insist on appointing the
+Prince of Wales Regent before it was known whether he would accept
+the Regency of England, it was manifestly not impossible "that they
+might be appointing a Regent for Ireland being a different person
+from the Regent of England; and in that case the moment a Regent
+was appointed in Great Britain, he might send a commission under
+the Great Seal appointing a Lord-lieutenant of Ireland, and to that
+commission the Regent of Ireland would be bound to pay obedience.
+Another objection of great force to his mind was, that the course
+recommended by Grattan would be a formal appeal from the Parliament
+of England to that of Ireland. It would sow the seeds of dissension
+between the Parliaments of the two countries. And, indeed, those
+who were professing themselves advocates for the independence of
+the Irish crown were advocates for its separation from
+England."</p>
+<p>But the House was too entirely under the influence of Grattan's
+impassioned eloquence for Fitzgibbon's more sober arguments to be
+listened to. The address proposed by Grattan was carried by
+acclamation; and the peers were scarcely less unanimous in its
+favor, one of the archbishops even dilating on "the duty of
+availing themselves of the opportunity of asserting the total
+independence of Ireland." Even when, on a second discussion as to
+the mode in which the address was to be presented to the Prince,
+Fitzgibbon reported that he had consulted the Chancellor and all
+the judges, and that they were unanimously of opinion that, till
+the Regency Bill should be passed in England, the address was not
+only improper but treasonable, he found his warning equally
+disregarded. And when the Lord-lieutenant refused to transmit the
+address to England, on the avowed ground of its illegality, Grattan
+proposed and carried three resolutions: the first, that the address
+was not illegal, but that, in addressing the Prince to take on
+himself the Regency, the Parliament of Ireland had exercised an
+undoubted right; the second, that the Lord-lieutenant's refusal to
+transmit the address to his Royal Highness was ill-advised and
+unconstitutional; the third, that a deputation from the two Houses
+should go to London, to present the address to the Prince. Mr.
+Fronde affirms that the deputation, even when preparing to sail for
+England, was very irresolute and undecided whether to present the
+address or not, from a reasonable fear of incurring the penalties
+of treason, to which the lawyers pronounced those who should
+present it liable. But their courage was not put to the test. As
+has been already seen, before the end of the month the King's
+recovery was announced, and the question of a Regency did not occur
+again till the Irish Parliament had been united to the English.</p>
+<p>Since Lord Rockingham's concessions, in 1782, the project of a
+legislative union between the two countries, resembling that which
+united Scotland to England, had more than once been broached. We
+have seen it alluded to by Fitzgibbon in the course of these
+discussions, and it was no new idea. It had been discussed even
+before the union with Scotland was completed, and had then been
+regarded in Ireland with feelings very different from those which
+prevailed at a later period. Ten years after the time of which we
+are speaking, Grattan denounced the scheme with almost frantic
+violence. Fitzgibbon (though after the Rebellion he recommended it
+as indispensable) as yet regarded it only as an alternative which,
+though he might eventually embrace it, he should not accept without
+extreme reluctance. But at the beginning of the century all parties
+among the Protestant Irish had been eager for it, and even the
+leading Roman Catholics had been not unwilling to acquiesce in it.
+Unluckily, the English ministers were unable to shake off the
+influence of the English manufacturers; and they, in another
+development of the selfish and wicked jealousy which had led them
+in William's reign to require the suppression of the Irish woollen
+manufacture, now, in Anne's, rose against the proposal of a
+legislative union.[<a href="#note-133">133</a>] In blindness which
+was not only fatal but suicidal also, "they persuaded themselves
+that the union would make Ireland rich, and that England's interest
+was to keep her poor;" as if it had been possible for one portion
+of the kingdom to increase in prosperity without every other
+portion benefiting also by the improvement.</p>
+<p>However, in the reign of Anne the union was a question only of
+expediency or of wisdom. The wide divergence of the two Parliaments
+on this question of the Regency transformed it into a question of
+necessity. The King might have a relapse; the Irish Parliament, on
+a recurrence of the crisis, might re-affirm its late resolutions;
+might frame another address to the Prince of Wales; and there might
+be no alternative between seeing two different persons Regents of
+England and Ireland, or, what would be nearly the same thing,
+seeing the same person Regent of the two countries on different
+grounds, and exercising a different authority.</p>
+<p>And if these proceedings of the Irish Parliament had wrought in
+the mind of the great English minister a conviction of the absolute
+necessity of preventing a recurrence of such dangers by the only
+practicable means open to him&mdash;the fusion of it into one body
+with the English Parliament by a legislative union&mdash;the
+occurrences of the ensuing ten years enforced that conviction with
+a weight still more irresistible. It has been seen how stirring an
+influence the revolutionary fever engendered by the overthrow of
+the French monarchy for a time exerted even over the calmer temper
+of Englishmen. In Ireland, where, ever since Sarsfield and his
+brave garrison enlisted under the banner of Louis XIV., a
+connection more or less intimate with France had been constantly
+kept up, the events in Paris had produced a far deeper and wider
+effect. More than one demagogue among the Volunteers had avowed a
+desire to see the whole country transfer its allegiance from the
+English to the French sovereign; and this preference was more
+pronounced after the triumph of democracy in the French capital.
+For the leaders of the movement, themselves nearly all men of the
+lowest degree, denounced the Irish nobles with almost as much
+vehemence as the English connection.</p>
+<p>Yet Pitt's policy, dictated partly by a spirit of conciliation,
+and still more by feelings of justice, was gradually removing many
+of the grievances of which the Irish had real reason to complain.
+Next to the restrictions on trade, nothing had made such an
+impression on his mind as the iniquity of the penal laws; and those
+he proceeded to repeal, encouraging the introduction of bills to
+throw open the profession of the law to Roman Catholics, to allow
+them seats on the magistrates' bench and commissions in the army,
+and to grant them the electoral franchise, a concession which he
+himself would willingly have extended by admitting them to
+Parliament itself. But these relaxations of the old Penal Code,
+important as they were, only conciliated the higher classes of the
+Roman Catholics. Most of the Roman Catholic prelates, and most of
+the Roman Catholic lay nobles, proclaimed their satisfaction at
+what had been done, and their good-will toward the minister who had
+done it; but the professional agitators were exasperated rather
+than conciliated at finding so much of the ground on which they had
+rested cut from beneath their feet. So desirous was Pitt to carry
+conciliation to the greatest length that could be consistent with
+safety, that he held more than one conference with Grattan himself;
+but he found that great orator not very manageable, partly, as it
+may seem from some of Mr. Windham's letters, through jealousy of
+Fitzgibbon, who was now the Irish Chancellor,[<a href=
+"#note-134">134</a>] and still more from a desire to propitiate the
+Roman Catholics, for whom he demanded complete and immediate
+Emancipation; while Pitt, who was, probably, already resolved on
+accomplishing a legislative Union, thought, as far as we can judge,
+that Emancipation should follow, not precede, the Union, lest, if
+it should precede it, it might prove rather a stumbling-block in
+the way than a stepping-stone to the still more important
+measure.</p>
+<p>It is not very easy to determine what influence the
+"Emancipation," as it was rather absurdly called,[<a href=
+"#note-135">135</a>] if it had been granted at that time, might
+have had in quieting the prevailing discontent. With one large
+party it would probably have increased it, for there was quite as
+great an inclination to insurrection in Ulster as in Leinster or
+Munster; and with the Northern Presbyterians animosity to Popery
+was at least as powerful a feeling as sympathy with the French
+Republicans. <a href="#CH7">A subsequent chapter</a>, however, will
+afford a more fitting opportunity for discussing the arguments in
+favor of or against Emancipation. What seems certain is, that a
+large party among the Roman Catholics of the lower class valued
+Emancipation itself principally as a measure to another end&mdash;a
+separation from England. Pitt, meanwhile, hopeless of reconciling
+the leaders of the different parties&mdash;the impulsive enthusiasm
+of Grattan with the sober, practical wisdom of
+Fitzgibbon&mdash;pursued his own policy of conciliation united with
+vigor; and one of the measures which he now carried subsists,
+unaltered in its principle, to the present day.</p>
+<p>There was no part of the penal laws of which the folly and
+iniquity were more intolerable than the restrictions which they
+imposed on education. To a certain extent, they defeated
+themselves. The clause which subjected to severe penalties a Roman
+Catholic parent who sent his child abroad to enjoy the benefits of
+an education which he was not allowed to receive at home, was
+manifestly almost incapable of enforcement, and the youths designed
+for orders in the Romish Church had been invariably sent to foreign
+colleges&mdash;some to Douai or St. Omer, in France; some to the
+renowned Spanish University of Salamanca. But the French colleges
+had been swept away by the Revolution, which also made a passage to
+Spain (the greater expense of which had at all times confined that
+resource to a small number of students) more difficult; and the
+consequence was, that in 1794 the Roman Catholic Primate, Dr. Troy,
+petitioned the government to grant a royal license for the
+endowment of a college in Ireland. Justice and policy were equally
+in favor of the grant of such a request. For the sake of the whole
+kingdom, and even for that of Protestantism itself, it was better
+that the Roman Catholic priesthood should be an educated rather
+than an ignorant body of men; and, in the temper which at that time
+prevailed over the western countries of the Continent, it was at
+least equally desirable that the rising generation should be
+preserved from the contagion of the revolutionary principles which
+the present rulers of France were so industrious to propagate. Pitt
+at once embraced the idea, and in the spring of the next year a
+bill was introduced into the Irish Parliament by the Chief
+Secretary, authorizing the foundation and endowment of a college at
+Maynooth, in the neighborhood of Dublin, for the education of Roman
+Catholics generally, whether destined for the Church or for lay
+professions. It is a singular circumstance that the only opposition
+to the measure came from Grattan and his party, who urged that, as
+the Roman Catholics had recently been allowed to matriculate and
+take degrees at Trinity College, though not to share in the
+endowments of that wealthy institution, the endowment of another
+college, to be exclusively confined to Roman Catholics, would be a
+retrograde step, undoing the benefits of the recent concession of
+the authorities of Trinity; would be "a revival and re-enactment of
+the principles of separation and exclusion," and an injury to the
+whole community. For, as he wisely contended, nothing was so
+important to the well-doing of the entire people as the extinction
+of the religious animosities which had hitherto embittered the
+feelings of each Church toward the other, and nothing could so
+surely tend to that extinction as the uniting the members of both
+from their earliest youth, in the pursuit both of knowledge and
+amusement, as school-fellows and playmates. If Mr. Froude's
+interpretation of the motives of those who influenced Grattan on
+this occasion be correct, he was unconsciously made a tool of by
+those whose real object was a separation from England, of the
+attainment of which they despaired, unless they could unite
+Protestants and Roman Catholics in its prosecution. The bill,
+however, was passed by a very large majority, and &pound;9000 a
+year was appropriated to the endowment of the college. Half a
+century afterward, as will be seen, that endowment was enlarged,
+and placed on a more solid and permanent footing, by one of the
+ablest of Pitt's successors. It was a wise and just measure; and if
+its success has not entirely answered the expectations of the
+minister who granted it, its comparative failure has been owing to
+circumstances which the acutest judgment could not have
+foreseen.</p>
+<p>But it seems certain that neither the concession nor the refusal
+of any demands put forward by any party in Ireland could have
+prevented the insurrection which broke out shortly afterward. There
+were two parties among the disaffected Irish&mdash;or it should,
+perhaps, rather be said that two different objects were kept in
+view by them&mdash;one of which, the establishment of a republic,
+was dearer to one section of the malcontents; separation from
+England, with the contingency of annexation to France, was the more
+immediate aim of the other, though the present existence of a
+republican form of government in France to a great extent united
+the two. As has been mentioned before, the original movers in the
+conspiracy were of low extraction, Dublin tradesmen in a small way
+of business. Napper Tandy was an ironmonger, Wolfe Tone was the son
+of a coach-maker. But they had obtained a recruit of a very
+different class, a younger son of the Duke of Leinster, Lord Edward
+Fitzgerald, a man of very slender capacity, who, at his first
+entrance into Parliament, when scarcely more than of age, had made
+himself remarkable by a furious denunciation of Pitt's Irish
+propositions; had married a natural daughter of the Duke of
+Orleans, a prince, in spite of his royal birth, one of the most
+profligate and ferocious of the French Jacobins; and had caught the
+revolutionary mania to such a degree that he abjured his nobility,
+and substituted for the appellation which marked his rank the title
+of "Citizen Fitzgerald." He had enrolled himself in a society known
+as the United Irishmen, and had gone to France, as its
+plenipotentiary, to arrange with Hoche, one of the most brilliant
+and popular of the French generals, a scheme for the invasion of
+Ireland, in which he promised him that, on his landing, he should
+be joined by tens of thousands of armed Irishmen. Hoche entered
+warmly into the plan, was furnished with a splendid army by the
+Directors, and in December, 1796, set sail for Ireland; but the
+fleet which carried him was dispersed in a storm; many of the ships
+were wrecked, others were captured by the British cruisers, and the
+remnant of the fleet, sadly crippled, was glad to regain its
+harbors. Two years afterward another invading expedition had still
+worse fortune. General Humbert, who in 1796 had been one of Hoche's
+officers, did succeed in effecting a landing at Killala Bay, in
+Mayo; but he and the whole of his force was speedily surrounded,
+and compelled to surrender; and a month afterward a large squadron,
+with a more powerful division of troops, under General Hardy, on
+board, found itself unable to effect a landing, but fell in with a
+squadron under Sir John Warren, who captured every ship but two;
+Wolfe Tone, who was on board one of them, being taken prisoner, and
+only escaping the gallows by suicide.</p>
+<p>This happened in October, 1798. But it is difficult to conceive
+with what object these last expeditions had been despatched from
+France at all; for in the preceding summer the rebellion of the
+Irish had broken out, and had been totally crushed in a few
+weeks;[<a href="#note-136">136</a>] not without terrible loss of
+life on both sides, nor without the insurgent leaders&mdash;though
+many of them were gentlemen of good birth, fortune, and education,
+and still more were clergy&mdash;showing a ferocity and ingenuity
+in cruelty which the worst of the French Jacobins had scarcely
+exceeded; one of the saddest circumstances of the whole rebellion
+being, that the insurgents, who had burnt men, women, and children
+alive, who had deliberately hacked others to pieces against whom
+they did not profess to have a single ground of complaint beyond
+the fact that they were English and Protestant, found advocates in
+both Houses of the English Parliament, who declared that the
+rebellion was owing to the severity of the Irish Viceroy and his
+chief councillors, who denied that the rebels had solicited French
+aid, and who even voted against granting to the government the
+re-enforcements necessary to prevent a revival of the treason.</p>
+<p>The rebellion was crushed with such celerity as might have
+convinced the most disaffected of the insanity of defying the power
+of Great Britain; but it was certain that the spirit which prompted
+the rebellion was not extinguished, and that, as it had been fed
+before, so it would continue to be fed by the factious spirit of
+members of the Irish House of Commons, and of those who could
+return members,[<a href="#note-137">137</a>] so long as Ireland had
+a separate Parliament. Not, indeed, that Pitt required the argument
+in favor of a Union which was thus furnished. The course adopted by
+the Irish Parliament on the Regency question was quite sufficient
+to show how great a mistake had been made by the repeal of
+Poynings' Act. But what the rebellion proved was, that the Union
+would not admit of an instant's delay; and Pitt at once applied
+himself to the task of framing a measure which, while it should
+strengthen England, by the removal of the necessity for a constant
+watchfulness over every transaction and movement in Ireland, should
+at the same time confer on and secure to Ireland substantial
+advantages, such as, without a Union, the English Parliament could
+scarcely be induced to contemplate.</p>
+<p>Mr. Hallam, in one of the last chapters of his work,[<a href=
+"#note-138">138</a>] while showing by unanswerable arguments the
+advantages which Scotland has derived from her Union with England,
+has also enumerated some of the causes which impeded the minister
+of the day in his endeavors to render it acceptable to the Scotch
+members to whom it was proposed. The most apparently substantial of
+these was the unprecedented character of the measure. No past
+"experience of history was favorable to the absorption of a lesser
+state, at least where the government partook so much of the
+republican form, in one of superior power and ancient rivalry."
+But, in the case of the present measure, what had thus been a
+difficulty in the Scotch Union might have been expected to be
+regarded as an argument in its favor, since the keenest patriots
+among the Scotch had long been convinced that the Union had brought
+a vast increase of prosperity and importance to their country, and
+what was now confessed to have proved advantageous to Scotland
+might naturally be expected to be equally beneficial to Ireland.
+Another obstacle had been the fear of the danger to which the
+Presbyterian Church might be "exposed, when brought thus within the
+power of a Legislature so frequently influenced by one which held
+her, not as a sister, but rather a bastard usurper to a sister's
+inheritance." But here again experience might give her testimony in
+favor of an Irish Union, since it was incontestable that those
+apprehensions&mdash;which, no doubt, many earnest Scotchmen had
+sincerely entertained&mdash;had not been realized, but that since
+the Union the Presbyterian Church had enjoyed as great security, as
+complete independence, and as absolute an authority over its
+members as in the preceding century; that the Parliament had never
+attempted the slightest interference with its exercise of its
+privileges, and that the Church of England had been equally free
+from the exhibition of any desire to stimulate the Parliament to
+such action; while the Roman Catholic Church, which had many more
+adherents in England than the Presbyterian Church had ever had, was
+quite powerful enough to exact for itself the maintenance of its
+rights, and the minister was quite willing to grant equal
+securities to those which, at the beginning of the century, had
+been thought sufficient for the Church of Scotland. A third reason
+which our great historical critic puts forward for the disfavor
+with which the Union was at the time regarded by many high-minded
+Scotchmen, he finds in "the gross prostitution with which a
+majority sold themselves to the surrender of their own legislative
+existence." That similar means were to some extent employed to win
+over opponents of the government in Ireland cannot, it must be
+confessed, be denied, though the temptations held out to converts
+oftener took the shape of titles, promotions, appointments, and
+court favors than of actual money. The most recent historian of
+this period&mdash;who, to say the least, is not biassed in favor of
+either the English or Irish government of the
+period&mdash;pronounces as his opinion, formed after the most
+careful research, that the bribery was on the other side.
+"Cornwallis and Castlereagh" (the Lord-lieutenant and the Chief
+Secretary) "both declared it to be within their knowledge that the
+Opposition offered four thousand pounds, ready money, for a vote.
+But they name only one man who was purchased, and his vote was
+obtained for four thousand pounds. From the language of Lord
+Cornwallis, it is certain that if money was spent by the government
+in this way it was without his knowledge; but many things may have
+been done by the inferior agents of the government, and possibly by
+Castlereagh himself, which they would not venture to lay before the
+Lord-lieutenant. It appears, however, from the papers which have
+recently come to light, that the prevalent belief of the Union
+having been mainly effected by a lavish expenditure of money is not
+well-founded; still it is certain that some money was expended in
+this way." Besides actual payment for votes, he adds that a very
+large sum&mdash;a hundred thousand pounds&mdash;is said to have
+been expended in the purchase of seats, the holders of which were,
+of course, to vote against the measure; and names Lord Downshire as
+subscribing &pound;5000, Lord Lismore and Mr. White &pound;3000
+each, while the government funds were chiefly expended "in
+engaging[<a href="#note-139">139</a>] young barristers of the Four
+Courts to write for the Union." But, even if it were true that
+corruption was employed to the very utmost extent that was ever
+alleged by the most vehement opponent of the measure and of the
+government, it may be feared that very few of the last century
+Irishmen would have been so shocked at it as to consider that fact
+an objection to the Union, especially, it is sad and shameful to
+say, among the upper classes. The poorer classes, those who could
+render no political service to a minister, as being consequently
+beneath official notice, were unassailed by his temptations; but
+the demoralization of the men of rank and property was almost
+universal, and few seats were disposed of, few votes were given,
+except in return for favors granted, or out of discontent at favors
+refused. And it cannot be denied that the tendency to political
+jobbery had not been diminished by the concessions of 1782, if,
+indeed, it may not be said that the increased importance which
+those concessions had given to the Irish Parliament had led the
+members of both Houses to place an increased value on their
+services. Certainly no previous Lord-lieutenant had given such
+descriptions of the universality of the demands made on him as were
+forwarded to the English government by those who held that office
+in the sixteen years preceding the outbreak of the Rebellion.</p>
+<p>It is remarkable that the transaction which, as has been said
+before, may be conceived to have first forced on Pitt's mind the
+conviction of the absolute necessity of the Union&mdash;namely, the
+course pursued by the Irish Parliament on the Regency
+Bill&mdash;bore a close resemblance to that which, above all other
+considerations, had made the Scotch Union indispensable, namely,
+the Act of Security passed by the Scottish Estates in 1703, which
+actually provided that, on the decease of Queen Anne without issue,
+the Estates "should name her successor, but should be debarred from
+choosing the admitted successor to the crown of England, unless
+such forms of government were settled as should fully secure the
+religion, freedom, and trade of the Scottish nation."[<a href=
+"#note-140">140</a>] The Scotch Estates, therefore, had absolutely
+regarded the possible separation of the two kingdoms as a
+contingency which might become not undesirable; and, though it was
+too ticklish an argument to bring forward, it may very possibly
+have occurred to Pitt that a similar vote of the Irish Parliament
+was not impossible. The claim which Grattan, following Fox, had set
+up on behalf of the Prince of Wales, was one of an indefeasible
+right to the Regency; and, as far as right by inheritance went, his
+claim to the crown, if, or whenever, a vacancy should occur, was
+far less disputable. But, as has been mentioned in the last
+chapter, a question had already been raised whether his Royal
+Highness had not forfeited his right to the succession, and it was
+quite possible that that question might be renewed. The fact of the
+Prince's marriage to a Roman Catholic was by this time generally
+accepted as certain; the birth of the Princess Charlotte gave
+greater importance to the circumstance than it seemed to have while
+the Prince remained childless; and, if the performance of the
+marriage ceremony should be legally proved, and the English law
+courts should pronounce that the legal invalidity of the marriage
+did not protect the Prince from the penalty of forfeiture, it was
+highly probable that the Irish Parliament would take a different
+view&mdash;would refuse, in spite of the Bill of Rights, to regard
+marriage with a Roman Catholic as a disqualification, but would
+recognize the Prince of Wales as King of Ireland.</p>
+<p>Several minor considerations, such as the desirableness of
+uniformity in the proceedings of the two countries with respect to
+Money Bills, the Mutiny Act, and other arrangements of
+parliamentary detail, all pointed the same way; and, on the whole,
+it may be said that scarcely any of the opponents of the government
+measure were found to deny its expediency, especially as regarded
+the interests of Great Britain. The objections which were made were
+urged on different grounds. In the Irish House of Commons, a member
+who, though a young man, had already established a very high
+reputation for professional skill as a barrister, for eloquence
+equally suited to the Bar and to the Senate, and for sincere and
+incorruptible patriotism, Mr. Plunkett, took upon himself to deny
+the competency of the Irish Parliament to pass a bill not only to
+extinguish its own existence, but to prevent the birth of any
+future Parliament, and to declare that the act, if it "should be
+passed," would be a mere nullity, and that no man in "Ireland would
+be bound to obey it." And, in the English House of Commons, Mr.
+Grey may be thought to have adopted something of the same view,
+when he proposed an amendment "to suspend all proceedings on the
+subject till the sentiments of the people of Ireland respecting
+that measure could be ascertained." He did not, of course, deny (he
+was speaking on the 21st of April, 1800) that the bill had been
+passed by both Houses of the Irish Parliament by considerable
+majorities.[<a href="#note-141">141</a>] But he contended that that
+Parliament did not speak the sentiments of the people; and, that
+being the case, that its voice was of no authority. It is evident
+that all arguments founded on a denial of the omnipotence of a
+Parliament, whether English or Irish, are invalid. The question of
+that omnipotence, as has been seen in a former chapter, had been
+fully discussed when Mr. Pitt's father denied the power of
+Parliament to tax the American Colonies; and that question may
+fairly be regarded as having been settled at that time. It is
+equally clear that the denial that, on any question whatever, the
+House of Commons must be taken to speak the sentiments of the
+constituencies, whether the proposal of such question had been
+contemplated at the time of their election or not, is the
+advancement of a doctrine wholly inconsistent with our
+parliamentary constitution, and one which would practically be the
+parent of endless agitation and mischief. To expect that the
+members could pronounce on no new question without a fresh
+reference to their constituents, would be to reduce them from the
+position of representatives to that of delegates; such as that of
+the members of the old States-general, in France, whose early decay
+is attributed by the ablest political writers in no small degree to
+the dependence of the members on their constituents for precise
+instructions. Another argument on which Mr. Grey insisted with
+great earnestness is worth preserving, though subsequent inventions
+have destroyed its force; he contended that the example of the
+Scotch Union did not, when properly considered, afford any argument
+in favor of an Irish Union, from the difference of situation of the
+two countries. Scotland was a part of the same island as England;
+"there was no physical impediment to rapid and constant
+communication; the relative situation of the two countries was such
+that the King himself could administer the executive government in
+both, and there was no occasion for a separate establishment being
+kept up in each." But the sea lay between England and Ireland, and
+the delays and sometimes difficulties which were thus interposed
+rendered it "necessary that Ireland should have a separate
+government;" and he affirmed that "this was an insuperable bar to a
+beneficial Union," quoting a saying of Lord Somers, that "if it
+were necessary to preserve a separate executive government at
+Edinburgh after the Union, he would abandon the measure." Mr. Grey
+even denied that the prosperity of Scotland since the Union was
+mainly attributable to that measure. "It was not the Union; it was
+the adoption of a liberal policy, the application of a proper
+remedy to the particular evils under which the country labored,
+that removed the causes which had impeded the prosperity of
+Scotland." But this argument was clearly open to the reply that the
+adoption of that liberal policy had been a direct effect of the
+Union, and would have been impracticable without it, and was,
+therefore, a strong inducement to the adoption of a similar Union
+with Ireland, where the existing evils were at least as great as
+those which, a century before, had kept down Scotland. Another of
+his arguments has been remarkably falsified by the event. With a
+boldness in putting forward what was manifestly, indeed avowedly, a
+party objection, and which, as such, must be looked upon as
+somewhat singular, he found a reason for resisting the addition of
+a hundred Irish members to the British House of Commons in the
+probability that they would, as a general rule, be subservient to
+the minister. He instanced "the uniform support which the members
+for Scotland had given to every act of ministers," and saw in that
+example "reason to apprehend that the Irish members would become a
+no less regular band of ministerial adherents." It would be
+superfluous to point out how entirely contrary the result has been
+to the prediction.</p>
+<p>It is, however, beside the purpose of this work to dwell on the
+arguments by which the minister supported his proposal, or on those
+with which the Opposition resisted it, whether apparently founded
+on practical considerations, such as those brought forward by Mr.
+Grey, or those of a more sentimental character, which rested on the
+loss of national "dignity and honor," which, it was assumed, would
+be the consequence of the measure. It seems desirable rather to
+explain the principal conditions on which the Union was to be
+effected, as Pitt explained it to the House of Commons in April,
+1800. In the preceding year he had confined himself to moving a
+series of resolutions in favor of the principle, which, though they
+were adopted by both Houses in England, he did not at that time
+endeavor to carry farther, since in the Irish House of Commons the
+utmost exertions of the government could only prevail by a single
+vote;[<a href="#note-142">142</a>] and he naturally thought such a
+majority far too slender to justify his relying on it so far as to
+proceed farther with a measure of such vast importance. But, during
+the recess, he had introduced some modifications into his original
+draft of the measure, which, though slight, were sufficient to
+conciliate much additional support; and the consequence was, that
+in February of this year both the Irish Houses accepted it by
+sufficient majorities;[<a href="#note-143">143</a>] and, therefore,
+he now felt able to lay the details of the measure before the
+English Parliament. To take them in the order in which he
+enumerated them, that which had appeared to the Irish Parliament
+"the first and most important, was the share which the Irish
+constituencies ought to have in the representation of the House of
+Commons." On this point, "the Parliament of Ireland was of opinion
+that the number of representatives for Ireland ought to be one
+hundred." And he was not disposed to differ from the conclusion to
+which it had come. He regarded it, indeed, as "a matter of but
+small importance whether the number of representatives from one
+part of the united empire were greater or less. If they were enough
+to make known the local wants, to state the interests and convey
+the sentiments of the part of the empire they represented, it would
+produce that degree of general security which would be wanting in
+any vain attempt to obtain that degree of theoretical perfection
+about which in modern times they had heard so much." He approved of
+"the principle which had been laid down upon this part of the
+subject in the Parliament of Ireland&mdash;a reference to the
+supposed population of the two countries, and to the proposed rate
+of contribution. The proportion of contribution proposed to be
+established was seven and a half for Great Britain, and one for
+Ireland; while in the proportion of population Great Britain was to
+Ireland as two and a half or three to one;[<a href=
+"#note-144">144</a>] so that the result, on a combination of these
+two calculations, would be something more than five to one in favor
+of Great Britain, which was about the proportion which it was
+proposed to establish between the representation of the two
+countries." The principle of selection of the constituencies which
+had been adopted he likewise considered most "equitable and
+satisfactory for Ireland. The plan proposed was, that the members
+of the counties and the principal commercial cities should remain
+entire.... The remaining members were to be selected from those
+places which were the most considerable in point of population and
+wealth.... This was the only plan which could be adopted without
+trenching on the constitution; it introduced no theoretical reforms
+in the constitution or in the representation of this country; it
+made no distinction between different parliamentary rights, nor any
+alteration, even the slightest, in the internal forms of
+Parliament."</p>
+<p>Another consideration which he had kept in mind in framing this
+measure was this: "By the laws of England care had been taken to
+prevent the influence of the crown from becoming too great by too
+many offices being held by members of Parliament." And Pitt had no
+doubt that there would be a general feeling "that some provision
+ought to be made on this subject" in the arrangements for the new
+Parliament. At present, among the representatives of the counties
+and great commercial towns, whose seats were to be preserved in the
+new united Parliament, there were not above five or six who held
+offices; and, though it was impossible to estimate the possible
+number of place-holders with precision, he thought what would he
+most fair for him to propose would be, that "no more than twenty of
+the Irish members should hold places, and that if it should happen
+that a greater number did hold places during pleasure, then those
+who had last accepted them should vacate their seats."</p>
+<p>In the House of Peers he proposed that twenty-eight lords
+temporal of Ireland should have seats in the united Parliament, who
+should be elected for life by the Peers of Ireland&mdash;an
+arrangement which differed from that which, at the beginning of the
+century, had been adopted for the representative Peers of Scotland;
+but he argued, and surely with great reason, that "the choice of
+Peers to represent the Irish nobility for life was a mode that was
+more congenial to the general spirit and system of a Peerage than
+that of their being septennially elected, as the nobility of
+Scotland were." Of the spiritual Peers, four were to sit in
+rotation; to the lay Peers a farther privilege was given, which the
+minister regarded as of considerable, and even constitutional
+importance. By the articles of the Scotch Union, a Peer, if not
+chosen as a representative of the Peerage, was not eligible as a
+candidate for the House of Commons in either England or Scotland.
+But this bill "reserved a right to the Peers of Ireland who should
+not be elected to represent their own Peerage, to be elected
+members of the House of Commons of the united Parliament of Great
+Britain;" and Pitt urged that this was "a far better mode of
+treatment than had been adopted for the nobility of Scotland; so
+that a nobleman of Ireland, if not representing his own order,
+might be chosen as a legislator by a class of inferior rank, which
+he was so far from regarding as improper, that he deemed it in a
+high degree advantageous to the empire, analogous to the practice
+as well as friendly to the spirit of the British constitution." And
+he enforced his argument by pointing out with honest pride the
+advantage which in that respect the spirit and practice of our
+constitution gave to our nobility over the nobles of other
+countries. "We know full well," he continued, "the advantage we
+have experienced from having in this House those who, in the course
+of descent, as well as in hopes of merit, have had a prospect of
+sitting in our House of Peers. Those, therefore, who object to this
+part of the arrangement" (for, as he had previously mentioned, it
+had been made a subject not only of objection, but of ridicule)
+"can only do so from the want of due attention to the true
+character of our constitution, one of the great leading advantages
+of which is, that a person may for a long time be a member of one
+branch of the Legislature, and have it in view to become a member
+of another branch of it. This it is which constitutes the leading
+difference between the nobility of Great Britain and those of other
+countries. With us they are permitted to have legislative power
+before they arrive at their higher stations; and as they are, like
+all the rest of mankind, to be improved by experience in the
+science of legislation as well as in every other science, our
+constitution affords them that opportunity by their being eligible
+to seats in this House from the time of their majority. This is one
+of those circumstances which arise frequently in practice, but the
+advantages of which do not appear in theory till chance happens to
+cast them before us, and makes them subjects of discussion. These
+are the shades of the British constitution in which its latent
+beauties consist;" and he affirmed his conviction that this
+privilege would prove "an advantage to the nobility of Ireland, and
+an improvement in the system of representation in the House."</p>
+<p>It will hardly be denied that the arrangement that the
+representative Peers of Ireland should enjoy their seats for life
+did make it desirable that those who were not so elected to the
+Upper House should be eligible as candidates for a place in the
+Lower House. Otherwise, those who were not chosen as
+representatives of the peerage would have been placed in the
+anomalous and unfair position of being the only persons in the
+kingdom possessed of the requisite property qualification, and not
+disqualified by sex or profession, who were absolutely excluded
+from the opportunity of distinguishing themselves and serving their
+country in Parliament. How great the practical benefit to the House
+of Commons and the country the clause he was recommending was
+calculated to confer, was shown in a remarkable manner the very
+year of his death, when an Irish Peer was returned to the House of
+Commons, who, retaining his seat for nearly sixty years as the
+representative of different constituencies, the University of
+Cambridge being among the number, during the course of that period
+rose through a variety of offices to that of Prime-minister, and,
+as is admitted even by those who dissented most widely from some of
+his opinions and actions, earned for himself an honorable
+reputation, as one who had rendered faithful services to the crown,
+and on more than one occasion had conferred substantial benefits on
+the country.</p>
+<p>The arrangements proposed with respect to the Peers were not
+opposed. But Mr. Grey&mdash;generally acting as the spokesman of
+the Opposition on this question&mdash;raised an objection to making
+so large an addition as that of one hundred new members to the
+British House of Commons. He repeated his prophecy, made on a
+previous occasion, of the subserviency to the minister which the
+Irish members might be expected to exhibit, and therefore moved an
+amendment to reduce the number of Irish representatives to
+eighty-five; but, to obviate the discontent which such a reduction
+might be expected to excite in Ireland, he proposed to diminish the
+number of English members also, by disfranchising forty "of the
+most decayed boroughs," a step which would leave the number of
+members in the new united Parliament as nearly as possible the same
+as it was before. He found, however, very few to agree with him;
+his amendment was rejected by 176 to 34; and the minister's
+proposal was adopted in all its details.</p>
+<p>Mr. Pitt touched lightly on the next article, which limited the
+royal prerogative of creating Peers by a provision that the King
+should never confer any fresh Irish peerage till three peerages
+should have become extinct. This, again, was a point of difference
+between the conditions of the Scotch and Irish Unions; since by the
+terms of the Scotch Union the King was forever debarred from
+creating any new Scotch peerages. But it was pointed out that the
+greater antiquity of the Scotch peerages, and the circumstance that
+in Scotland the titles descended to collateral branches, were
+calculated to make the extinction of a Scotch peerage an event of
+very rare occurrence; while the comparative newness (with very few
+exceptions) of Irish peerages, and the rule by which they are
+"confined to immediate male descendants," rendered the entire
+extinction of the Irish peerage probable, "if the power of adding
+to or making up the number were not given to the crown."</p>
+<p>Recent legislation has given such importance to the next
+resolution, that it will be well to quote his precise words:</p>
+<p>"5. That it would be fit to propose, as the fifth article of
+union, that the Churches of that part of Great Britain called
+England and of Ireland shall be united into one Church; and that
+when his Majesty shall summon a Convocation, the archbishops,
+bishops, and clergy of the several provinces in Ireland shall be
+respectively summoned to and sit in the Convocation of the united
+Church, in the like manner and subject to the same regulations as
+to election and qualification as are at present by law established
+with respect to the like orders of the Church of England; and that
+the doctrine, worship, discipline, and government of the said
+united Church shall be preserved as now by law established for the
+Church of England, saving to the Church of Ireland all the rights,
+privileges, and jurisdictions now thereunto belonging; and that the
+doctrine, worship, discipline, and government of the Church of
+Scotland shall likewise be preserved as now by law, and by the Act
+of Union established for the Church of Scotland; and that the
+continuance and preservation forever of the said united Church, as
+the Established Church, of that part of the said United Kingdom
+called England and Ireland, shall be deemed and taken to be an
+essential and fundamental article and condition of the Union."</p>
+<p>Pitt's comment on this article was so brief as to show that he
+regarded its justice as well as its importance too obvious to need
+any elaborate justification. He pointed out that that portion of it
+which related to Convocation had been added by the Irish
+Parliament, and "would only say on so interesting a subject that
+the prosperity of the Irish Church could never be permanent, unless
+it were a part of the Union, to leave as a guard a power to the
+United Parliament to make some provision in this respect as a fence
+beyond any act of their own that could at present be agreed on."
+But, while he thus showed his conviction that the permanent
+prosperity of the Irish Church was essential to the welfare of the
+kingdom, he was by no means insensible to the claims of the Roman
+Catholic Church (as founded not more in policy than in justice) to
+be placed in some degree on a footing of equality with it; not only
+by a recognition of the dignity of its ministers, but also by an
+endowment which should be proportioned to their requirements, and
+should place them in a position of worldly competence and comfort
+for which hitherto they had been dependent on their
+flocks.[<a href="#note-145">145</a>] To use the expression of a
+modern statesman, he contemplated "levelling up," not "levelling
+down." Perhaps it may be said that he contemplated levelling up, as
+the surest and most permanent obstacle to any proposal of levelling
+down.</p>
+<p>At the same time it is fair to remark, that the argument which
+on a recent occasion was so strongly pressed by the champions of
+the Church, that it was beyond the power of Parliament to repeal
+what was here declared to be "an essential and fundamental article
+and condition of the Union," is untenable, on every consideration
+of the power of Parliament, and, indeed, of common-sense; since it
+would be an intolerable evil, and one productive of the worst
+consequences, if the doctrine were admitted that any Parliament
+could make an unchangeable law and bind its successors forever;
+and, moreover, since the very words of this article do clearly
+imply the power of Parliament over the Church, the power asserted,
+to "make some provision for the permanence of its prosperity,"
+clearly involving a power to make provisions of an opposite
+character. The expediency or impolicy, the propriety or
+unrighteousness, of a measure must always depend on the merits of
+the question itself at the time, and not on the judgment or
+intentions of legislators of an earlier generation. And advocates
+weaken instead of strengthening their case when they put forward
+arguments which, however plausible or acceptable to their own
+partisans, are, nevertheless, capable of refutation.</p>
+<p>The next article related to a question of paramount practical
+importance, and of special interest, since, as has been seen
+before, there was no subject on which the past legislation of the
+English Parliament had been so discreditable. But the jealousy of
+English manufacturers, though it had prevailed over the
+indifference of William III., who reserved all his solicitude for
+matters of foreign diplomacy, could find no echo in the large mind
+and sound commercial and financial knowledge of the modern
+statesman. He laid it down as the principle of his legislation on
+this subject&mdash;a principle which "he was sure that every
+gentleman in the House was ready to admit&mdash;that the
+consequence of the Union ought to be a perfect freedom of trade,
+whether of produce or manufacture, without exception, if possible;
+that a deviation from that principle ought to be made only when
+adhering to it might possibly shake some large capital, or
+materially diminish the effect of the labor of the inhabitants, or
+suddenly and violently shock the received opinion or popular
+prejudices of a large portion of the people; but that, on the
+whole, the communication between the two kingdoms should in spirit
+be free; that no jealousy should be attempted to be created between
+the manufacturers of one place or the other upon the subject of
+'raw materials' or any other article; for it would surely be
+considered very narrow policy, and as such would be treated with
+derision, were an attempt made to create a jealousy between
+Devonshire and Cornwall, between Lancashire and Durham.... He said,
+then, that the principle of the Union on this head should be
+liberal and free, and that no departure from it should ever take
+place but upon some point of present unavoidable necessity." He was
+even able to add (and he must have felt peculiar satisfaction in
+making the statement, since the change in the feelings of the
+English manufacturers on the subject must have been mainly the
+fruit of his own teaching, and was a practical recognition of the
+benefits which they had derived from his commercial policy taken as
+a whole), that "the English manufacturers did not wish for any
+protective duties; all they desired was free intercourse with all
+the world; and, though the want of protective duties might occasion
+them partial loss, they thought it amply compensated by the general
+advantage." He even thought the arrangements now to be made "would
+encourage the growth of wool in Ireland, and that England would be
+able to draw supplies of it from thence; and he did not fear that
+there would be trade enough for both countries in the markets of
+the world, and in the market which each country would afford to the
+other." The English manufacturers did not, however, acquiesce very
+cheerfully in every part of his commercial arrangements. On the
+contrary, against the clause which repealed all prohibitions of or
+bounties on exportation of different articles grown or manufactured
+in either country, they petitioned, and even set up a claim, which
+was granted, to be heard by counsel and to produce witnesses. But
+Pitt steadily refused the least modification of this part of his
+measure, not merely on account of its intrinsic reasonableness and
+justice, but because there was scarcely any condition to which the
+Irish themselves attached greater importance.</p>
+<p>An equally important and more difficult matter to adjust to the
+satisfaction of both Parliaments was the apportionment of the
+financial burdens between the two nations. It would be tiresome as
+well as superfluous to enter into minute details; the more so as
+the arrangement proposed was of a temporary character. After a long
+and minute discussion, Pitt's appraisement was admitted to come as
+near to strict fairness and equity as any that could be made; the
+separate discharge of its public debt already incurred was left to
+each kingdom; and it was farther settled that for twenty years
+fifteen parts of the expense of the nation out of seventeen should
+be borne by Great Britain and two by Ireland.</p>
+<p>Other articles provided that the laws and courts of both
+kingdoms, civil and ecclesiastical, should remain in their existing
+condition, subject, of course, to such alterations as the united
+Legislature might hereafter deem desirable.</p>
+<p>The resolutions, when adopted&mdash;as they speedily
+were&mdash;were embodied in a bill, which passed through the last
+stage by receiving the royal assent at the beginning of July. The
+state of public feeling in Ireland was not yet sufficiently calmed
+down after the Rebellion for it to be prudent to venture on a
+general election, and it was, consequently, ordained that the
+members for the Irish counties and for those Irish boroughs which
+had been selected for the retention of representation should take
+their seats in the united Parliament on its next meeting. On the
+22d of January, 1801, the united, or, to give it its more proper
+designation, the Imperial Parliament held its first meeting, being,
+although in its sixth session, so far regarded as a new Parliament,
+that the King directed a fresh election of a Speaker.</p>
+<p>The Union, as thus effected, was so far a vital change in the
+constitution of both Great Britain and Ireland, that it greatly
+altered the situation in which each kingdom had previously stood to
+the other. Till 1782 the position of Ireland toward England had
+been one of entire political subordination; and, though that had in
+appearance been modified by the repeal of Poynings' Act, yet no one
+doubted or could doubt that, whenever the resolutions of the two
+Parliaments came into conflict, the Irish Parliament would find
+submission unavoidable. But by the Union that subordination was
+terminated forever. The character of the Union&mdash;of the
+conditions, that is, on which the two countries were
+united&mdash;was one of perfect and complete equality on all
+important points, indeed, in all matters whatever, except one or
+two of minor consequence, where some irremovable difference between
+them compelled some trifling variations. It was not a connection of
+domination on the one side and subordination on the other, where
+every concomitant circumstance might tempt the one to overbearing
+arrogance, while the other could not escape a feeling of
+humiliation. It was rather&mdash;to quote the eloquent peroration
+of Pitt, when, in the preceding year, he first introduced the
+subject to the consideration of the House of Commons&mdash;"a free
+and voluntary association of two great countries, joining for their
+common benefit in one empire, where each retained its proportionate
+weight and importance, under the security of equal laws, reciprocal
+affection, and inseparable interests; and which wanted nothing but
+that indissoluble connection to render both invincible."</p>
+<p>On that occasion Pitt had argued, from the great subsequent
+increase in the population and wealth of Edinburgh and Glasgow, and
+in the prosperity of the whole country of Scotland, that a similar
+result might be looked for in Ireland. And the general trade of
+Ireland, and especially the linen manufacture, within a very few
+years began to realize his prediction. So that it is strange to
+find Fox, on the great minister's death, five years afterward,
+reiterating his disapproval of the Union as a plea for refusing him
+the appellation of a great statesman.[<a href="#note-146">146</a>]
+In one point alone the intrigues of a colleague prevented Pitt from
+carrying out to the full his liberal and enlightened views, and
+compelled him to leave the Union incomplete in a matter of such
+pre-eminent importance, that it may be said that all the subsequent
+disquietudes which have prevented Ireland from reaping the full
+benefit he desired from the Union are traceable to his
+disappointment on that subject.[<a href="#note-147">147</a>] We
+have seen that he contemplated, as a natural and necessary
+consequence or even part of the Union, an extensive reform of the
+laws affecting the Roman Catholics. Indeed, the understanding that
+he was prepared to introduce a measure with that object had no
+small weight in conciliating in some quarters support to the Act of
+Union. Accordingly, when describing the arrangements which he had
+in view for the Church of Ireland, he indicated his intention with
+sufficient plainness by the statement, that "it might be proper to
+leave to Parliament an opportunity of considering what might be fit
+to be done for his Majesty's Catholic subjects;" words which were
+generally understood to express his feeling, that both justice and
+policy required the removal of the restrictions which debarred the
+Roman Catholics from the complete enjoyment of political
+privileges. But the history and different bearings of that question
+it will be more convenient to discuss in <a href="#CH7">a
+subsequent chapter</a>, when we shall have arrived at the time when
+it was partially dealt with by the ministry of the Duke of
+Wellington.</p>
+<p>Notes:</p>
+<p><a name="note-125" id="note-125">
+<!-- Note Anchor 125 --></a>[Footnote 125: Mr. Froude says four
+great families&mdash;the Fitzgeralds of Kildare, the Boyles, the
+Ponsonbys, and the Beresfords&mdash;returned a majority of the
+House of Commons ("English in Ireland," ii., 5); and besides those
+peers, the arrangement for the Union proved that the influence of
+the Loftuses and the Hills fell little short of them.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-126" id="note-126">
+<!-- Note Anchor 126 --></a>[Footnote 126: Such a system actually
+had existed in France, where articles of ordinary trade could not
+be transported from one province to another without payment of a
+heavy duty; but Colbert had abolished that system in France above
+one hundred years before the time of which we are speaking.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-127" id="note-127">
+<!-- Note Anchor 127 --></a>[Footnote 127: "History of England,"
+vol. v., c. xxiii., p. 57.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-128" id="note-128">
+<!-- Note Anchor 128 --></a>[Footnote 128: "The English in
+Ireland," ii., 39.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-129" id="note-129">
+<!-- Note Anchor 129 --></a>[Footnote 129: Fronde's "English in
+Ireland," ii., 345. He does not name the author whom he
+quotes.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-130" id="note-130">
+<!-- Note Anchor 130 --></a>[Footnote 130: <i>Ibid</i>., ii,
+42.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-131" id="note-131">
+<!-- Note Anchor 131 --></a>[Footnote 131: See <a href=
+"#brownlow">p. 164</a>.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-132" id="note-132">
+<!-- Note Anchor 132 --></a>[Footnote 132: Mr. Froude imputes to
+Grattan a singularly base object. "Far from Grattan was a desire to
+heal the real sores of the country for which he was so zealous.
+These wild, disordered elements suited better for the campaign in
+which he engaged of renovating an Irish
+nationality."&mdash;<i>English in Ireland</i>, ii., 448. But,
+however on many points we may see reason to agree with Mr. Froude's
+estimate of the superior wisdom of Fitzgibbon, we conceive that
+this opinion is quite consistent with our acquittal of the other of
+the meanness of deliberately aiming at a continuance of evils, in
+order to find in them food for a continuance of agitation.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-133" id="note-133">
+<!-- Note Anchor 133 --></a>[Footnote 133: Froude, "English in
+Ireland," i., 304.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-134" id="note-134">
+<!-- Note Anchor 134 --></a>[Footnote 134: See especially a letter
+of Mr. Windham's. quoted by Lord Stanhope ("Life of Pitt," ii.,
+288).]</p>
+<p><a name="note-135" id="note-135">
+<!-- Note Anchor 135 --></a>[Footnote 135: Mr. Archdall, in his
+place in Parliament, denounced the term as utterly inapplicable.
+"Emancipation meant that a slave was set free. The Catholics were
+not slaves. Nothing more absurd had ever been said since language
+was first abused for the delusion of mankind."]</p>
+<p><a name="note-136" id="note-136">
+<!-- Note Anchor 136 --></a>[Footnote 136: The first beginning of
+the insurrection was at Prosperous, County Kildare, May 24. General
+Lake dealt it the final blow on Vinegar Hill, June 21.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-137" id="note-137">
+<!-- Note Anchor 137 --></a>[Footnote 137: Mr. Sheridan, Mr.
+Tierney, and Lord William Russell led the denunciations of the
+government in the English House of Commons. A protest against
+Pitt's refusal to dismiss the Lord-lieutenant, Lord Camden, the
+Chancellor Fitzgibbon, and the Commander-in-chief, Lord Carhampton,
+was signed by the Dukes of Norfolk, Devonshire, and Leinster; Lords
+Fitzwilliam, Moira, and Ponsonby, "two of them Irish absentees, who
+were discharging thus their duties to the poor country which
+supported their idle magnificence."&mdash;<i>The English in
+Ireland</i>, iii., 454.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-138" id="note-138">
+<!-- Note Anchor 138 --></a>[Footnote 138: "Constitutional
+History," iii., 451 seq.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-139" id="note-139">
+<!-- Note Anchor 139 --></a>[Footnote 139: Massey's "History of
+England," iv., 397 (quoting the Cornwallis correspondence).]</p>
+<p><a name="note-140" id="note-140">
+<!-- Note Anchor 140 --></a>[Footnote 140: Lord Stanhope's "Reign
+of Queen Anne," p. 89.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-141" id="note-141">
+<!-- Note Anchor 141 --></a>[Footnote 141: In the House of Commons
+by 158 to 115; in the House of Lords, February 10, by 75 to
+26.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-142" id="note-142">
+<!-- Note Anchor 142 --></a>[Footnote 142: An amendment pledging
+the House to maintain "an independent Legislature, as established
+in 1782," was only defeated by 106 to 105.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-143" id="note-143">
+<!-- Note Anchor 143 --></a>[Footnote 143: In the House of Commons
+the majority was 158 to 115; in the House of Lords, 75 to 26.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-144" id="note-144">
+<!-- Note Anchor 144 --></a>[Footnote 144: This estimate, which was
+but a guess, proved very inaccurate. The first census for the
+United Kingdom, which was taken the next year (1801), showed that
+Ireland was considerably more populous than its own representatives
+had imagined. The numbers returned (as given by Alison, "History of
+Europe," ii., 335, c. ix., sec. 8) were:</p>
+<pre>
+  England..................................... 8,382,484
+  Wales.......................................   547,346
+  Scotland.................................... 1,599,068
+  Army, Navy, etc.............................   470,586
+                                              ----------
+      Total...................................10,999,434
+  Ireland..................................... 5,396,436
+</pre>
+<p>So that the proportion of population in Great Britain, as
+compared with that of Ireland, only exceeded two to one by an
+insignificant fraction.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-145" id="note-145">
+<!-- Note Anchor 145 --></a>[Footnote 145: See his letter to the
+King, dated January 31, 1801, quoted by Lord Stanhope in the
+appendix to vol. iii. of his "Life of Pitt," p. 25.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-146" id="note-146">
+<!-- Note Anchor 146 --></a>[Footnote 146: Mr. Fox, called on by
+Mr. Alexander to explain his expressions (in the debate relative to
+Mr. Pitt's funeral), by which he had declared his disapprobation of
+the Union, and his concurrence in opinion with Mr. O'Hara that it
+ought to be rescinded. Mr. Fox repeated his disapprobation, but
+disclaimed ever having expressed an opinion or entertained a
+thought of proposing its repeal, that being now impracticable,
+though he regretted its ever having been effected.&mdash;<i>Diary
+of Lord Colchester</i>, February 17, 1806, ii., 39.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-147" id="note-147">
+<!-- Note Anchor 147 --></a>[Footnote 147: It may be remarked that
+in another respect also political critics have pronounced the Union
+defective. Archbishop Whately, whose long tenure of office in
+Ireland, as well as the acuteness and candor which he brought to
+bear on every subject he discussed, entitle his opinions to most
+respectful consideration, held this view very strongly. In several
+conversations which he held with Mr. W.N. Senior, in 1858 and 1862,
+he condemned the retention of the Lord-lieutenancy as "a half
+measure," which, however unavoidable at the time when "no ship
+could be certain of getting from Holyhead to Dublin in less than
+three weeks," he pronounced "inconsistent with the fusion of the
+two peoples, which was the object of the Union," and wholly
+indefeasible "in an age of steam-vessels and telegraphs." And,
+besides its theoretical inconsistency, he insisted that it produced
+many great and practical mischiefs, among which he placed in the
+front "the keeping up in people's minds the notion of a separate
+kingdom; the affording a hotbed of faction and intrigue; the
+presenting an image of Majesty so faint and so feeble as to be
+laughed at and scorned. Disaffection to the English Lieutenancy is
+cheaply shown, and it paves the way toward disaffection to the
+English crown." And he imputed its continued retention to "the
+ignorance which prevails in England of the state of feeling in
+Ireland."&mdash;<i>Journals and Conversations Relating to
+Ireland</i>, by W.N. Senior, ii., 130, 251, and <i>passim</i>. And
+it is worthy of observation that a similar view is expressed by a
+Scotch writer of great ability, who, contrasting the mode in which
+Scotland is governed with that which prevails In Ireland, farther
+denounces the Viceroyalty "as a distinct mark that Ireland is not
+directly under the sovereignty of Great Britain, but rather a
+dependency, like India or the Isle of Man."&mdash;<i>Ireland</i>,
+by J.B. Kinnear, quoted in the <i>Fortnightly Review</i>, April 1,
+1881. It is remarkable that in 1850 a bill for the abolition of the
+office was passed in the House of Commons by a large majority (295
+to 70), but was dropped in the House of Lords, chiefly on account
+of the opposition of the Duke of Wellington. But it is, at all
+events, plain that the reasons, arising from the difficulty and
+uncertainty of communication, which made its abolition impossible
+at the beginning of the century, have passed away with the
+introduction of steam-vessels and telegraphs. Communication of
+London with Dublin is now as rapid as communication with Edinburgh,
+and, that being the case, it is not easy to see how an
+establishment which has never been thought of for Scotland can be
+desirable for Ireland.]</p>
+<hr />
+<a name="CH6" id="CH6"><!-- CH6 --></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER VI.</h2>
+<p class="blockquote">A Census is Ordered.&mdash;Dissolution of
+Pitt's Administration.&mdash;Impeachment of Lord
+Melville.&mdash;Introduction of Lord Ellenborough into the
+Cabinet.&mdash;Abolition of the Slave-trade.&mdash;Mr. Windham's
+Compulsory Training Bill.&mdash;Illness of the King, and
+Regency.&mdash;Recurrence to the Precedent of 1788-'89.&mdash;Death
+of Mr. Perceval.&mdash;Lord Liverpool becomes
+Prime-minister.&mdash;Question of Appointments in the
+Household.&mdash;Appointment of a Prime-minister.</p>
+<p>The Union with Ireland was the last great work of Pitt's first
+administration, and a noble close to the legislation of the
+eighteenth century. But the last months of the year were also
+signalized by another enactment, which, though it cannot be said to
+have anything of a character strictly entitled to the name of
+constitutional, nevertheless established a practice so valuable as
+the foundation of a great part of our domestic legislation, that it
+will, perhaps, hardly be considered foreign to the scope and
+purpose of this volume to record its commencement. In November,
+1800, Mr. Abbott, the member for Helstone, brought in a bill to
+take a census of the people of the United Kingdom, pointing out not
+only the general importance of a knowledge of the population of a
+country in its entire amount and its different classes to every
+government, but also its special bearing on agriculture and on the
+means requisite to provide subsistence for the people, on trade and
+manufactures, and on our resources for war. Such a census as he
+proposed had been more than once taken in Holland, Sweden, Spain,
+and even in the United States, young as was their separate national
+existence; it had been taken once&mdash;nearly fifty years
+previous&mdash;in Scotland; and something like one had been
+furnished in England in the reign of Edward III. by a subsidy roll,
+and in that of Elizabeth by diocesan returns furnished by the
+Bishops to the Privy Council.[<a href="#note-148">148</a>] He
+farther argued for the necessity of such a proceeding from the
+different notions entertained by men of sanguine or desponding
+tempers as to the increase or diminution of the population. "Some
+desponding men had asserted that the population had decreased by a
+million and a half between the Revolution and Peace of Paris, in
+1763; others (of whom the speaker himself was one) believed that,
+on the contrary, it had increased in that interval by two
+millions." His motion was unanimously adopted by both Houses; and
+when the census was taken, its real result furnished as strong a
+proof of its usefulness as any of the mover's arguments, by the
+extent of the prevailing miscalculations which it detected. For Mr.
+Abbott, who had spared no pains to arrive at a correct estimate,
+while he mentioned that some persons reckoned the population of
+England and Wales at 8,000,000, pronounced that, according to other
+statements, formed on a more extensive investigation, and, as it
+seemed to him, on a more correct train of reasoning, the total
+number could not be less than 11,000,000. In point of fact,
+excluding those employed in the army and navy, who were nearly half
+a million, the number for England and Wales fell short of nine
+millions.[<a href="#note-149">149</a>] It would be quite
+superfluous to dilate on the value of the information thus
+supplied, without which, indeed, much of our subsequent legislation
+on poor-laws, corn-laws, and all matters relating to rating and
+taxation, would have been impracticable or the merest
+guesswork.</p>
+<p>As was mentioned in the preceding chapter, Pitt found himself
+unable to fulfil the hopes which, in his negotiations with
+different parties in Ireland, he had led the Roman Catholics to
+entertain of the removal of their civil and political disabilities.
+So rigorous were those restrictions, both in England and Ireland,
+that a Roman Catholic could not serve even as a private in the
+militia; and a motion made in 1797 by Mr. Wilberforce&mdash;a man
+who could certainly not be suspected of any leaning to Roman
+Catholic doctrine&mdash;to render them admissible to that service,
+though it was adopted in the House of Commons, was rejected by the
+House of Lords. But Pitt, who on that occasion had supported
+Wilberforce, did not confine his views to the removal of a single
+petty disability, but proposed to put the whole body of Roman
+Catholics on a footing of perfect equality with Protestants in
+respect of their eligibility to every kind of office, with one or
+two exceptions. And during the autumn of 1800 he was busily engaged
+in framing the details of his measure, in order to submit it to his
+royal master in its entirety, and so to avoid disquieting him with
+a repetition of discussions on the subject, which he knew to be
+distasteful to him. For, five years before, George III. had
+consulted the Chief-justice, Lord Kenyon, and the Attorney-general,
+Sir John Scott (afterward Lord Eldon), on the question whether some
+proposed concessions to Dissenters, Protestant as well as Roman
+Catholic, did not "militate against the coronation oath and many
+existing statutes;" and had received their legal opinion that the
+tests enacted in the reign of Charles II., "though wise laws, and
+in policy not to be departed from, might be repealed or altered
+without any breach of the coronation oath or Act of Union" (with
+Scotland).[<a href="#note-150">150</a>] Their opinions on the point
+were the more valuable, since they were notoriously opposed to
+their political convictions, and might be supposed to have carried
+sufficient conviction to the royal mind. But his Majesty's scruples
+were now, unfortunately, revived by the Lord Chancellor, who,
+strange to say, was himself a Presbyterian; and who treacherously
+availed himself of his knowledge of what was in contemplation to
+anticipate the Prime-minister's intended explanations to the King.
+He fully succeeded in his object of fixing the King's resolution to
+refuse his assent to the contemplated concessions (which, by a
+curious confusion of ideas, his Majesty even characterized as
+"Jacobinical"[<a href="#note-151">151</a>]), though not in the
+object which he had still more at heart, of inducing the King to
+regard him as the statesman in the whole kingdom the most deserving
+of his confidence. The merits of the question will be more
+appropriately examined hereafter. It is sufficient to say here that
+Pitt, conceiving himself bound by personal honor as well as by
+statesman-like duty to persevere in his intended measure, or to
+retire from an office which no man is justified in holding unless
+he can discharge its functions in accordance with his own judgment
+of what is required by the best interests of the state, resigned
+his post, and was succeeded by Mr. Addington.</p>
+<p>Addington's ministry was made memorable by the formation of the
+Northern Confederacy against us, and its immediate and total
+overthrow by Nelson's cannon; and for the Peace of Amiens, severely
+criticised in Parliament, as that of Utrecht and every subsequent
+treaty with a similar object had been, but defensible both on
+grounds of domestic policy, as well as on that of affording us a
+much-needed respite from the strain of war; though it proved to be
+only a respite, and a feverish one, since at the end of two years
+the war was renewed, to be waged with greater fury than ever. But
+it was too short-lived for any constitutional questions to arise in
+it. And when, in 1804, Pitt resumed the government, his attention
+was too completely engrossed by the diplomatic arrangements by
+which he hoped to unite all the nations east of the Rhine in
+resistance to a power whose ever aggressive ambition was a standing
+menace to every Continental kingdom, for him to be able to spare
+time for the consideration of measures of domestic policy, except
+such as were of a financial character. But, though his premature
+death rendered his second administration shorter than even
+Addington's, it was not wholly unproductive of questions of
+constitutional interest. It witnessed a recurrence to that which
+cannot but be regarded as among the most important privileges of
+the House of Commons, the right of impeaching a minister for
+maladministration. A report of a commission appointed for the
+investigation of the naval affairs of the kingdom had revealed to
+Parliament a gross misapplication of the public money committed by
+the Paymaster of the Navy. And, as that officer could not have
+offended as he had done without either gross carelessness or
+culpable connivance on the part of the Treasurer of the Navy, Lord
+Melville, who had since been promoted to the post of First Lord of
+the Admiralty, the House of Commons ordered his impeachment at the
+Bar of the House of Lords; the vote being passed in 1805, during
+Pitt's administration, though the trial did not take place till the
+year following. In reality, the charge did not impugn Lord
+Melville's personal honor, on which at first sight it appeared to
+press hardly, Mr. Whitbread himself, the member for Bedford, who
+was the chief promoter and manager of the impeachment, admitting
+that he never imputed to Lord Melville "any participation in the
+plunder of the public;" and, as Lord Melville was acquitted on
+every one of the charges brought against him, the case might have
+been passed over here with the barest mention of it, were it not
+that Lord Campbell has pointed out the mode of procedure as
+differing from that adopted in the great trial of Warren Hastings,
+twenty years before; and, by reason of that difference, forming a
+model for future proceedings of the same kind, if, unhappily, there
+should ever be occasion given for a similar prosecution. The credit
+of the difference Lord Campbell gives to the Chancellor, Lord
+Erskine, who, "instead of allowing the House of Lords to sit to
+hear the case a few days in a year, and, when sitting, being
+converted from a court of justice into a theatre for rhetorical
+display, insisted that it should sit, like every other criminal
+tribunal, <i>de die in diem</i>, till the verdict was delivered.
+And he enforced both upon the managers of the House of Commons and
+on the counsel for the defendant the wholesome rules of procedure
+established for the detection of crime and the protection of
+innocence."[<a href="#note-152">152</a>] It is well known that on
+the trial of Hastings the managers of that impeachment, and most
+especially Burke, claimed a right of giving evidence such as no
+court of law would have admitted, and set up what they entitled "a
+usage of Parliament independent of and contradistinguished from the
+common law."[<a href="#note-153">153</a>] But on that occasion Lord
+Thurlow, then Chancellor, utterly denied the existence of any such
+usage&mdash;a usage which, "in times of barbarism, when to impeach
+a man was to ruin him by the strong hand of power, was quoted in
+order to justify the most arbitrary proceedings." He instanced the
+trial of Lord Stafford, as one which "was from beginning to end
+marked by violence and injustice," and expressed a "hope that in
+these enlightened days no man would be tried but by the law of the
+land." We may fairly agree with Lord Campbell, that it is to be
+hoped that the course adopted by Lord Erskine in this case has
+settled the principle and mode of procedure for all future time;
+since certainly the importance of an impeachment, both as to the
+state interests involved in it, and the high position and authority
+of the defendant, ought to be considered as reasons for adhering
+with the greatest closeness to the strict rules of law, rather than
+for relaxing them in any particular.</p>
+<p>But, as was natural, the public could spare little attention for
+anything except the war, and the arrangements made by the minister
+for engaging in it with effect; the interest which such a state of
+things always kindles being in this instance greatly inflamed by
+Napoleon's avowal of a design to invade the kingdom, though it is
+now known that the preparations of which he made such a parade were
+merely a feint to throw Austria off her guard.[<a href=
+"#note-154">154</a>] During Addington's administration Pitt had
+spoken warmly in favor of giving every possible encouragement to
+the Volunteer movement, and also in support of a proposal made by
+an independent member, Colonel Crawford, to fortify London; and one
+of his first measures after his resumption of office was a measure,
+known as the Additional Force Bill, to transfer a large portion of
+the militia to the regular army. It was so purely a measure of
+detail, that it would hardly have been necessary to mention it, had
+it not been for an objection made to it by the Prime-minister's
+former colleague, Lord Grenville, and for the reply with which that
+objection was encountered by the Chief-justice, Lord Ellenborough;
+the former denouncing it as unconstitutional, since, he declared,
+it tended to establish a large standing army in time of peace; and
+Lord Ellenborough, on the other hand, declaring the right of the
+crown to call out the whole population in arms for the defence of
+the realm to be so "radical, essential, and hitherto never
+questioned part of the royal prerogative, that, even in such an age
+of adventurous propositions, he had not expected that any lord
+would have ventured to question it."[<a href=
+"#note-155">155</a>]</p>
+<p>Pitt died in the beginning of 1806, and was succeeded by an
+administration of which his great rival, Fox, was the guiding
+spirit while he lived, though Lord Grenville was First Lord of the
+Treasury, and, after Fox's death, which took place in September,
+the undisputed Prime-minister. But the formation of the
+administration was not completed without a step which was at once
+strongly denounced, not only by the regular Opposition, but by
+several members of political moderation, as a violation, if not of
+the letter, at least of the spirit, of the constitution, the
+introduction of the Lord Chief-justice, Lord Ellenborough, into the
+cabinet. It was notorious that he was invited to a seat among that
+body as the representative of a small party, the personal friends
+of Lord Sidmouth. For the ministry was formed in some degree on the
+principle of a coalition; Lord Grenville himself having been a
+colleague of Pitt throughout the greater part of that statesman's
+first ministry, and as such having been always opposed to Fox;
+while Lord Ellenborough had been Attorney-general in Addington's
+administration, which avowedly only differed from Pitt on the
+single subject of the Catholic question.</p>
+<p>The appointment was at once made the subject of motions in both
+Houses of Parliament. In the House of Lords, Lord Bristol, who
+brought the question forward, denounced "this identification of a
+judge with the executive government as injurious to the judicial
+character, subversive of the liberty of the people, and having a
+direct and alarming tendency to blend and amalgamate those great
+elementary principles of political power which it is the very
+object of a free constitution to keep separate and distinct." In
+the House of Commons, Mr. Canning took a similar objection; and,
+though he admitted that a precedent for the act might be found in
+the case of Lord Mansfield who, while Chief-justice, had also been
+a cabinet minister in the administration of 1757, he argued
+forcibly that that precedent turned against the ministry and the
+present appointment, because Lord Mansfield himself had
+subsequently admitted that "he had infringed the principles of the
+constitution by acting as a cabinet minister and Chief-justice at
+the same time." Fox, in reply, relied principally on two arguments.
+The first was, that "he had never heard of such a thing as the
+cabinet council becoming the subject of a debate in that House. He
+had never known of the exercise of the King's prerogative in the
+appointment of his ministers being brought into question on such
+grounds as had now been alleged." The second, that "in point of
+fact there is nothing in the constitution that recognizes any such
+institution as a cabinet council; that it is a body unknown to the
+law, and one which has in no instance whatever been recognized by
+Parliament." He farther urged that as Lord Ellenborough was a privy
+councillor, and as the cabinet is only a select committee of the
+Privy Council, he was, "in fact, as liable to be summoned to attend
+the cabinet, as a privy councillor, as he was in his present
+situation."</p>
+<p>The last argument was beneath the speaker to use, since not one
+of his hearers was ignorant that no member of the Privy Council
+unconnected with the government ever is summoned to the
+deliberations of the cabinet; and though, as he correctly stated,
+"there is no legal record of the members comprising any cabinet,"
+it may safely be affirmed that since July, 1714, when the Duke of
+Argyll and the Duke of Somerset claimed admission to the
+deliberations of the ministers, on account of the danger in which
+the Queen lay, though they admitted that they had received no
+summons to attend,[<a href="#note-156">156</a>] there has been no
+instance of any privy councillor attending without a summons; nor,
+except at the accession of a new sovereign, of summonses being sent
+to any members of the council except the actual ministers. The
+second argument was even worse, as being still more sophistical. It
+might be true that no law nor statute recognized the cabinet as a
+body distinct from the Privy Council, but it was at least equally
+true that there was no one who was ignorant of the distinction;
+that it was, in truth, one without which it would be difficult to
+understand the organization or working of any ministry. The
+indispensable function and privilege of a ministry is, to
+deliberate in concert and in private on the measures to be taken
+for the welfare of the state; but there could be little chance of
+concert, and certainly none of privacy, if every one who has ever
+been sworn a member of the Privy Council had a right to attend all
+its deliberations. Again, to say that the King's prerogative, as
+exercised in the choice of his advisers, is a thing so sacred that
+no abuse of it, or want of judgment shown in its exercise, can
+warrant a complaint, is inconsistent with every principle of
+constitutional government, and with every conceivable idea of the
+privileges of Parliament. In fact, Parliament has claimed a right
+to interfere in matters apparently touching more nearly the royal
+prerogative, and it is only in the reign preceding the present
+reign that hostile comments have been made in Parliament on the
+appointment of a particular person as ambassador to a foreign
+power. Yet the post of ambassador is one which might have been
+supposed to have been farther removed from the supervision of
+Parliament than that of a minister, an ambassador being in a
+special degree the personal representative of the sovereign, and
+the sovereign therefore, having, it might be supposed, a right to a
+most unfettered choice in such a matter.</p>
+<p>Stripped of all technicalities, and even of all reference to the
+manifest possibility of such a circumstance arising as that the
+Chief-justice, if a member of a cabinet, may have a share in
+ordering the institution of a prosecution which, as a judge, it may
+be his lot to try, one consideration which is undeniable is, that a
+member of a cabinet is of necessity, and by the very nature of his
+position in it, a party man, and that it is of preeminent
+importance to the impartiality of the judicial bench, and to the
+confidence of the people in the purity, integrity, and freedom from
+political bias of their decisions, that the judges should be exempt
+from all suspicion of party connection. Lord Campbell even goes the
+length of saying, what was not urged on either side of either House
+in these debates, that it was alleged by at least one contemporary
+writer that Lord Mansfield's position in the cabinet did
+perceptibly influence some of his views and measures respecting the
+Press;[<a href="#note-157">157</a>] and, though in both Houses the
+ministry had a majority on the question of the propriety of the
+appointment, he records his own opinion[<a href=
+"#note-158">158</a>] that "the argument was all on the losing
+side;" and that Mr. Fox showed his consciousness that it was so by
+his "concession that the Chief-justice should absent himself from
+the cabinet when the expediency of commencing prosecutions for
+treason or sedition was to be discussed." He adds, also, that "it
+is said that Lord Ellenborough himself ere long changed his
+opinion, and, to his intimate friends, expressed deep regret that
+he had ever been prevailed upon to enter the cabinet."</p>
+<a name="composition" id="composition"></a>
+<p>But, if the composition of the cabinet of 1806 has in this
+respect been generally condemned, on the other hand the annals of
+that ministry, short-lived as it was, are marked by the enactment
+of one great measure which has been stamped with universal
+approbation. It may, perhaps, be said that the existence,
+promotion, discouragement, or suppression of a branch of trade has
+no title to be regarded as a constitutional question. But the
+course which the British Parliament, after a long period of
+hesitation, has adopted respecting, not only the slave-trade, but
+the employment of slave-labor in any part of the British dominions,
+is so intimately connected with the great constitutional principle,
+that every man, whatever be his race or nation or previous
+condition, whose foot is once planted on British soil, is free from
+that moment, that it cannot be accounted a digression to mention
+the subject here. To our statesmen of Queen Anne's time traffic in
+slaves was so far from being considered discreditable, that the
+ministry of that reign prided themselves greatly on what was called
+the Assiento Treaty with Spain, by which they secured for the
+British merchants and ship-owners the privilege of supplying the
+West India Islands with several thousand slaves a year. In 1748 the
+ministers of George II were equally jealous of the credit of
+renewing it. It had even on one occasion been decided in the Court
+of Common Pleas that an action of trover could be maintained for a
+negro, "because negroes are heathens;" though Chief-justice Holt
+scouted the idea of being bound by a precedent which would put "a
+human being on the same footing as an ox or an ass," and declared
+that "in England there was no such thing as a slave." Subsequent
+decisions, however, of two Lord Chancellors&mdash;Lord Talbot and
+Lord Hardwicke&mdash;were not wholly consistent with the doctrine
+thus laid down by Holt; and the question could not be regarded as
+finally settled till 1772, when a slave named Somersett was brought
+over to England from Jamaica by his master, and on his arrival in
+the Thames claimed his freedom, and under a writ of <i>habeas
+corpus</i> had his claim allowed by Lord Mansfield. The master's
+counsel contended that slavery was not a condition unsanctioned by
+English law, for villeinage was slavery, and no statute had ever
+abolished villeinage. But the Chief-justice, in the first place,
+denied that villeinage had ever been slavery such as existed in the
+West Indies; and, in the second place, he pronounced that, whether
+it had been or not, it had, at all events, long ceased in England,
+and could not be revived. "The air of England has long been too
+pure for a slave, and every man is free who breathes it. Every man
+who comes into England is entitled to the protection of English
+law."[<a href="#note-159">159</a>] But this freedom was as yet held
+to be only co-extensive with these islands. And for sixty years
+more our West India Islands continued to be cultivated by the labor
+of slaves, some of whom were the offspring of slaves previously
+employed, though by far the greater part were imported yearly from
+the western coast of Africa. The supply from that country seemed
+inexhaustible. The native chiefs in time of war gladly sold their
+prisoners to the captains of British vessels; in time of peace they
+sold them their own subjects; and, if at any time these modes of
+obtaining slaves slackened, the captains would land at night, and,
+attacking the villages on the coast sweep off the inhabitants on
+board their ships, and at once set sail with their booty. The
+sufferings of these unhappy captives in what was called the "middle
+passage"&mdash;the passage between their native land and the West
+India Islands&mdash;were for a long time unknown or disregarded,
+till, early in Pitt's first ministry, they attracted the notice of
+some of our naval officers who were stationed in the West Indies,
+and who, on their return to England, related the horrors which they
+had witnessed or heard of&mdash;how, between decks too low to admit
+of a full-grown man standing upright, the wretched victims, chained
+to the sides of the ships, lay squeezed together in such numbers,
+though the whole voyage was within the tropics, that, from the
+overpowering heat and scantiness of food, it was estimated that
+two-thirds of each cargo died on the passage. Most fortunately for
+the credit of England, the fearful trade was brought under the
+notice of a young member of Parliament singularly zealous in the
+cause of humanity and religion, endowed with untiring industry and
+powerful eloquence, and connected by the closest ties of personal
+intimacy with Mr. Pitt. To hear of such a system of organized
+murder, as the British officers described the slave-trade to be,
+was quite sufficient to induce Mr. Wilberforce to resolve to devote
+himself to its suppression. He laid the case in all its horrors
+before his friend the Prime-minister, a man as ready as himself to
+grapple with and extinguish all proved abuses; and Pitt at once
+promised him all the support which he could give. It was no easy
+task that he had taken on himself. A year or two before, Burke had
+applied himself to frame some regulations which he hoped might
+gradually remove the evil; but, little as he was moved by
+considerations of popularity or daunted by difficulty, he had
+abandoned the attempt, as one which would meet with a resistance
+too powerful to be overcome. Wilberforce was not a bolder man than
+Burke, but he had no other object to divide his attention, and,
+therefore, to this one he devoted all his faculties and energies,
+enlisting supporters in every quarter, seeking even the
+co-operation of the French government, and opening a correspondence
+with the French Secretary of State, M. Montmorin, a statesman of
+great capacity, and, what was far rarer in France, of incorruptible
+honesty. M. Montmorin, however, though alive to the cruelty of the
+traffic, was unable to promise him any aid, alleging the fears of
+the French planters that its abolition "would ruin the French
+islands. He said that it was one of those subjects upon which the
+interests of men and their sentiments were so much at variance,
+that it was difficult to learn what was practicable."[<a href=
+"#note-160">160</a>]</p>
+<p>Wilberforce had already found that the English merchants were
+still less manageable. Pitt had entered so fully into his views,
+that in 1788 he himself moved and carried a resolution pledging the
+House of Commons to take the slave-trade into consideration in the
+next session. And another friend of the cause, Sir W. Dobben,
+brought in a bill to diminish the horrors of the middle passage by
+proportioning the number of slaves who might be conveyed in one
+ship to the tonnage of the vessel. But those concerned in the West
+India trade rose up in arms against even so moderate a measure, and
+one so clearly demanded by the most ordinary humanity as this. The
+Liverpool merchants declared that the absence of restrictions on
+the slave-trade had been the chief cause of the prosperity and
+opulence of their town, and obtained leave to be heard by counsel
+against the bill. But Fox united with Pitt on this subject, and the
+bill was carried. But this was all the practical success which the
+efforts of the "Abolitionists," as they began to be called,
+achieved for many years. And even that was not won without extreme
+difficulty; Lord Chancellor Thurlow opposing it with great
+vehemence in the House of Lords, as the fruit of a "five days' fit
+of philanthropy which had just sprung up," and pointing to the
+conduct of the French government, which, as he asserted, had
+offered premiums to encourage the trade, as an example that we
+should do well to follow. It was even said that he had contrived to
+incline the King himself to the same view; to have persuaded him
+that the trade was indispensable to the prosperity of our
+manufacturers, and, in the Chancellor's words, "that it was his
+royal duty to show some humanity to the whites as well as to the
+negroes." And more than once, when bills to limit or wholly
+suppress the trade had been passed by the Commons, the same
+mischievous influence defeated them in the Lords. The last years of
+Pitt's first administration were too fully occupied with the
+affairs of Ireland, negotiations with foreign powers, and the great
+war with France, to enable him to keep pace with his friend's zeal
+on the subject. But in his second administration, occupied though
+he was with a recurrence of the same causes, he found time to
+prepare and issue an Order in Council prohibiting the importation
+of slaves into our fresh colonial acquisitions, and the employment
+of British ships to supply the Dutch, French, and Spanish
+islands.</p>
+<p>And this Order in Council paved the way for the total abolition.
+One of the earliest proceedings of the new ministry was the
+introduction by the Attorney-general, Sir Arthur Pigott, of a bill
+to extend and make it perpetual; to forbid "the importation of
+African negroes by British ships into the colonies conquered by or
+ceded to us in war; or into the colonies of any neutral state in
+the West Indies. For at present every state that had colonies in
+America or the West Indies, and that was not actually at war with
+us, availed itself of the opportunity of British shipping to carry
+on the trade." It was resisted as vehemently as any former measure
+with the same object, and partly on the new ground that it would in
+no degree stop the trade or diminish the sufferings of the
+Africans, but would merely rob our ship-owners of their profits to
+enrich the Americans. Mr. Rose, the member for Christchurch, who
+advanced this argument, had been a friend of Pitt; yet, though he
+quoted an instance of a single vessel having buried one hundred and
+fifty-two slaves on one voyage, he was not ashamed to deprecate the
+bill, on the plea that "the manufacturers of Manchester, Stockport,
+and Paisley would be going about naked and starving, and thus, by
+attending to a supposed claim for relief from a distant quarter, we
+should give existence to much more severe distress at home." The
+bill, however, was carried in both Houses, and received the royal
+assent. And Fox, who supported it warmly in his speech on the third
+reading (one of the last speeches which he ever addressed to the
+House), invited Wilberforce to regard it as a stepping-stone to the
+total abolition of the trade, and as an encouragement to renew his
+motion for that object; and, though he could not promise him the
+support of the government as a government, he "could answer for
+himself and many of his friends who held the highest and most
+dignified stations in the other House of Parliament. They still
+felt the question of the total abolition as one involving the
+dearest interests of humanity, and as one which, should they be
+successful in effecting it, would entail more true glory upon their
+administration, and more honor upon their country, than any other
+transaction in which they could be engaged."</p>
+<p>Mr. Fox did not live to see the opening of another session; but,
+when that time came, the position which he had taken up, that the
+measure of which he had thus promoted the passing was an
+encouragement to do more, was adopted to its full extent by the
+chief of his colleagues, Lord Grenville, who, in February, 1807,
+himself brought forward a motion for the entire abolition of the
+trade. Though he was Prime-minister, he could not introduce it as a
+government measure, since two of his colleagues&mdash;Lord
+Sidmouth, the President of the Council, and Mr. Windham, the
+Secretary of State for the Colonies&mdash;opposed it; though the
+former professed a desire to see the trade abolished, but would
+have preferred to attain that end by imposing such a tax on every
+slave imported as should render the trade unprofitable. He had
+another obstacle also to encounter, in the vehement opposition of
+some of the princes of the royal family, the Dukes of Clarence and
+Sussex more especially, who were known to be canvassing against the
+bill, and were generally understood, in so doing, to be acting in
+accordance with the views of their elder brothers. But he was
+confident that by this time the feeling of the whole country was
+with him on the subject. He was resolved to rest his case on its
+justice, and therefore consented that the House should hear counsel
+on the subject, though he resisted their demand to be allowed to
+call witnesses. Accordingly, counsel were heard for the whole body
+of West India planters, and for those of one or two separate
+islands, such as Jamaica and Trinidad; for the Liverpool merchants,
+and even for the trustees of the Liverpool Docks. But some of their
+reasonings he even turned against themselves, refusing for a moment
+to admit "that the profits obtained by robbery could be urged as an
+argument for the continuance of robbery." He denounced the trade as
+"the most criminal that any country could be engaged in," and as
+one that led to other crimes in the treatment of the slaves after
+they reached the West Indies. He instanced "three most horrible and
+dreadful murders of slaves" that had been committed in Barbadoes,
+and quoted the report of Lord Seaforth, governor of the island,
+who, on investigation, had found that by the law of the colony the
+punishment affixed to such murders was a fine of eleven pounds. He
+was opposed by the Duke of Clarence, who directed his remarks
+chiefly to a defence of the general humanity of the planters; and
+by Lord Westmoreland, who, in a speech of singular intemperance,
+denounced the principle of the measure, as one after the passing of
+which "no property could be rendered safe which could fall within
+the power of the Legislature." He even made it an argument against
+the bill that its principle, if carried to its legitimate logical
+end, must tend to the abolition of slavery as well as of the
+slave-trade. He objected especially to the assertion in the
+preamble that the trade was "contrary to justice and humanity,"
+declaring that those words were only inserted in the hope that by
+them "foreign powers might be humbugged into a concurrence with the
+abolition," and wound up his harangue by a declaration that, though
+he should "see the Presbyterian and the prelate, the Methodist and
+pew-preacher, the Jacobin and the murderer, unite in support of it,
+he would still raise his voice against it." It must have been more
+painful to the minister to be opposed by so distinguished an
+officer as Lord St. Vincent, who resisted the bill chiefly on the
+ground that "its effect would be to transfer British capital to
+other countries, which would not be disposed to abandon so
+productive a trade," and declared that he could only account for
+Lord Grenville's advocacy of it "by supposing that some Obi man had
+cast his spell upon him." But the case was too strong for any
+arguments to prevail which were based solely on the profits of a
+trade which no one pretended to justify. The bill passed the Lords
+by a majority of nearly three to one; in the House of Commons,
+where the opposition was much feebler, by one infinitely
+larger;[<a href="#note-161">161</a>] and, by a somewhat remarkable
+coincidence, it received the royal assent on the same day on which
+Lord Grenville announced to his brother peers that his
+administration was at an end.</p>
+<p>Even before the abolition had thus become law, the member for
+Northumberland, Earl Percy, endeavored to give practical effect to
+Lord Westmoreland's view, that emancipation of the slaves was its
+inevitable corollary, by moving for leave to bring in a bill for
+the gradual abolition of slavery in the British settlements of the
+West Indies. But he was opposed by Lord Howick,[<a href=
+"#note-162">162</a>] though he had been among the earnest advocates
+of abolition, partly for the sake of the negroes themselves, and
+partly on the ground that the Legislature had no "right to
+interfere with the property of the colonists;" little foreseeing
+that the measure which he now opposed was reserved for his own
+administration, and that its accomplishment would be one of its
+chief titles to the respectful recollection of posterity. And, as
+the House was presently counted out, the discussion would not have
+been worth recording, were it not for the opportunity which it gave
+of displaying the practical and moderate wisdom of Wilberforce
+himself, who joined in the opposition to Lord Percy's motion. "The
+enemies of abolition had," he said, "always confounded abolition
+with emancipation. He and his friends had always distinguished
+between them; and not only abstained from proposing emancipation,
+but were ready to reject it when proposed by others. How much
+soever he looked forward with anxious expectation to the period
+when the negroes might with safety be liberated, he knew too well
+the effect which the long continuance of abject slavery produced
+upon the human mind to think of their immediate emancipation, a
+measure which at the present moment would be injurious both to them
+and to the colonies. He and those who acted with him were satisfied
+with having gained an object which was safely attainable."</p>
+<p>And they had reason to be satisfied. For the good work thus done
+was not limited by the extent of the British dominions, vast as
+they are. The example of the homage thus paid by the Parliament and
+the nation to justice and humanity was contagious; the principle on
+which the bill was founded and was carried being such that, for
+mere shame, foreign countries could hardly persist in maintaining a
+traffic which those who had derived the greatest profit from it had
+on such grounds renounced; though our ministers did not trust to
+their spontaneous sympathies, but made the abolition of the traffic
+by our various allies, or those who wished to become so, a constant
+object of diplomatic negotiations, even purchasing the co-operation
+of some by important concessions, in one instance by the payment of
+a large sum of money. The conferences and congresses which took
+place on the re-establishment of peace gave them great facilities
+for pressing their views on the different governments. And Lord
+Liverpool's instructions to Lord Castlereagh and the Duke of
+Wellington, as plenipotentiaries of our government,[<a href=
+"#note-163">163</a>] show the keen interest which he took in the
+matter, and the skilful manner in which he sought to avail himself
+of the predominant influence which the exertions and triumphs of
+this country had given her with every foreign cabinet. Though
+Portugal was an ally to whom we regarded ourselves as bound by
+special ties, as well as by the great benefits we had conferred on
+her, yet, as she clung with the greatest pertinacity to the trade,
+he did not scruple to endeavor to put a constraint upon her which
+should compel her submission, and instructed Lord Castlereagh "to
+induce the Congress to take the best means in their power to
+enforce it by the adoption of a law, on the part of the several
+states, to exclude the colonial produce of those countries who
+should refuse to comply with this system of abolition."</p>
+<p>And exertions so resolutely put forward were so successful, that
+the trade was avowedly proscribed by every European nation, though
+unquestionably it was still carried on by stealth by merchants and
+ship-owners of more than one country&mdash;not, if the suspicions
+of our statesmen were well founded, without some connivance on the
+part of their governments. Nor were our efforts in the cause the
+fitful display of impulsive excitement. We have continued them and
+widened their sphere as occasions have presented themselves,
+exerting a successful influence even over unchristian and
+semi-civilized governments, of which an instance has very recently
+been furnished, in the assurances given by the Khedive of Egypt to
+our minister residing at his court, that he is taking vigorous
+measures to suppress the slave-trade, which is still carried on in
+the interior of Africa; and that we may believe his promise that he
+will not relax his exertions till it is extinguished, at least in
+the region on the north of the equator.</p>
+<p>Individuals, as a rule, are slow to take warning from the
+experience of others; slower, perhaps, to follow their example in
+well-doing. Nations are slower still. When such an example is
+followed, still more when it is adopted by a general imitation, it
+will usually be found not only that the good is of a very unusual
+standard of excellence, but that he or they who have set the
+example are endowed with a force of character that predisposes
+others to submit to their influence. And credit of this kind
+England may fairly claim for the general abolition of the
+slave-trade; for the condemnation and abolition of the slave-trade
+had this distinguishing feature, that the idea of such a policy was
+of exclusively British origin. No nation had ever before conceived
+the notion that to make a man a slave was a crime. On the contrary,
+there were not wanting those who, from the recognition of such a
+condition in the Bible, argued that it was a divine institution.
+And they who denounced it, and labored for its suppression, had not
+only inveterate prejudice and long custom to contend with, but
+found arrayed against them many of the strongest passions that
+animate mankind. The natural desire for gain united merchants,
+ship-owners, and planters in unanimous resistance to a measure
+calculated to cut off from them one large source of profit.
+Patriotism, which, however misguided, was sincere and free from all
+taint of personal covetousness, induced many, who wore wholly
+unconnected either with commerce or with the West Indies, to look
+with disfavor on a change which not only imperilled the interests
+of such important bodies of men, but which they were assured by
+those concerned, must render the future cultivation of estates in
+the West Indies impracticable; while such a result would not only
+ruin those valuable colonies, but would also extinguish that great
+nursery for our navy which was furnished by the vessels at present
+engaged in the West India trade. To disregard such substantial
+considerations to risk a loss of revenue, a diminution of our
+colonial greatness, and a weakening of our maritime power, even
+while engaged in a formidable war, under no other pressure but that
+of a respect for humanity and justice, was certainly a homage to
+those virtues, and also an act of self-denying courage, of which
+the previous history of the world had furnished no similar example;
+and it is one of which, in one point of view, the nation may be
+more justly proud than of the achievements of its wisest statesmen,
+or the exploits of its most invincible warriors. For it was the act
+of the nation itself. No previous sentiment of the people paved the
+way for Pitt's triumphs in finance, for Nelson's or Wellington's
+victories by sea and land; but the slave-trade could never have
+been abolished by any parliamentary leader, had not the nation as a
+whole become convinced of its wickedness, and, when once so
+convinced, resolved to brave everything rather than persist in it.
+The merit of having impressed it with this conviction belongs to
+Mr. Wilberforce, whose untiring, unswerving devotion of brilliant
+eloquence and practical ability to the one holy object, and whose
+ultimate success, give him a just claim to be reckoned among the
+great men of a generation than which the world has seen none more
+prolific of every kind of greatness. But the nation itself is also
+entitled to no slight credit for having so rapidly appreciated the
+force of his teaching, and for having encouraged its
+representatives to listen to his voice, by the knowledge that by
+adopting his measures they would be carrying out the wish and
+determination of the whole people.</p>
+<p>A measure for the strengthening of the army, introduced by the
+Secretary of State for War, Mr. Windham, though not one of
+perpetual force, since it required to be renewed every year, claims
+a brief mention, from the extent to which one of its clauses
+trenched on the freedom of the subject, by making every man of
+military age (from sixteen years old[<a href="#note-164">164</a>]
+to forty) liable to be compelled to submit to military training for
+a certain period of each year. "Nothing," to quote the Secretary's
+words, "was to exempt any man from the general training but his
+becoming a volunteer at his own expense, the advantage of which
+would be that he could train himself if he chose, and fight, if
+occasion required it, in the corps to which he should belong,
+instead of being liable to fall in among the regulars.... As out of
+the immense mass of the population some selection must be made,
+those called on to be trained were to be selected by lot, and he
+would have the people divided into three classes, between the ages
+of sixteen and forty: the first class to comprehend all from
+sixteen to twenty-four; the second, those between twenty-four and
+thirty-two; and the third, all from thirty-two to forty. The number
+of days for training he proposed to limit to twenty-six, with an
+allowance of a shilling a day for each man." The result aimed at by
+this part of his measure was the creation of a force different from
+and unconnected with the militia; and he did not conceal his hope
+that the military habits which it would implant in a large portion
+of the population would lead many of those thus about to be trained
+to enlist in the regular army. To the militia itself he paid a high
+but not undeserved compliment, declaring it "for home service
+certainly equal to any part of our regular forces, with the single
+exception that it had never seen actual service." But the militia
+could not be called on to serve out of the kingdom; and his object
+was to increase the force available for foreign service&mdash;"to
+see the great mass of the population of the country so far trained
+as to be able to recruit immediately whatever losses the regular
+army might sustain in action." As yet, the number of men yearly
+obtained by recruiting fell far short of the requirements of the
+service. Wellington had not yet begun that career of victory which
+created a national enthusiasm for war, and filled our ranks with
+willing soldiers. And another clause of the same bill was framed in
+the hope of making the service more acceptable to the peasantry, by
+limiting the time for which recruits were to be enlisted, and
+entering men, at first, in the infantry for seven years, or in the
+cavalry (as that branch of the service required a longer
+apprenticeship) for ten; then allowing them the option of renewing
+their engagement for two periods&mdash;in the infantry of seven
+years each, in the cavalry of six and five, with increased pay
+during each of the two periods, and a small pension for life, if
+the soldier retired after the second period; and "the full
+allowance of Chelsea," which was to be farther raised to a shilling
+a day, for those who elected to serve the whole twenty-one years.
+This principle the present reign has seen carried to a much greater
+extent, but the change is too recent for even the most experienced
+officers to be agreed on its effects. And it is only because of
+this recent extension of it that this clause is mentioned here. But
+the enactment of a law of compulsory service was clearly an inroad
+on the great constitutional right of every man to choose his own
+employment. At the same time, it is equally clear that it was only
+such an inroad as under the circumstances, was fully justifiable.
+It is true that all danger of French invasion had passed away with
+Trafalgar; but the kingdom was still engaged in a gigantic war, and
+the necessity of the case&mdash;always the supreme law&mdash;was so
+little denied by the Opposition, that their objections to the bill
+were directed entirely against the clause for limited enlistment,
+and not against that which abridged the subject's liberty, by
+compelling him to learn to serve his country in war.</p>
+<p>The reign of George III., which had now lasted fifty years, was
+drawing practically to a close. The excitement caused by the
+ministerial changes in 1801 had already brought on one relapse,
+though fortunately a very brief one, of the King's malady of 1788;
+and in the autumn of 1810 the death of the daughter who was
+supposed to be his especial favorite, the Princess Amelia, produced
+a recurrence of it, which, though at first the physicians
+entertained more sanguine hopes of his speedy recovery than on any
+former occasion, he never shook off. More than one change of
+ministry had recently taken place. In 1807 Lord Grenville had been
+compelled, as Pitt had been in 1801, to choose between yielding his
+opinions on the Catholic question or resigning his office, and had
+chosen the latter alternative. He had been succeeded for two years
+by the Duke of Portland; but in 1809 that nobleman had also
+retired, and had been succeeded by his Attorney-general, Mr.
+Perceval, the only practising barrister who had ever been so
+promoted. And he now being Prime-minister, and, as such, forced to
+make arrangements for carrying on the government during the illness
+of his sovereign, naturally regarded the course pursued in 1789 as
+the precedent to be followed. Accordingly, on the 20th of December
+he proposed for the adoption of the House of Commons the same
+resolutions which Pitt had carried twenty-two years
+before&mdash;that the King was prevented by indisposition from
+attending to public business; that it was the duty of Parliament to
+provide means for supplying the defect of the personal exercise of
+the royal authority, and its duty also to determine the mode in
+which the royal assent to the measures necessary could be
+signified. And he also followed Pitt's example in expressing by
+letter to the Prince of Wales his conviction that his Royal
+Highness was a person most proper to be appointed Regent, and
+explaining at the same time the restrictions which seemed proper to
+be imposed on his immediate exercise of the complete sovereign
+authority; though the advanced age at which the King had now
+arrived made it reasonable that those restrictions should now be
+limited to a single year. The Prince, on his part, showed that time
+had in no degree abated his repugnance to those restrictions, and
+he answered the minister's letter by referring him to that which he
+had addressed to Pitt on the same subject in 1788. And he induced
+all his brothers to address to Perceval a formal protest against
+"the establishment of a restricted Regency," which they proceeded
+to describe as perfectly unconstitutional, as being contrary to and
+subversive of the principles which seated their family upon the
+throne of this realm.[<a href="#note-165">165</a>]</p>
+<p>Perceval, however, with Pitt's example before him, had no doubt
+of the course which it was his duty to pursue; and the Opposition
+also, for the most part, followed the tactics of 1789; the line of
+argument now adopted by each party being so nearly identical with
+that employed on the former occasion, that it is needless to
+recapitulate the topics on which the different speakers insisted;
+though it is worth remarking that Lord Holland, who, as the nephew
+of Fox, thought it incumbent on him to follow his uncle's guidance,
+did on one point practically depart from it. As his uncle had done,
+he denied the right of the Houses to impose any restrictions on the
+Prince's exercise of the royal authority; but, at the same time, he
+consented to put what may be called a moral limitation on that
+exercise, by adding to an amendment which he proposed to the
+resolution proposed by the minister an expression of "the farther
+opinion of the House that it will be expedient to abstain from the
+exercise of all such powers as the immediate exigencies of the
+state shall not call into action, until Parliament shall have
+passed a bill or bills for the future care of his Majesty's royal
+person during his Majesty's present indisposition."</p>
+<p>It is remarkable that the leaders of the Opposition were in a
+great degree stimulated in the line they took by the very same
+hopes which had animated Fox and his followers in 1789&mdash;the
+expectation that the Regent's first act would be to discard the
+existing ministry, and to place them in office. But again they were
+disappointed in their anticipations, of the realization of which
+they had made so sure that they had taken no pains to keep them
+secret. They even betrayed their mortification to the world when
+the Prince's intentions on the subject of the administration became
+known by the violence of their language in Parliament, some of
+their party denouncing the employment of the Great Seal to give the
+royal assent to the bill as "fraud and forgery." Nor, indeed, could
+the Regent himself, even while expressing his intention to make no
+change in the administration, lest "any act of his might in the
+smallest degree have the effect of interfering with the progress of
+his sovereign's recovery," suppress an expression of
+dissatisfaction at the recent arrangements, which he considered had
+placed him in "a situation of unexampled embarrassment," and had
+created "a state of affairs ill calculated, as he feared, to
+sustain the interests of the United Kingdom in this awful and
+perilous crisis, and most difficult to be reconciled to the general
+principles of the British constitution."[<a href=
+"#note-166">166</a>] There were at this time general and apparently
+well-founded hopes of the King's recovery. For at intervals during
+the whole of January the Prime-minister had interviews with his
+Majesty; and, on the very day on which the bill became law, the
+King himself mentioned it to Lord Eldon, the Chancellor, and said
+that he acquiesced in it from perfect confidence in the advice of
+his physicians, and on the sound judgment and personal attachment
+of his ministers.</p>
+<a name="endeavors" id="endeavors"></a>
+<p>For the present, therefore, no change was made in the
+administration; but when, in the spring of the following year, Mr.
+Perceval was murdered, the necessity for a new arrangement which
+this strange and calamitous atrocity forced upon the
+Regent&mdash;who by this time had come into possession of his full
+authority&mdash;led to his making offers of the conduct of affairs
+to more than one prominent statesman, all of them, as is somewhat
+remarkable, being peers. And, though the proposals eventually came
+to nothing, and the negotiations terminated in the re-establishment
+of the former ministry, with Lord Liverpool at its head, yet some
+of the causes to which their failure was publicly or generally
+attributed seem desirable to be recorded, because the first, and
+that most openly avowed, bears a not very distant resemblance to
+the complication which baffled Sir Robert Peel's endeavors to form
+an administration in 1839; and another corresponds precisely to a
+proposal which, in 1827, the Regent&mdash;then King George
+IV.&mdash;did himself make to the Duke of Wellington. It is
+unnecessary to dwell on the singular manner in which the Regent
+first professed to give his confidence to Lord Wellesley, then
+transferred it to Lord Moira,[<a href="#note-167">167</a>] and then
+to a certain extent included Lord Grey and Lord Grenville in it.
+Nor would it be profitable to discuss the correctness or
+incorrectness of the suspicion expressed by Mr. Moore, in his "Life
+of Sheridan"&mdash;who was evidently at this time as fully in the
+Regent's confidence as any one else&mdash;that "at the bottom of
+all these evolutions of negotiation there was anything but a
+sincere wish, that the object to which they related should be
+accomplished."[<a href="#note-168">168</a>] The reason avowed by
+Lord Grey and Lord Grenville for refusing a share in the projected
+administration was the refusal of Lord Moira, who had been employed
+by the Prince to treat with them on the subject, to allow them to
+make a power of removing the officers at present filling "the great
+offices of the household"[<a href="#note-169">169</a>] an express
+condition of their acceptance of ministerial office. They affirmed
+that a "liberty to make new appointments" to these offices had
+usually been given on every change of administration. But Lord
+Moira, while admitting that "the Prince had laid no restriction on
+him in that respect," declared that "it would be impossible for him
+to concur in making the exercise of this power positive and
+indispensable in the formation of the administration, because he
+should deem it on public grounds peculiarly objectionable." Such an
+answer certainly gives a great color to Moore's suspicion, since it
+is hardly possible to conceive that Lord Moira took on himself the
+responsibility of giving it without a previous knowledge that it
+would be approved by his royal master. In a constitutional point of
+view, there can, it will probably be felt, be no doubt that the two
+lords had a right to the liberty they required. And the very men
+concerned, the great officers of the household, were evidently of
+the same opinion, since the chief, Lord Yarmouth, informed Sheridan
+that they intended to resign, in order that he might communicate
+that intention to Lord Grey; and Sheridan, who concealed the
+intelligence from Lord Grey, can hardly be supposed, any more than
+Lord Moira, to have acted in a manner which he did not expect to be
+agreeable to the Prince. But, in Canning's opinion, this question
+of the household was only the ostensible pretext, and not the real
+cause, of those two lords rejecting the Regent's offers; the real
+cause being, as he believed, that the Prince himself had already
+named Lord Wellesley as Prime-minister, and that they were resolved
+to insist on the right of the Whig party to dictate on that point
+to the Regent,[<a href="#note-170">170</a>] just as, in 1782, Fox
+had endeavored to force the Duke of Portland on the King, when his
+Majesty preferred Lord Shelburne. As has been intimated in a
+<a href="#endeavors">former page</a>, it will be seen hereafter
+that in 1839 a similar claim to be allowed to remove some of the
+ladies of the royal household, and the rejection of that claim by
+the sovereign, prevented Sir R. Peel from forming an
+administration. And, as that transaction was discussed at some
+length in Parliament, it will afford a better opportunity for
+examining the principle on which the claim and practice (for of the
+practice there is no doubt) rest. For the present it is sufficient
+to point out the resemblance between the cases.</p>
+<p>But it is remarkable that, unwarrantable as the pretension of
+the Whig leaders was to dictate to the Regent to whom he should
+confide the lead of the government (if, indeed, Canning be correct
+in his opinion), yet it was not one to which the Regent felt any
+repugnance, since, in 1827, when Lord Liverpool's illness again
+left the Treasury vacant, he, being then on the throne as George
+IV., proposed to the Duke of Wellington to desire the remaining
+members of the administration themselves to select a chief under
+whom they would be willing to continue in his service; but the Duke
+told him that the plan of allowing them to choose their own leader
+would be most derogatory to his position; that the choice of the
+Prime-minister was an act which ought to be entirely his own, for
+that, in fact under the British constitution, it was the only
+personal act of government which the King of Great Britain had to
+perform.[<a href="#note-171">171</a>] Though not generally a great
+authority on constitutional points, we apprehend that the Duke was
+clearly correct in this view, which, indeed, has been so invariably
+carried out in practice, that the King's suggestion would not have
+deserved mention had it not been a king's. So far from it belonging
+to any individual subject or to any party to name the
+Prime-minister, to do so is even beyond the province of the
+Parliament. Parliament decides whether it will give its confidence
+to an administration of one party or the other; but not only has no
+vote ever been given on the question whether one member of the
+dominant party be fitter or not than another to be its head, but we
+do not remember a single instance of any member of either House
+expressing an opinion on the subject in his place in Parliament. To
+do so would be felt by every member of experience to be an
+infringement on the prerogative of his sovereign; and it may be
+added that a contrary practice would certainly open the door to
+intrigue, or, what would be equally bad, a suspicion of intrigue,
+and would thus inevitably diminish the weight which even the
+Opposition desire to see a Prime-minister possess both in
+Parliament and in the country.</p>
+<p>Notes:</p>
+<p><a name="note-148" id="note-148">
+<!-- Note Anchor 148 --></a>[Footnote 148: It is somewhat
+remarkable that Lord Macaulay, in his endeavors to estimate the
+population in 1685, takes no notice of any of these details
+mentioned by Mr. Abbott.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-149" id="note-149">
+<!-- Note Anchor 149 --></a>[Footnote 149: The details of this
+census of 1801 are given in a <a href="#note-144">note</a> in the
+preceding chapter (see <a href="#note-144">page 185</a>), from
+which it appears that the entire population of the United Kingdom
+was in that year 16,395,870. Sir A. Alison, in different chapters
+of the second part of his "History of Europe," gives returns of
+subsequent censuses, from the last of which (c. lvi., s. 34, note),
+it appears that in 1851 the population amounted to 27,511,862. an
+increase of 11,116,792 in half a century.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-150" id="note-150">
+<!-- Note Anchor 150 --></a>[Footnote 150: "Lives of the
+Chief-justices," by Lord Campbell, iii., 87, life of Lord
+Kenyon.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-151" id="note-151">
+<!-- Note Anchor 151 --></a>[Footnote 151: "What is this," said
+George III. to Mr. Dundas, "which this young lord (Castlereagh) has
+brought over, which they are going to throw at my head? The most
+Jacobinical thing I ever heard of! I shall reckon any man my
+personal enemy who proposes any such measure."&mdash;<i>Life of
+Pitt</i>, iii., 274.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-152" id="note-152">
+<!-- Note Anchor 152 --></a>[Footnote 152: "Lives of the
+Chancellors," c. clxxxiv., life of Lord Erskine.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-153" id="note-153">
+<!-- Note Anchor 153 --></a>[Footnote 153: "Lives of the
+Chancellors," c. clix., life of Lord Thurlow.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-154" id="note-154">
+<!-- Note Anchor 154 --></a>[Footnote 154: See "Memoires de M. de
+Metternich," ii., 156.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-155" id="note-155">
+<!-- Note Anchor 155 --></a>[Footnote 155: "Lives of the
+Chief-justices," iii., 175.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-156" id="note-156">
+<!-- Note Anchor 156 --></a>[Footnote 156: Lord Stanhope, "History
+of England," i., 133.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-157" id="note-157">
+<!-- Note Anchor 157 --></a>[Footnote 157: "Lives of the
+Chief-justices," ii., 451. He is quoting H. Walpole.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-158" id="note-158">
+<!-- Note Anchor 158 --></a>[Footnote 158: Ibid., iii., 187.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-159" id="note-159">
+<!-- Note Anchor 159 --></a>[Footnote 159: Campbell's "Lives of the
+Chief-justices," II., 139, life of Chief-justice Holt; and p. 418,
+life of Lord Mansfield.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-160" id="note-160">
+<!-- Note Anchor 160 --></a>[Footnote 160: "Life of Wilberforce,"
+i., 158.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-161" id="note-161">
+<!-- Note Anchor 161 --></a>[Footnote 161: The division in the
+Lords was 100 to 36; in the Commons, 283 to 16.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-162" id="note-162">
+<!-- Note Anchor 162 --></a>[Footnote 162: Afterward the Earl Grey
+of 1831.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-163" id="note-163">
+<!-- Note Anchor 163 --></a>[Footnote 163: See especially his
+"Letters to Lord Castlereagh," p. 814; and "Life of Lord
+Liverpool," i., 512; ii., 35, 49, 127.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-164" id="note-164">
+<!-- Note Anchor 164 --></a>[Footnote 164: Lord Colchester's
+"Diary," ii., 49, dated April 3, 1806, says eighteen years. But Mr.
+Windham's speech, as reported in the "Parliamentary History,"
+second series, vi., 685, says sixteen years; and as he divides the
+ages into three classes, the two latter of which, from twenty-four
+to thirty-two, and from thirty-two to forty, are of eight years
+each, it is probable that the younger class was of the same
+duration, i.e., from sixteen to twenty-four.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-165" id="note-165">
+<!-- Note Anchor 165 --></a>[Footnote 165: Lord Colchester's
+"Diary," ii., 300.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-166" id="note-166">
+<!-- Note Anchor 166 --></a>[Footnote 166: See "Diary of Lord
+Colchester" (Speaker at the time), c. xxxvi., p. 316. He gives the
+whole of the Prince's letter to Perceval (which had been composed
+by Sheridan), and of Perceval's reply. The Regency Bill became law
+February 5, 1811.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-167" id="note-167">
+<!-- Note Anchor 167 --></a>[Footnote 167: A letter of Lord
+Wellesley to Lord Grey, June 4 (given by Pearce, "Life of Lord
+Wellesley," iii., 270), shows that Lord Moira had been in
+communication with Lord Grey and Lord Grenville before Lord
+Wellesley had given up the idea of forming a ministry. And though
+Lord Grey in his reply (p. 272) expresses his conviction that Lord
+Moira's letter was not "an authorized communication," but only "a
+private communication," it is clear that it could not have been
+written without the privity of the Regent.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-168" id="note-168">
+<!-- Note Anchor 168 --></a>[Footnote 168: "Life of Sheridan," ii.,
+425.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-169" id="note-169">
+<!-- Note Anchor 169 --></a>[Footnote 169: Pearce's "Life of Lord
+Wellesley," iii., 276. All the letters which passed between Lord
+Grey, Lord Grenville, Lord Moira, and Lord Wellesley himself are
+given at full length by Mr. Pearce in that chapter.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-170" id="note-170">
+<!-- Note Anchor 170 --></a>[Footnote 170: Stapleton's "George
+Canning and his Times," p. 202.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-171" id="note-171">
+<!-- Note Anchor 171 --></a>[Footnote 171: Mr. Stapleton affirms
+that his Royal Highness actually did adopt this plan on this
+occasion: "His Royal Highness adopted the unprecedented course of
+commanding his servants to elect the First-minister. Their choice
+fell on Lord Liverpool."&mdash;<i>George Canning and his Times</i>,
+p. 208. Mr. Stapleton, however, gives no authority for this
+assertion, and he was probably mistaken, since Lord Liverpool's
+papers afford no corroboration of it, but rather tend to disprove
+it.]</p>
+<hr />
+<a name="CH7" id="CH7"><!-- CH7 --></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER VII.</h2>
+<p class="blockquote">The Toleration Act.&mdash;Impropriety of
+making Catholic Emancipation (or any other Important Matter) an
+Open Question.&mdash;Joint Responsibility of all the
+Ministers.&mdash;Detention of Napoleon at St.
+Helena.&mdash;Question whether the Regent could Give Evidence in a
+Court of Law in a Civil Action.&mdash;Agitation for
+Reform.&mdash;Public Meetings.&mdash;The Manchester
+Meeting.&mdash;The Seditious Meetings Prevention Bill.&mdash;Lord
+Sidmouth's Six Acts.</p>
+<p>The war was daily becoming of more exciting interest, and, so
+far as our armies were concerned, was rapidly assuming greater
+proportions. While the Duke of Portland was still at the head of
+affairs, Napoleon, by his unprovoked attacks on both the Peninsular
+kingdoms, had at last opened a field of action to our armies, in
+which even the most sanguine of those who placed a loyal confidence
+in the old invincibility of English prowess could not have
+anticipated the unbroken series of glories which were to reward
+their efforts. For four years Lord Wellington had contended against
+all the most renowned marshals of the Empire,[<a href=
+"#note-172">172</a>] driving them back from impregnable lines of
+defence, defeating them in pitched battles, storming their
+strongest fortresses, without ever giving them room to boast of
+even the most momentary advantage obtained over himself; and he was
+now on the eve of achieving still more brilliant and decisive
+triumphs, which were never to cease till he had carried his
+victorious march far into the heart of France itself.</p>
+<p>At such a time it may well be supposed that the attention of the
+new ministry was too fully occupied with measures necessary for the
+conduct of the war to leave it much time for domestic legislation.
+Yet even its first session was not entirely barren.</p>
+<p>In the first excitement of the Restoration, when the nation was
+still exasperated at the recollection of what it had suffered under
+the triumphant domination of the Puritans, two laws had been framed
+to chastise them, conceived in a spirit as intolerant and
+persecuting as had dictated the very worst of their own. One, which
+was called the Conventicle Act, inflicted on all persons above the
+age of sixteen, who should be present at any religious service
+performed in any manner differently from the service of the Church
+of England, in any meeting-house, where more than five persons
+besides the occupiers of the house should be present, severe
+penalties, rising gradually to transportation; and gave a single
+magistrate authority to convict and to pass sentence on the
+offenders. The other, commonly known as the Five Mile Act, forbade
+all ministers, of any sect, who did not subscribe to the Act of
+Uniformity, and who refused to swear to their belief in the
+doctrine of passive obedience, from teaching in any school, and
+from coming within five miles of any city, corporate town, or
+borough sending members to Parliament, or any town or village in
+which they themselves had resided as ministers. The latter statute
+had fallen into complete disuse, and many of the provisions of the
+former had been relaxed, though magistrates in general construed
+the relaxing enactments as leaving the relaxations wholly at their
+discretion to grant or to withhold, and were very much in the habit
+of withholding or abridging them. Other statutes, such as the Test
+Act, had subsequently been passed against every sect of Dissenters,
+though they had only imposed civil disabilities, and had not
+inflicted penalties. But the new Prime-minister was a man to whose
+disposition anything resembling persecution was foreign and
+repugnant. Before his predecessor's unhappy death he had already
+discussed with him the propriety of abolishing laws conceived in
+such a spirit; and he no sooner found himself at the head of the
+government than he prepared a bill to carry out his views. He drew
+a distinction between the acts inflicting penalties and those which
+only imposed disabilities. With these latter he did not propose to
+interfere; but, in July, his colleague, Lord Castlereagh,
+introduced into the House of Commons a bill to repeal the
+Conventicle Act and the Five Mile Act altogether, and, when it had
+passed the Commons, he himself moved its adoption by the Lords,
+enforcing his recommendation by the argument, that "an enlarged and
+liberal toleration was the best security to the Established Church,
+a Church not founded on the exclusion of religious discussion, but,
+in its homilies, its canons, and all the principles on which it
+rested, courting the investigation of the Scriptures, upon which it
+founded its doctrines." At the same time, while urging the repeal
+of acts which he truly branded as a disgrace to the statute-book,
+he was not blind to the duty imposed on him, as responsible for the
+public tranquillity, of taking care that meetings held ostensibly
+for purposes of devotion should not be perverted to the designs of
+political agitators; and therefore he provided in the bill for the
+registration of all places appropriated to religious worship, and
+for the exaction from "the preachers and teachers in those meetings
+of some test or security in the oaths to be taken by them." He had
+already secured the acquiescence of the bishops, and he was equally
+successful now in winning the assent of the House. The conditions,
+such as they were, did not prevent the bill from being entirely
+acceptable to the Non-conformists; and though their spokesman in
+the House of Commons, Mr. W. Smith, member for Norwich, confessed a
+wish "that it had gone a little farther, and had granted complete
+religious liberty," he at the same time expressed sincere gratitude
+on the part of the Non-conformists for what was thus done for them;
+and declared that, "as an act of toleration, it certainly was the
+most complete which had hitherto been passed in this country." It
+was, in fact, the beginning of the abandonment of that system of
+discouragement of and hostility to all sects except the Established
+Church, which had hitherto been regarded by a large party as one of
+the most essential principles of the constitution. And as such it
+makes the year 1812 in some respects a landmark in our
+constitutional history.</p>
+<p>Mr. Smith had referred to an omission which prevented him from
+speaking of the bill as complete. He was alluding to the Test and
+Corporation Acts, which had been passed ten years later than the
+Conventicle Act, in the same reign of Charles II., and which many
+of the Non-conformists, and especially the Unitarians, had urged
+Lord Liverpool to include in this measure of repeal, but which he
+decided on retaining. As has been said above, he drew a distinction
+between acts inflicting penalties and those which went no farther
+than imposing political disabilities, feeling that any relief of
+Protestant Dissenters from such disabilities must inevitably lead
+to the concession of a similar indulgence to Roman Catholics, and
+not being as yet prepared to admit to Parliament the members of a
+Church which recognized the duty of obedience in any matter to a
+foreign sovereign; for, as the disabilities had been originally
+imposed on the Roman Catholics, so they were now maintained on
+political, not religious, grounds; and even those most opposed to a
+relaxation of them were careful to explain their resistance to be
+one which time and a change of circumstances might
+mitigate.[<a href="#note-173">173</a>]</p>
+<p>As a fitter opportunity for discussing the question will be
+afforded by the Duke of Wellington's bill, in 1829, we should not
+have mentioned it at all in this place, had not Lord Liverpool, in
+arranging his administration, adopted a mode of dealing with it
+which, though rather a parliamentary or departmental than a
+constitutional innovation, was, nevertheless, one of so strange a
+character as to seem to call for examination. Ever since the
+formation of Walpole's ministry it had been the invariable rule and
+practice for all the members of the cabinet to act in concert on
+all measures of importance, or, indeed it may be said, on all
+measures on which a Parliamentary vote was taken. But, in arranging
+his administration after Mr. Perceval's death, Lord Liverpool found
+it absolutely impossible to form one satisfactory either to the
+nation or to himself if it were to be confined to members in
+perfect agreement with himself on the subject of the retention of
+the disabilities affecting the Roman Catholics; and therefore, in
+order to be able to form a ministry generally strong and respected,
+he adopted the strange expedient of allowing every member of it to
+act independently on this one question. He made it what was called
+an open question. The arrangement, as explained to the House of
+Commons by Lord Castlereagh, the ministerial leader of that
+assembly, was that, "in submission to the growing change of public
+opinion in favor of those claims (the Roman Catholic claims), and
+the real sentiments of certain members of the government, it had
+been resolved upon, as a principle, that the discussion of this
+question should be left free from all interference on the part of
+the government, and that every member of that government should in
+it be left to the free and unbiassed suggestions of his own
+conscientious discretion."</p>
+<p>It was an arrangement which secured the Prime-minister the
+co-operation of Lord Castlereagh himself, and eventually of Mr.
+Canning; but it failed to propitiate the Opposition, the leader of
+which in the House of Commons, Mr. Ponsonby, turned it into open
+ridicule, affirming that "nothing could be more absurd than a
+cabinet professing to have no opinion on such an important
+subject." And it must be confessed that Mr. Ponsonby's language on
+the subject seems the language of common-sense. So far from the
+importance of a question justifying such an arrangement, that
+importance appears rather to increase, if possible, the necessity
+for absolute unanimity in the administration than to diminish it;
+and on a grave and momentous subject to leave each member of a
+ministry free to pronounce a separate and different judgment, so
+that one may resist what his colleague advocates, is to abdicate
+the functions of government altogether. To permit such liberty was
+either a proof that the ministry was weak altogether&mdash;which it
+was not&mdash;or that its conduct on this question was weak. In
+either case, it was a mischievous precedent that was thus
+set;[<a href="#note-174">174</a>] and the fact that it has since
+been followed in more than one instance, is so far from being any
+justification of it, that it rather supplies an additional reason
+for condemning it, as being the cause of wider mischief than if it
+had been confined to one single question, or had influenced the
+conduct of one cabinet only. It has often been said that the name
+"cabinet" is unknown to the law, and that what we call the cabinet
+is, in fact, only a committee of the Privy Council. As a statement
+of law the assertion may be correct, but it is certain that for
+more than a century and a half the constitution has adopted the
+principle that the cabinet consists of the holders of a certain, to
+some extent a fluctuating, number of the principal state officers;
+and, recognizing the responsibility of all for the actions of each
+member of it, does by that recognition sanction an expectation that
+on all questions, or at all events on all but those of the most
+trivial character, they will speak and act with that unanimity
+which is indispensable, not only to the strength of the government
+itself, but to its being held in respect by the people; such
+respect being, indeed, among the most essential elements of its
+strength.</p>
+<p>The incidents of the war itself do not belong to a work such as
+this; but, tantalizing as it must be to an historian of any class
+to pass over the brilliant series of achievements which gave
+Britain the glory of being twice[<a href="#note-175">175</a>] the
+principal agent in the deliverance of Continental Europe, the
+glories of Salamanca, Victoria, Orthes, and Waterloo must be left
+to other writers, who, it is not unpatriotic to hope, may never
+again have similar cause for exulting descriptions. But out of the
+crowning triumph of Waterloo a difficulty arose which, though it
+may be difficult to characterize the principle on which it was
+settled, since it was not strictly a question of constitutional,
+international, or military law; and though the circumstances were
+so peculiar that the conclusion adopted is never likely to be
+referred to as a precedent, seems still deserving of a brief
+mention, especially as an act of Parliament was passed to sanction
+the decision of the cabinet. Baffled by the vigilance of our
+cruisers in every attempt to escape from one of the western ports
+of France to America, Napoleon was at last compelled to surrender
+himself to a British squadron. But, though he was our prisoner, the
+Prime-minister considered us, in all our dealings with him, as so
+bound by engagements to our allies, that he was to be regarded as
+"the common prisoner of all, so far that we should not give him up
+or release him without the joint consent of all." The question was
+full of difficulty. There were, probably, very few persons in this
+or any other country who did not coincide in the impropriety of
+releasing him, and so putting it in his power once more to rekindle
+a war in Europe. But it was a political view of the case, founded
+on a consideration of what was required by the tranquillity of
+Europe; and it was not easy to lay down any legal ground to justify
+the determination. Some regarded him as a French subject, and, if
+that view were correct, he could hardly be detained by us as a
+prisoner of war after we had concluded a treaty of peace with
+France. But, again, it seemed to some, the Lord Chancellor being
+among them, a questionable point whether in the last campaign we
+had been at war with France; whether, on the contrary, we had not
+assumed the character of an ally of France against him. And, on the
+supposition that we had been at war with France, a second question
+was raised by Lord Ellenborough, the Chief-justice, "what rights
+result on principle from a state of war, as against all the
+individuals of the belligerent nations&mdash;rights, whatever they
+may be, seldom, if ever, enforced against individuals, because
+individuals hardly ever make war but as part of an aggregate
+nation." The question&mdash;as, after consultation with Lord
+Ellenborough and his own brother, Sir William Scott, it finally
+appeared to Lord Eldon, on whom the Prime-minister naturally
+depended, as his chief legal counsellor, though in its political
+aspect he judged for himself&mdash;was, firstly, "whether it could
+possibly be inconsistent with justice or the law of nations that,
+till some peace were made by treaty with some person considered as
+Napoleon's sovereign, or till some peace were made with himself, we
+should keep him imprisoned in some part of our King's dominions."
+And, secondly, "whether there were any person who could possibly be
+considered his sovereign, after the treaty of 1814 had clothed him
+with the character of Emperor of Elba, with imperial dignity and
+imperial revenue." Lord Liverpool himself, however, raised another
+question: whether, by his invasion of France, he had not forfeited
+his right to be regarded as an independent sovereign; resting this
+doubt on a suggestion which, among others, he proposed to the Lord
+Chancellor, that "at Elba he enjoyed only a limited and conditional
+sovereignty, which ceased when the condition on which he held it
+was violated."</p>
+<p>This last suggestion, it must be confessed, appears untenable,
+as totally inconsistent with the language of the Treaty of
+Fontainebleau, under the provisions of which Napoleon became
+sovereign of Elba, and which does not contain a single article
+which bears out the opinion that his sovereignty was limited or
+conditional. On the contrary, the words of the treaty expressly
+agree that "Elba should form during his life a separate
+principality, which should be possessed by him in full sovereignty
+and property."</p>
+<p>There is no need to discuss the views of Blucher. On the news of
+Napoleon's landing at Frejus reaching the plenipotentiaries
+assembled at the Congress of Vienna, they at once issued a
+declaration that, "in breaking the convention which had established
+him at Elba, Buonaparte" (for they refused him his imperial
+appellation of Napoleon) "had destroyed the only legal title on
+which his existence depended.... He had placed himself out of the
+pale of civil and social relations, and, as the enemy and disturber
+of the peace of the world, he was delivered over to public
+justice." And the old Prussian, burning with a desire to avenge the
+indignities and injuries which he had inflicted on Prussia, avowed
+his determination to execute him as an outlaw, if he should fall
+into his hands. And it is still less worthwhile to
+inquire&mdash;though Lord Holland in his place in Parliament did
+desire the House to consult the judges on the point&mdash;whether,
+if Napoleon were a prisoner of war, he "were not entitled to his
+<i>habeas corpus</i>, if detained after the signature of a treaty
+of peace with all the powers, or any of which he could be
+considered as the subject."</p>
+<p>On the whole, the simplest view of the position and of our
+detention of him, the view most reconcilable with the principles
+which regulate the waging and the relinquishing a state of war,
+seems to be to consider that Napoleon was a sovereign with whom we
+were at war; that that war could only be terminated by a treaty of
+peace between ourselves and him; that it rested with us to
+conclude, or to abstain from concluding, any such treaty; and that,
+till we should conclude it, we had clearly a right to detain him as
+a prisoner of war. It must, at the same time, be admitted that
+modern history afforded no precedent for the detention of a
+prisoner for his whole life (unless, indeed, Elizabeth's
+imprisonment of the Queen of Scots may be considered as one), and
+that the most solid justification for it was necessity. To quote
+the language of Lord Eldon, "I believe it will turn out that, if
+you can't make this a <i>casus exceptionis</i> or <i>omissus</i> in
+the law of nations, founded upon necessity, you will not really
+know what to say upon it. <i>Salus Reipublicae suprema lex</i>, as
+to one state; <i>Salus omnium Rerumpublicarum</i> must be the
+<i>suprema lex</i> as to this case."[<a href=
+"#note-176">176</a>]</p>
+<p>In the course of the year 1818 a somewhat singular question as
+to the position of the Regent was raised by a claim advanced by
+Colonel Berkeley to produce his Royal Highness as a witness in a
+court of law. The Prince consulted the Prime-minister, and the
+Prime-minister referred it to the Attorney and Solicitor General,
+not concealing his own impression that it could not be consistent
+with his constitutional position and prerogative for the King to
+appear as a witness to be subjected to examination and
+cross-examination.[<a href="#note-177">177</a>] They, in their
+statement of opinion, assumed it to be an undeniable principle of
+the constitution that the sovereign, "by reason of his royal
+character, could not give testimony." And therefore they had no
+doubt that the Regent, exercising his authority, was equally
+prevented from so doing. Colonel Berkeley's counsel had urged that,
+even if he could not appear in open court and be sworn, he had the
+privilege of communicating his evidence in a peculiar mode, by
+certificate under the Sign Manual or Great Seal. But the Attorney
+and Solicitor General professed that they could not discover whence
+this last privilege was derived; they urged, as an insurmountable
+objection to such a contrivance, that "all instruments under the
+Sign Manual or Great Seal must, in point of form, be in the name of
+and on behalf of the King, which would manifestly be incongruous
+when the evidence certified was not that of the King, but of the
+Regent himself." And they quoted a case in which Lord Chief-justice
+Willes had said "that the certificate of the King, under his Sign
+Manual, of a fact (except in an old case in Chancery) had always
+been refused." As it had been urged also, on Colonel Berkeley's
+behalf, that the Prince had formerly "joined in proving the will of
+the Duke of Brunswick," his brother-in-law, they farther expressed
+an opinion that "he ought not to have done so, but should have left
+it to the other executors."</p>
+<p>On the point whether "the King himself could give evidence
+orally or in any other manner," their opinion expressed very
+plainly the principle on which they maintained that he could not.
+"That he was not compellable to do so; that he could not be sworn
+(there being no power capable of administering an oath to him in a
+court of justice). That, whether his testimony be given
+<i>viv&acirc; voce</i> or otherwise, no question in chief or on
+cross-examination could be proposed to him, was admitted by Colonel
+Berkeley's counsel. And that his testimony must be conclusive as to
+the facts stated by him, appeared necessarily to follow from the
+perfection ascribed by law to his royal character. For such
+remarkable exceptions, therefore, to the case of all other
+witnesses they could not but think that strong and decisive
+authority ought to be produced; while the silence of text-writers
+on the subject, so far from being favorable to the notion that the
+King can give evidence, appeared to afford a directly contrary
+inference." And they summed up their opinion in a few words: "that
+his Royal Highness the Prince Regent, while in the personal
+exercise of the royal authority, was in the situation of the King
+in this respect, and that the King could not by any mode give
+evidence as a witness in a civil suit."</p>
+<p>It is very improbable that Colonel Berkeley should have made the
+application without previously ascertaining the willingness of the
+Prince to give evidence, could such a course be permitted. And as
+his Royal Highness, on receiving this opinion of the law-officers
+of the crown, did not come forward as a witness, that opinion may
+be held to have settled the question. And, apart from the
+constitutional objections relied on by those able lawyers, it is
+evident that there would be serious practical objections to the
+sovereign being made a witness. It would be derogatory to his royal
+character to put himself in a position where comments could be
+made, either by the opposing barrister or by the public outside, on
+his evidence. And, on the other hand, it would be perilously unfair
+to one litigant for his adversary to be able to produce a witness
+who was not subject to cross-examination, nor to remarks upon his
+testimony.</p>
+<p>The reign of George III. was now drawing to its close, and, if
+it produced no legislation affecting the principles of the
+constitution (it will presently be seen that it did produce one
+measure which its opponents branded as a violation of these
+principles), yet in its last years it witnessed the revival of an
+agitation which was kept up with varying animation till it was
+temporarily quieted by the concession of its demands. We have seen
+that one of Pitt's earliest efforts at legislation had been
+directed to a reform in Parliament, an object which to the end of
+his life he considered of great importance, though the
+revolutionary spirit aroused by the troubles in France, and the
+open sympathy with the French Jacobins and Republicans avowed by a
+party among ourselves&mdash;which, if numerically weak, was
+sufficiently loud and active to be dangerous&mdash;prevented him
+from ever re-opening the subject. But, though the French Revolution
+in this way proved for the time an insurmountable obstacle to the
+success of the reformers, in another way it insured the revival of
+the question, by the general spirit of inquiry which it awakened
+among the population at large, and which soon went beyond the
+investigation of any single abuse or anomaly. For even less
+far-sighted statesmen than Pitt confessed the existence of much
+that was not only theoretically indefensible, but practically
+mischievous. The period, little short of a century, which elapsed
+between the death of William III. and Pitt's accession to office
+had been one of almost complete stagnation and apathy. The Scotch
+Union, the Septennial Bill, the establishment of a militia, and the
+Place Bill of 1743 were the only instances of any legislation
+deserving the name of constitutional which made the reigns of Anne
+and the first two Georges memorable. And in the very nature of
+things it was impossible that, after so long a slumber, there
+should not be much to do, and many, whether capable or incapable,
+eager to bear a share in the work. The sudden cessation of the
+excitement of war had begotten a restless craving for some other
+excitement to take its place, and none seemed so creditable as
+energy and acuteness in the discovery and removal of abuses.
+Complaints were made, and not without reason, of the working of the
+poor-law; of the terrible severity of our criminal code; of the
+hardships and sufferings of the younger members of the working
+classes, especially in the factories; of the ignorance of a large
+portion of the people, in itself as prolific a cause of mischief
+and crime as any other. But, though committees and commissions were
+appointed by Parliament to investigate the condition of the kingdom
+in respect of these matters, a feeling was growing up that no
+effectual remedy would be applied till the constitution of the
+House of Commons itself were reformed, so as to make it a more real
+representation of the people than it could as yet be considered.
+And a farther stimulus to this wish for such a Parliamentary reform
+was supplied by the distress which a combination of circumstances
+spread among almost all classes in the years immediately following
+the conclusion of the second treaty of peace.[<a href=
+"#note-178">178</a>] The harvests of the years 1816 and 1817 were
+unusually deficient, and this pressed heavily on the farmers and
+landed proprietors. The merchants and manufacturers, who, while
+every part of the Continent was disturbed or threatened by the
+operations of contending armies, had practically enjoyed almost a
+monopoly of the trade of the world, found their profits reduced, by
+the new competition to which the re-establishment of peace exposed
+them, to a point which compelled them to a severe reduction of
+expenditure. The uncertainty felt as to the results to be brought
+about by the inevitable repeal of the Bank Act of 1797, and the
+return to cash payments&mdash;results which it was impossible to
+estimate correctly beforehand&mdash;had a tendency to augment the
+distress, by the general feeling of uneasiness and distrust which
+it created. And the employers of labor could not suffer without
+those who depended on them for employment suffering still more
+severely. The consequence was, that there was a general stagnation
+of trade; numbers of artisans and laborers of every kind were
+thrown out of work, and their enforced idleness and poverty, which
+was its result, made them ready to become the tools of demagogues
+such as are never wanting in the hour of distress and perplexity.
+Meetings were convened, ostensibly to petition for reform, but in
+reality to afford opportunities for mob-orators, eager for
+notoriety, to denounce the government and those whom they styled
+the "ruling classes," as the causes of the present and past evils.
+From these meetings multitudes issued forth ripe for mischief. In
+some places they rose against the manufacturers, and destroyed
+their machines, to the recent introduction of which they attributed
+their want of employment. In others, still more senselessly, they
+even set fire to the stores of grain in the corn-dealers'
+warehouses, aggravating by their destruction the most painful of
+their own sufferings. On one occasion, a mob which had assembled in
+one of the eastern districts of London, on pretence of framing a
+petition to be presented to the Prince Regent, at the close of the
+meeting paraded the streets with a tricolor flag, the emblem of the
+French Revolutionists, and pillaged a number of shops, especially
+those of the gun-makers, spreading terror through all that side of
+the metropolis. In at least one instance the violence of the
+rioters rose to the height of treason. Assassins fired at the
+Regent in the Park as he was returning from the House of Lords,
+whither he had been to open Parliament; and when it was found that
+they had missed their aim, the mob attacked the royal carriage,
+pelting it with large stones, and breaking the windows; nor was it
+without some difficulty that the escort of troops cleared a path
+for him through the mob, and enabled him to reach Carlton House in
+safety.</p>
+<p>The first effect of these outrages was to damage the cause of
+Reform itself, even such uncompromising reformers as Lord Grey
+denouncing "meetings at which extensive schemes of Reform were
+submitted to individuals incapable of judging of their propriety."
+The second consequence was to compel the ministers to take steps to
+prevent a recurrence of such tumults and crimes. At first they were
+contented with a temporary suspension of the <i>Habeas Corpus</i>
+Act; but, even while that suspension was in force, it did not
+entirely prevent meetings, at some of which the language of the
+speakers certainly bordered on sedition; and when the suspension
+was taken off, fresh meetings on a larger scale, and of a more
+tumultuous character than ever, were held in more than one rural
+district; finally, in July of 1819, the whole kingdom was thrown
+into a violent state of excitement by a meeting held at Birmingham,
+at which the leaders, assuming the newly-invented party name of
+Radicals, not only demanded the remodelling of the whole system of
+government, but, because Birmingham as yet sent no members to the
+House of Commons, took it upon themselves to elect Sir Charles
+Wolseley, a baronet of respectable family, as their representative
+to the Parliament, and charged him to claim a place in the House of
+Commons in the next session, by the side of those elected in
+obedience to the royal writs. Sir Charles was at once arrested on
+the charge of having at this meeting used seditious language
+calculated to lead to a breach of the peace; but the Radical
+leaders, far from being intimidated by this demonstration of vigor
+on the part of the government, immediately summoned a similar
+meeting in Manchester, announcing their intention to elect a
+representative of that great town likewise, which, though the
+largest of all the manufacturing towns, was also unrepresented in
+the Imperial Parliament. The magistrates prohibited the meeting. It
+was only postponed for a week, when the people assembled in such
+formidable numbers (no estimate reckoned them at fewer than
+60,000), that the ordinary civil authorities deemed themselves
+unequal to dealing with it, and called in the aid first of the
+Yeomanry and then of a hussar regiment. The soldiers behaved with
+great forbearance, as soldiers always do behave on such occasions;
+but they were bound to execute the orders which were given them to
+arrest some of the leaders, and, in the tumult which was the
+inevitable consequence of their attempt to force a way through so
+dense a crowd, three or four lives were, unfortunately, lost.</p>
+<p>So unusual a catastrophe called out the energies of both
+parties. The Radical leaders published manifestoes declaring the
+people had been "massacred" by the soldiers by the orders of the
+government. Meetings were held to denounce the conduct of the
+ministers, one being even promoted by Lord Fitzwilliam, as
+Lord-lieutenant of Yorkshire, a dignity of which he was instantly
+deprived; while, on the other hand, the grand-juries of Cheshire
+and Lancashire made reports of the condition of those counties to
+the Secretary of State, which showed that a most alarming spirit
+prevailed over the greater part of the district. "The most
+inflammatory publications had been issued in the principal towns,
+at a price which put them within the reach of the poorest classes
+of society. The training and military drilling of large bodies of
+men under regular leaders had been carried on to a great extent for
+some time, chiefly by night; and there was no doubt that an
+extensive manufacture of arms was going on." What was a hardly
+inferior symptom of danger was a system of intimidation which
+prevailed to a most serious degree. Many magistrates had received
+notices threatening their lives, and combinations had been formed
+to withhold custom from publicans and shopkeepers who had come
+forward to support the civil power. In many parts of the two
+counties the grand-juries declared "that no warrant of arrest or
+other legal process could be executed; the payment of taxes had
+ceased, and the landlords were threatened with the discontinuance
+of their rents."</p>
+<p>It was admitted that the spirit of disaffection was local,
+confined to three or four counties; but those counties were, next
+to Middlesex itself, the most populous and among the most important
+in the kingdom, and there was danger lest the feeling, if not
+checked, might spread. The crisis seemed so momentous, that some
+even of the Opposition leaders volunteered their counsels and aid
+to the ministers in dealing with it. And the ministers, after long
+deliberation, decided on calling Parliament together in November,
+and introducing some bills which they conceived necessary to enable
+them to restore and preserve tranquillity. They were six in number;
+and&mdash;perhaps, with some sarcastic reference to Gardiner's Six
+Acts in the sixteenth century&mdash;they were very commonly spoken
+of as Lord Sidmouth's Six Acts, that noble lord being the
+Home-secretary, to whose department they belonged. It is not
+necessary here to do more than mention the general purport of five
+of them. One prohibited military training without the sanction of
+the government; another empowered magistrates to search for arms
+which they had reason to believe were collected for illegal
+purposes; the third authorized the seizure of seditious and
+blasphemous libels; the fourth subjected publications below a
+certain size to the same stamp as that required for a newspaper;
+the fifth regulated the mode of proceeding in trials for
+misdemeanor of a political character. But these enactments were
+regarded as little more than arrangements of detail or procedure
+involving no principles, and some of them were admitted even by the
+most steadfast opponents of the ministers to be necessary. But the
+sixth, designed to restrain the practice of holding large open-air
+meetings&mdash;not, indeed, forever, but for a certain period,
+fixed at five years&mdash;was strongly resisted by the greater
+portion of the Whig party in both Houses, as a denial to the people
+of one of their most ancient and constitutional rights.[<a href=
+"#note-179">179</a>]</p>
+<p>Its principal clauses enacted that "no meeting exceeding the
+number of fifty persons (except a meeting of any county or division
+of any county, called by the Lord-lieutenant or sheriff of such
+county, etc., or by five or more acting justices of the peace for
+such county, or by the major part of the grand-jury; or any meeting
+of any city, borough, etc., called by the mayor or other head
+officer of such city, etc.) should be holden for the purpose or on
+the pretext of deliberating upon any public grievance, or upon any
+matter relating to any trade, manufacture, etc., or upon any matter
+of Church or State, or of considering, proposing, or agreeing to
+any petition, address, etc., etc., unless in the parish or township
+within which the persons calling any such meeting usually dwell;"
+and it required six days' notice of the intention to hold such
+meetings, with their time, place, and object, to be given to a
+magistrate. It empowered the magistrate to whom such notice was
+given to alter the time and place. It forbade adjournments intended
+to evade these prohibitions. It forbade any one to attend such
+meetings except freeholders of the county, or parishioners of the
+parish, or members of the corporation of the city or borough in
+which they were held, or members of the House of Commons for such
+places. It empowered magistrates to proceed to the places where
+such meetings were being held, and, if they thought it necessary,
+to require the aid of constables. It enacted that any meeting, the
+tendency of which should be "to incite or stir up the people to
+hatred and contempt of the person of his Majesty, his heirs and
+successors, or of the government or constitution of this country as
+by law established, should be deemed an unlawful assembly." It
+empowered one or more justices of the peace, in the event of any
+meeting being held contrary to the provisions of this act, to warn
+every one present, in the King's name, to depart; and made those
+who did not depart in obedience to such warning liable to
+prosecution for felony, and, if convicted, to seven years'
+transportation. It forbade the display of flags, banners, or
+ensigns at any meeting, and the employment of any drum, or military
+or other music; but it excepted from its operation "any meeting or
+assembly which should be wholly holden in any room."</p>
+<p>There was one peculiarity in the line taken by the opponents of
+the bill, that they did not deny that the meetings which had
+induced the ministers to propose it were an evil, dangerous to the
+general tranquillity; but it was strongly urged by Lord Erskine and
+others that the existing laws were quite strong enough to deal with
+them, so that a new enactment was superfluous; and by others, in
+both Houses, that such meetings were "an ancient and constitutional
+mode of discussing abuses or petitioning Parliament," any
+interference with which was a greater evil than the meetings
+themselves, as being a violation of the constitution. Mr. Brougham
+in particular admitted, to the full extent of the assertions of the
+ministers themselves, "the wickedness and folly of many of the
+speeches" made at the recent meetings. He expressed with great
+force his entire disapproval of the system on which these meetings
+had been conducted, and admitted that the martial array which had
+been exhibited, and the vastness of the numbers of those who had
+attended, were of themselves calculated to excite alarm; but he
+declared that "he could not on that account acquiesce in a total
+subversion of a popular right." On the other hand, the ministers
+themselves did not deny "the general right of the people to
+petition the Legislature, or to carry their addresses to the foot
+of the throne. And therefore (as Lord Harrowby, the President of
+the Council, admitted) there could be no doubt of their right to
+assemble, so far as was necessary to agree to their petitions or
+addresses. It was a right that did not depend on the Bill of
+Rights, on which it was usually grounded, but had existed long
+before. But this bill," he contended, "imposed no restrictions on
+the legitimate enjoyment of that privilege; it only regulated the
+meetings at which it was to be exercised." And Lord Liverpool
+affirmed that the bill was not only "consistent with the existing
+laws and principles of the constitution, but was even proposed in
+furtherance of those principles, and for the purpose of protecting
+the people of this country against a series of evils which, if not
+checked, must subvert their laws and liberties."</p>
+<p>In attempting to form a correct judgment on the question whether
+this bill were constitutional or unconstitutional, it must, I
+think, be admitted that, as has been remarked before, the terms
+"constitutional" and "unconstitutional" are somewhat vague and
+elastic. There is no one document&mdash;not Magna Charta, nor the
+Petition of Eight, nor the Bill of Rights&mdash;which can be said
+to contain the whole of the British constitution. Its spirit and
+principles are, indeed, to be found in all the laws, to which they
+give animation and life, but not in any one law. And among its
+leading principles are those which embrace the right of every
+individual to freedom of action and freedom of speech, so long as
+he does not commit any crime himself, nor tempt others to do so.
+Yet it does not follow that a new enactment which for a while
+abridges or suspends that freedom of action or speech is
+inconsistent with those constitutional principles.</p>
+<p>Ministers, to whom the government of a country is intrusted, do
+wrong if they limit their operations to the punishment of offences
+which have been committed. It is at least equally their duty, as
+far as possible, to prevent their commission; to take precautionary
+measures, especially at times when there is notorious danger of
+offences being committed. At the same time they are bound not to
+legislate under the influence of panic; not to yield to fears
+having no substantial ground. And in their measures of precaution
+they are farther bound to depart from or overstep the ordinary law
+as little as is compatible with the attainment of their object. In
+all such cases each action of theirs must stand or fall by its own
+merits; by the greatness of the emergency which has caused it, and
+by its sufficiency for its end. For as no law, except such as
+forbids moral crimes, is invariable, so even the dearest privileges
+of each subject, being his for the common good, are liable to
+temporary suspension for that common good. But the burden of
+justification lies on those who propose that suspension.</p>
+<p>Now, that this bill was such a suspension of the
+long-established rights of the subject, and so far an overstepping
+of the principles of the constitution, is admitted by the very fact
+of its framers only proposing for it a temporary authority. Had it
+not invaded a valuable and real right, it might have been made of
+perpetual obligation. But it is not easy to see how it can be
+denied that the dangers against which it was intended to guard were
+also real. It was certain that itinerant demagogues were visiting
+districts with which they had no connection, for the sole purpose
+of stirring up political agitation. It was clear that such meetings
+as they convened, where those assembled could only be counted by
+tens of thousands, were too large for deliberation, and were only
+meant for intimidation; and equally clear that, though the existing
+laws may have armed the magistrate with authority to disperse such
+meetings, they did not furnish him with the means of doing so
+without at least the risk of bloodshed (for such a risk must be
+involved in the act of putting soldiers in motion), and still less
+did they invest him with the desirable power of preventing such
+meetings. It was necessary, therefore, to go back to the original
+principles and objects of every constitution, the tranquillity,
+safety, and welfare of the nation at large. And it does not appear
+that this bill went beyond what was necessary for that object.
+Indeed, though party divisions are not always trustworthy tests of
+the wisdom or propriety of a measure, the unusual magnitude of the
+majorities by which on this occasion the minister was supported in
+both Houses may fairly be regarded as a testimony to the necessity
+of the bill,[<a href="#note-180">180</a>] while its sufficiency was
+proved by the abandonment of all such meetings, and the general
+freedom from agitation in every part Of the country which prevailed
+in the following year, though its most remarkable incident was one
+of which demagogues might well have taken advantage, if they had
+not had so convincing a proof of the power of government, and of
+the resolution of the ministers to exert it.[<a href=
+"#note-181">181</a>]</p>
+<p>Notes:</p>
+<p><a name="note-172" id="note-172">
+<!-- Note Anchor 172 --></a>[Footnote 172: Against Junot, at
+Vimiera and Rolica, in 1808; Soult, at Oporto, and Victor, at
+Talavera, in 1809; Massena and Ney, at Busaco and Torres Vedras, in
+1810; Mass&eacute;na and Bessi&eacute;res, at Fuentes d'Onor, in
+1811. Ciudad Rodrigo and Badajoz had been taken in 1812, in spite
+of the neighborhood of Soult and Marmont. In July, 1813, a month
+after the formation of Lord Liverpool's ministry, he routed Marmont
+at Salamanca; in 1813 he took Madrid, and routed Jourdain at
+Vittoria; and, having subsequently defeated Soult at Sauroren, he
+crossed the French frontier in October.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-173" id="note-173">
+<!-- Note Anchor 173 --></a>[Footnote 173: A resolution, moved by
+Mr. Canning, to take the claims of the Roman Catholics into
+consideration in the next session had been carried in June by the
+large majority of 129; and when Lord Wellesley brought forward a
+similar motion in the House of Lords, not only did Lord Liverpool
+"protest against its being inferred from any declaration of his
+that it was, or ever had been, his opinion that under no
+circumstances would it be possible to make any alteration in the
+laws respecting the Roman Catholics," but the Chancellor, Lord
+Eldon, who was generally regarded as the stoutest champion of the
+existing law, rested his opposition entirely on political grounds,
+explaining carefully that he opposed the motion, "not because he
+quarrelled with the religion of the Roman Catholics, but because
+their religious opinions operated on their political principles in
+such a way as to render it necessary to adopt some defence against
+them," and met the motion by moving the previous question, avowedly
+because "he did not wish, at once and forever, to shut the door of
+conciliation;" and the previous question was only carried by a
+single vote&mdash;126 to 125.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-174" id="note-174">
+<!-- Note Anchor 174 --></a>[Footnote 174: "It (difference on the
+Catholic question) was an evil submitted to by the government, of
+which Mr. Fox, Lord Grenville, and Lord Grey were members, in the
+years 1806, 1807, as well as by the governments of Mr. Perceval,
+Lord Liverpool, and the Duke of Wellington."&mdash;<i>Peel's
+Memoirs</i>, i., 62. This passage would seem to imply that Peel
+believed the Catholic question to have been left "open" in 1806;
+but there is not, so far as the present writer is aware, any trace
+of such an arrangement on record, and Lord Liverpool's letter to
+the King, of November 10, 1826 ("Life," iii., 436), shows clearly
+that he was not aware of such a precedent for the arrangement
+which, in 1812, "he and others advised his Majesty" to consent to.
+Moreover, the condemnation passed on it by Mr. Ponsonby, who had
+been Chancellor of Ireland in 1806 and 1807, seems a clear proof
+that he knew nothing of it, though it is hardly possible that he
+should have been ignorant of it if it had existed.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-175" id="note-175">
+<!-- Note Anchor 175 --></a>[Footnote 175: To whom the chief glory
+of the Waterloo campaign belongs there can, of course, be no doubt;
+and though the Austrians and Prussians put forward a claim to an
+equal share, and Russia even to a preponderating one, in the first
+deposition of Napoleon, he himself constantly attributed his fall
+more to the Peninsular contest than to any of his wars east of the
+Rhine. And, indeed, it is superfluous to point out that almost to
+the last he gained occasional victories over the Continental
+armies, but that he never gained one advantage over the British
+force; and that Wellington invaded France the first week of
+October, 1813&mdash;nearly three months before a single Russian or
+German soldier crossed the Rhine.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-176" id="note-176">
+<!-- Note Anchor 176 --></a>[Footnote 176: Letter to Sir W. Scott,
+Twiss's "Life of Lord Eldon," ii., 272. It is remarkable that in
+his "Life of Lord Ellenborough" Lord Campbell takes no notice of
+this case.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-177" id="note-177">
+<!-- Note Anchor 177 --></a>[Footnote 177: The opinion of the
+Attorney and Solicitor General, Sir S. Shepperd and Sir R. Gifford,
+is given at length in the author's "Life of Lord Liverpool," ii.,
+373.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-178" id="note-178">
+<!-- Note Anchor 178 --></a>[Footnote 178: It is a shrewd
+observation of Sully, that it is never any abstract desire for
+theoretical reforms, or even for increased privileges, which
+excites in lower classes to discontent and outrage, but only
+impatience under actual suffering.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-179" id="note-179">
+<!-- Note Anchor 179 --></a>[Footnote 179: The bill (entitled "The
+Seditious Meetings Prevention Bill"), 60 George III., c. 6, is
+given at full length in Hansard's "Parliamentary Debates," series
+1., vol. xli., p. 1655.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-180" id="note-180">
+<!-- Note Anchor 180 --></a>[Footnote 180: In the House of Lords
+the majority was 135 to 38; in the House of Commons, 851 to 128.
+And even of this minority, many would have supported the bill, if
+the ministers would have consented to adopt an amendment proposed
+by Lord Althorp, to limit its operation to a few of the northern
+and midland counties, in which alone, as he contended, any spirit
+of dangerous disaffection had been exhibited.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-181" id="note-181">
+<!-- Note Anchor 181 --></a>[Footnote 181: It may be as well to
+mention that these pages were written in the autumn of 1880.]</p>
+<hr />
+<a name="CH8" id="CH8"><!-- CH8 --></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER VIII.</h2>
+<p class="blockquote">Survey of the Reign of George III.&mdash;The
+Cato Street Conspiracy.&mdash;The Queen's Return to England, and
+the Proceedings against her.&mdash;The King Visits Ireland and
+Scotland.&mdash;Reform of the Criminal Code.&mdash;Freedom of
+Trade.&mdash;Death of Lord Liverpool.&mdash;The Duke of Wellington
+becomes Prime-minister.&mdash;Repeal of the Test and Corporation
+Act.&mdash;O'Connell is Elected for Clare.&mdash;Peel Resigns his
+Seat for Oxford.&mdash;Catholic Emancipation.&mdash;Question of the
+Endowment of the Roman Catholic Clergy.&mdash;Constitutional
+Character of the Emancipation.&mdash;The Propriety of Mr. Peel's
+Resignation of his Seat for Oxford Questioned.</p>
+<p>In the first month of 1820 George III. died. His had been an
+eventful reign, strangely checkered with disaster and glory; but,
+if we compare its close with its commencement, it was still more
+remarkably distinguished by a development of the resources and an
+increase in the wealth and power of the nation, to which the
+history of no other country in the same space of time affords any
+parallel.</p>
+<p>Regarded from the first point of view, our successes greatly
+outweighed our disasters. The loss of our North American Colonies,
+the only event which can be so described, was far more than
+counterbalanced by our vast acquisitions in India, at the Cape of
+Good Hope, and Malta; while to our maritime supremacy, in the
+complete establishment of which Rodney and Nelson had crowned the
+work of Anson and Hawke, was now added a splendor of military
+renown far surpassing that achieved by any other of the nations
+which had borne their share in the overthrow of Napoleon.</p>
+<p>The increase of our resources is sufficiently shown by a single
+fact. At his accession George III. found the kingdom engaged in the
+great seven years' war; one British army employed beyond the Rhine,
+another in India; fleets traversing the seas in every direction,
+capturing the Havana, in the West Indies; Manilla, in the East; and
+routing French squadrons in sight of their own harbors. While, to
+maintain these varied armaments, supplies were voted by Parliament
+in 1761 to what Lord Stanhope calls "the unprecedented amount of
+almost twenty millions." In 1813 the supplies reached nearly six
+times that amount,[<a href="#note-182">182</a>] and that prodigious
+sum was raised with greater ease than the revenue of 1761, the
+interest on the necessary loans being also lower than it had been
+on the former occasion.</p>
+<p>The philosophical man of science will point with at least equal
+exultation to the great discoveries in art and science; to the
+achievements of the mechanic, the engineer, and the chemist; to the
+labors of Brindley and Arkwright and Watts, to which, indeed, this
+great expansion of the resources and growth of the wealth of the
+country is principally owing.</p>
+<p>While, as the preceding chapters of this work have been designed
+to show, our political progress and advancement had been no less
+steady or valuable; yet, important from a constitutional point of
+view as were many of the labors of our legislators in these sixty
+years, they are surpassed in their influence on the future history
+of the nation, as well as in the reality and greatness of the
+changes which were produced by them in the constitution, by the
+transactions of the reigns of the next two sovereigns, though the
+two united scarcely equalled in their duration a quarter of that of
+their venerable father.</p>
+<p>It has been seen how Pitt was baffled in his efforts to remodel
+the House of Commons, and to remove the disabilities under which
+the Roman Catholics labored, the reasons for which, even granting
+that they had been sufficient to justify their original imposition,
+had, in his judgment, long passed away. His pursuit of the other
+great object of his domestic policy, the emancipation of trade from
+the shackles which impeded its universal development, was rudely
+interrupted by the pressure of the war forced upon him by that very
+nation which he had desired to make the first partner, if one may
+use such an expression, in the prosperity which he hoped to diffuse
+by his commercial treaty with her. But, as in the case of other men
+in advance of their age, the principles which he had asserted were
+destined to bear fruit at a later period. And the mere fact of a
+change in the person of the sovereign seemed to make a change in
+the policy hitherto pursued less unnatural.</p>
+<p>Yet, memorable as the reforms which it witnessed were destined
+to make it, no reign ever commenced with more sinister omens than
+that at which we have now arrived. The new King had not been on the
+throne a month, when a conspiracy was discovered, surpassing in its
+treasonable atrocity any that had been heard of in the kingdom
+since the days of the Gunpowder Plot; and, even before those
+concerned in that foul crime had been brought to punishment, the
+public mind was yet more generally and profoundly agitated by a
+scandal which, in one point of view, was still more painful, as in
+some degree involving the whole kingdom in its disgrace.</p>
+<p>The marriage of the present sovereign to Mrs. Fitzherbert has
+already been mentioned. A few years afterward, in the year 1795,
+regarding that marriage as illegal, he had contracted a second with
+his cousin, the Princess Caroline of Brunswick. But, even in royal
+families, a more unfortunate alliance had never taken place. They
+had never met till she arrived in England for the wedding; and, as
+he had never professed any other motive for consenting to the match
+than a desire to obtain the payment of his debts, he did not think
+it necessary to disguise his feelings, or to change his habits, or
+even to treat her with decency for a single day. On his very first
+introduction to her he behaved to her with marked
+discourtesy.[<a href="#note-183">183</a>] Shortly after the
+marriage he formally separated himself from her, and, both before
+and after the separation, lived in undisguised licentiousness. She,
+on her part, indignant at his neglect and infidelity, and
+exasperated at the restrictions which he presently placed on her
+intercourse with their only child, made no secret of her feelings,
+and on many occasions displayed such disregard of the ordinary
+rules of prudence and propriety, that he had some color for charges
+of infidelity to her marriage vows which, after a few years, he
+brought against her. The King, her uncle, could not refuse to
+appoint a commission to investigate the truth of the accusation;
+but the commissioners unanimously acquitted her of any graver fault
+than imprudence. She was again received at court, from which she
+had been excluded while the inquiry was pending; but her husband's
+animosity toward her was not appeased. As time wore on, and as the
+King's derangement deprived her of her only protector, it even
+seemed as if he desired to give it all the notoriety possible, till
+at last, wearied out by his implacable persecution, she sought and
+obtained his permission to quit the country and take up her abode
+abroad. It was a most unfortunate resolution on her part. She fixed
+her residence in Italy, where she gradually learned to neglect the
+caution which she had observed in England, till, after a year or
+two, reports arose of her intimacy with a servant whom she had
+raised from a menial situation to that of the chief officer of her
+household, and whom she admitted to a familiarity of intercourse
+which others besides her husband thought quite incompatible with
+innocence. He sent agents into Italy to inquire into the truth of
+those rumors; and their report so greatly confirmed them that, even
+before the King's death, he laid it before the Prime-minister, with
+a demand that he should at once take steps to procure him a
+divorce, in which he professed to believe that the Princess herself
+would willingly acquiesce. He was so far correct, that her legal
+advisers were willing to advise her to consent to "a formal
+separation, to be ratified by an act of Parliament." But such an
+arrangement fell far short of the Prince's wishes. The Princess
+Charlotte, the heiress to his throne, had died in childbirth two
+years before, and he was anxious to be set free to marry again. The
+ministers were placed in a situation of painful embarrassment.
+There was an obvious difficulty in pointing out to one who already
+stood toward them in the character of their sovereign, and who must
+inevitably soon become so, that his own conduct made the prospect
+of obtaining a divorce from the Ecclesiastical Courts hopeless; and
+the only other expedients calculated to attain his end, "a direct
+application to Parliament for relief, founded upon the special
+circumstances of the case," or "a proceeding against the Princess
+for high-treason," were but little more promising. Indeed, it was
+afterward ascertained to be the unanimous opinion of the judges
+that the charge of high-treason could not be legally sustained,
+since the individual who was alleged to be the partner in the
+criminality imputed to her was a foreigner, and therefore, "owing
+no allegiance to the crown," could not be said to have violated
+it.[<a href="#note-184">184</a>]</p>
+<p>He chafed under their resistance to his wish, and would have
+deprived them of their offices, could he have relied on any
+successors whom he might give them proving more complaisant; but,
+before he could make up his mind, the death of George III. forced
+upon both him and them the consideration of his and his wife's
+position, since it made it necessary to remodel the prayer for the
+royal family, and instantly to decide whether her name and title as
+Queen were to be inserted in it. He was determined that they should
+not be mentioned; and, as the practice of praying for a Queen
+Consort by name appeared not to have been invariable, they were
+willing to gratify him on this point, though it was evidently
+highly probable that she would consider this as a fresh insult,
+sufficient to justify her in carrying out a threat, which she had
+recently held out, of returning to England. Her ablest advisers did
+not, indeed, regard it in this light, since the prayer as now
+framed implored the Divine protection for "all the royal family" in
+general terms, in which she might be supposed to be included, and
+made no separate mention of any member of the family.[<a href=
+"#note-185">185</a>] But, unfortunately, she was much more under
+the influence of counsellors who were neither lawyers nor
+statesmen, but who only desired to use her as a tool to obtain
+notoriety for themselves. A long negotiation ensued. It was
+inevitable that some application should be made to Parliament in
+connection with her affairs, since the annuity which had been
+settled upon her by Parliament in 1814, on the occasion of her
+departure from England, had expired with the life of the late King.
+And the ministers proposed that that annuity should now be raised
+from &pound;35,000 to &pound;50,000, on condition of her remaining
+abroad, having, by their positive refusal to concur in any
+proceedings against her while she remained abroad, extorted the
+King's acquiescence in this proposal, though he called it a "great
+and painful sacrifice of his personal feelings." They sought to
+conciliate her acceptance of it by mentioning her in it by her
+title of "Queen," and by coupling with it a sanction to her
+appointment of her law-officers, an Attorney and Solicitor General,
+an act which could only be exercised by a Queen. And, though a part
+of the condition of her residence abroad required that she should
+do so under some other title, that seemed only a conforming to an
+ordinary practice of royal princes on their travels. At the same
+time, the ministers stated frankly to Mr. Brougham, a lawyer of the
+highest reputation as an advocate, whom she had appointed her
+Attorney-general, that, if she should reject the offer, and come to
+England, as she had already announced her intention of doing, such
+a course would leave them no alternative, but would compel them to
+institute proceedings against her.</p>
+<p>Eventually she preferred the advice of others to that of Mr.
+Brougham, or, as it may, perhaps, be more consistent with the real
+fact to say, she yielded to her own feelings of hatred of her
+husband, which, it must be confessed, were far from unnatural. She
+believed, or professed to believe, that he had more to dread from
+an exposure of his conduct than she had from any revelations of her
+actions; and, under this impression, in the spring she crossed the
+Channel and took up her residence in London. It was a step which
+seemed to Lord Liverpool to leave him no alternative, and, in
+consequence, he at once took the course which he had from the
+beginning conceived her arrival would render indispensable. He
+brought down to Parliament a royal message from the King,
+announcing that her return to England had made it necessary to
+communicate to the Houses documents relating to her conduct since
+her departure from the kingdom, which he recommended to their
+immediate and serious attention. He proposed the appointment by
+ballot of a committee of the House of Lords to examine those
+documents; and when the committee had reported that the documents
+containing "allegations deeply affecting the honor of the Queen,
+etc., ... appeared to the committee calculated to affect not only
+the honor of the Queen, but also the dignity of the crown and the
+moral feelings and honor of the country, so that in their opinion,
+they should become the subject of a solemn inquiry, which might be
+best effected in the course of a legislative proceeding," he
+introduced a "Bill of Pains and Penalties" to deprive her of her
+title of Queen, and to annul her marriage.</p>
+<p>No one would willingly dwell on so melancholy and disgraceful a
+subject. As far as the Queen was concerned, a protracted
+investigation, during which a number of witnesses, favorable and
+unfavorable, were examined, left no doubt on the mind of almost all
+dispassionate people that the misconduct alleged against her had
+been abundantly proved. At the same time there was a feeling
+equally general that the King's treatment of her from the very
+beginning of their married life had disentitled him to any kind of
+relief; and this sentiment was so strongly shown by the gradual
+diminution of the majority in favor of the bill, as it proceeded
+through its several stages, that Lord Liverpool, who had already
+abandoned the clause annulling the marriage, eventually withdrew
+the whole bill, perceiving the impossibility of inducing the House
+of Commons to pass it when it should go down to that House.</p>
+<p>No act of Lord Liverpool's ministry has been attacked with
+greater bitterness than that of allowing any proceedings whatever
+to be taken against the Queen, partly on the ground that, however
+profligate her conduct had been, it had certainly not been more
+gross than that of her husband, which had provoked and given
+opportunity for her errors; partly because a great scandal was thus
+published to the world, and a shock was given to the national
+decency and morality which the ministers, above all men, were bound
+to avoid; partly, also, because the mode of proceeding adopted was
+alleged to be wholly unprecedented; and because, as was contended,
+the power of Parliament ought not to be invoked to inflict
+penalties which, if deserved, should have been left to the courts
+of law. It cannot be denied that there is weight in these
+objections; but, in estimating their force, it must be considered
+that every part of the conduct of the ministers showed that their
+motive was not the gratification of the King's private feelings,
+whether directed to the object of indulging his enmity against his
+wife or to that of obtaining freedom to contract a second marriage;
+on the contrary, so long as the Queen remained abroad, no language
+could be more distinct, consistently with the respect due to his
+royal dignity, than that in which they expressed to him their
+insurmountable objection to every mode of proceeding against her
+which he had suggested, founded almost equally on considerations of
+"the interests of his Majesty and of the monarchy,"[<a href=
+"#note-186">186</a>] and "the painful obligation" under which they
+conceived themselves to lie "of postponing their regard for his
+Majesty's feelings to great public interests."</p>
+<p>But when the Queen came to England the case was greatly altered.
+The question now forced on the consideration of the cabinet was,
+not the mode of avoiding an intolerable scandal, but the choice
+between two scandals, both of the gravest character. The scandal to
+be dreaded from the revelations of the conduct of both King and
+Queen, that could not fail to result from the investigation which,
+in justice, must precede any attempt to legislate on the subject,
+was, indeed, as great as ever; but it had now to be compared with
+the alternative scandal of allowing a woman lying under such
+grievous imputations to preside over the British court, as, if
+resident in England, and in undisturbed possession of her royal
+rank, she of necessity must preside. The consequence would
+evidently have been that the court would have been deserted by all
+who could give lustre and dignity to it by their position and
+character; and, in the slights thus offered to her, royalty and the
+monarchy themselves would seem to be brought into contempt. The
+latter scandal, too, would be the more permanent. Grievous and
+shameful as might be the disclosures which must be anticipated from
+an investigation in which the person accused must be permitted the
+employment of every means of defence, including recrimination, the
+scandal was yet one which would, to a certain extent, pass away
+with the close of the inquiry. But, if she were left undisturbed in
+the enjoyment of her royal rank, and of privileges which could not
+be separated from it, that scandal would last as long as her
+life&mdash;longer, in all probability, than the reign. It is hardly
+too much to say that the monarchy itself might have been endangered
+by the spectacle of such a King and such a Queen; and the ministers
+might fairly contend that, of two great dangers and evils, they
+had, on the whole, chosen the least.</p>
+<p>Lastly, if the Queen's conduct was to be investigated, though
+the mode adopted was denounced as unconstitutional by the
+Opposition (for, not greatly to their credit, the leading Whigs
+made her guilt or innocence a party question), it does not seem to
+deserve the epithet, though it may be confessed to have been
+unsupported by any direct precedent. Isabella, the faithless wife
+of Edward II., had, indeed, been condemned by "the Lords" to the
+forfeiture of many of the estates which she had illegally
+appropriated; but it does not appear that her violation of her
+marriage vows, or even her probable share or acquiescence in her
+husband's murder, formed any portion of the grounds of her
+deprivation. And the Parliament which attainted Catherine Howard
+proceeded solely on her confession of ante-nuptial licentiousness,
+without giving her any opportunity of answering or disproving the
+other charges which were brought against her. Unprecedented,
+therefore, the course now adopted may be admitted to have been. But
+it was the only practicable one. The different minutes of the
+cabinet, which the Prime-minister laid before the King, established
+most conclusively the correctness of their opinion that no
+impeachment for high-treason could lie against her. She could not
+be an accomplice in such an offence of one who, being a foreigner,
+could not have committed it. It was equally impossible for the King
+to sue for a divorce, as one of his subjects might have done;
+because it was the established practice of Parliament not to
+entertain a bill of divorce without the judgment of the
+Ecclesiastical Court being previously obtained and produced. And,
+under the circumstances, to obtain from the Ecclesiastical Court
+such a sentence as could alone lay the foundation for a bill of
+divorce was clearly out of the question.</p>
+<p>The case was a new and extraordinary one, and, being such, could
+only be dealt with in some new and extraordinary manner. And in all
+such cases an appeal to Parliament seems the most, if not the only,
+constitutional mode of solving the difficulty. Where the existing
+laws are silent or inapplicable, the most natural resource clearly
+is, to go back to the fountain of all law; that is, to the
+Parliament, which alone is competent to make a new law. In one
+point of view the question may seem unimportant, since we may well
+hope that no similar case will ever arise to require the precedent
+now set to be appealed to; but not unimportant, if it in any way or
+degree contributes to establish the great principle, that the
+solution of all matters of moment to the state belongs to the
+Parliament alone: a principle which, in its legitimate
+completeness, carries with it a condemnation of many a modern
+association whose object, whether avowed or disguised, is clearly
+to supersede where it fails to intimidate the sole constitutional
+Legislature.</p>
+<p>The abandonment of the bill was naturally hailed as a triumph by
+the Queen and her partisans; but with the excitement of the
+struggle against the government the interest taken in her case died
+away. The next year, when she demanded to be crowned with her
+husband, his refusal to admit her claim elicited scarcely any
+sympathy for her under this renewed grievance; in truth, it was one
+as to which precedent was unfavorable to her demand. And the
+mortification at finding herself already almost forgotten
+contributed to bring on an illness of which she died in less than a
+year after the termination of what was called her trial; and in a
+short time both she and it were forgotten.</p>
+<p>For the next few years the history of the kingdom is one of
+progressive correction of abuses or defects. The King paid visits
+to Ireland and Scotland, parts of his dominions which his father
+had never once visited, and in both was received with the most
+exultant and apparently sincere acclamations. And, though one great
+calamity fell on the ministry in the loss of Lord
+Castlereagh&mdash;who, in a fit of derangement, brought on by the
+excitement of overwork, unhappily laid violent hands on
+himself&mdash;his death, sad as it was, could not be said to weaken
+or to affect the general policy of the cabinet. Indeed, as he was
+replaced at the Foreign Office by his old colleague and rival, Mr.
+Canning, in one point of view the administration may be said to
+have been strengthened by the change, since, as an orator, Canning
+had confessedly no equal in either House of Parliament. Another
+change was productive of still more practical advantage. Lord
+Sidmouth retired from the Home Office, and was succeeded by Mr.
+Peel, previously Secretary for Ireland; and the transfer of that
+statesman to an English office facilitated reforms, some of which
+were as yet little anticipated even by the new Secretary himself.
+The earliest of them, and one not the least important in its
+bearing on the well-doing of society, the mitigation of the
+severity of our Criminal Code, was, indeed, but the following up of
+a series of measures in the same direction which had been commenced
+in the time of the Duke of Portland's second administration, and,
+it must be added, in spite of its resistance. The influence of
+various trades, and of the owners of different kinds of property,
+pressing in turns upon our legislators, had rendered our code the
+most sanguinary that had, probably, ever existed in Christendom.
+Each class of proprietor regarded only the preservation of his own
+property, and had no belief in the efficacy of any kind of
+protection for it, except such as arose from the fear of death; nor
+any doubt that he was justified in procuring the infliction of that
+penalty to avert the slightest loss to himself. The consequence was
+that, at the beginning of the present century, there were above two
+hundred offences the perpetrators of which were liable to capital
+punishment, some of a very trivial character, such as cutting down
+a hop-vine in a Kentish hop-garden, robbing a rabbit-warren or a
+fish-pond, personating an out-pensioner of Greenwich Hospital, or
+even being found on a high-road with a blackened face, the
+intention to commit a crime being inferred from the disguise, even
+though no overt act had been committed. An act of Elizabeth made
+picking a pocket a capital offence; another, passed as late as the
+reign of William III., affixed the same penalty to shop-lifting,
+even when the article stolen might not exceed the value of five
+shillings. And the fault of these enactments was not confined to
+their unreasonable cruelty; they were as mischievous even to those
+whom they were designed to protect as they were absurd, as some
+owners began to perceive. In the list of capital offences was that
+of stealing linen from a bleaching-ground. And a large body of
+bleachers presented a petition to Parliament entreating the repeal
+of the statute which made it such on the ground that, practically,
+it had been found not to strike terror into the thieves, but almost
+to secure them impunity from the reluctance of juries to find a
+verdict which would sentence a fellow-creature to the gallows for
+such an offence.</p>
+<p>Nor was this by any means the only instance in which the
+barbarity of the law defeated its object. And its combined impolicy
+and inhumanity had some years before attracted the notice of Sir
+Samuel Romilly, who had been Solicitor-general in the
+administration of 1806, and who, shortly after its dissolution,
+began to apply himself to the benevolent object of procuring the
+repeal of many of the statutes in question, and in the course of a
+few years did succeed in obtaining the substitution of milder
+penalties for several of the less flagitious offences. He died in
+1818; but the work which he had began was continued by Sir James
+Mackintosh, a man of even more conspicuous ability, and one who
+could adduce his own experience in favor of the changes which he
+recommended to the Parliament, since he had filled the office of
+Recorder of Bombay for eight years, and had discharged his duties
+with a most diligent and consistent avoidance of capital
+punishment, which he had never inflicted except for murder; his
+lenity, previously unexampled in that land, having been attended
+with a marked diminution of crime. He procured the substitution of
+milder penalties in several additional cases; and at last, in 1822,
+he carried a resolution engaging the House of Commons "the next
+session to take into its serious consideration the means of
+increasing the efficacy of the criminal law by abating its undue
+rigor." And this success had the effect of inducing the new
+minister to take the question into his own hands. Peel saw that it
+was one which, if it were to be dealt with at all, ought to be
+regulated by the government itself, and not be left to independent
+members, who could not settle it with satisfactory completeness;
+and therefore, in 1823, he introduced a series of bills to carry
+out the principle implied in Mackintosh's resolution of the
+preceding year, not only simplifying the law, but abolishing the
+infliction of capital punishment in above a hundred cases. He was
+unable to carry out his principle as fully as he could have
+desired. The prejudice in favor of still retaining death as a
+punishment for forgery was too strong for even his resolution as
+yet to overbear, though many private bankers supplied him with the
+same arguments against it in their case which had formerly been
+alleged by the bleachers. But the example which he now set,
+enforced as it was with all the authority of the government, was
+followed in many subsequent sessions, till at last our code,
+instead of the most severe, has become the most humane in Europe,
+and death is now never inflicted except for murder, or crimes
+intended or calculated to lead to murder. It is worth remarking,
+however, that neither Romilly, Mackintosh, nor Peel ever
+entertained the slightest doubt of the right of a government to
+inflict capital punishment. In the last address which Mackintosh
+delivered to the grand-jury at Bombay he had said: "I have no doubt
+of the right of society to inflict the punishment of death on
+enormous crimes, wherever an inferior punishment is not sufficient.
+I consider it as a mere modification of the right of self-defence,
+which may as justly be exercised in deterring from attack as in
+repelling it."[<a href="#note-187">187</a>] And in his diary, when
+speaking of a death-warrant which he had just signed, he says: "I
+never signed a paper with more perfect tranquillity of mind. I felt
+agitation in pronouncing the sentence, but none in subscribing the
+warrant; I had no scruple of conscience on either occasion."</p>
+<p>And it seems that his position is unassailable. The party whose
+interest is to be kept in view by the Legislature in imposing
+punishments on offences is society, the people at large, not the
+offender. The main object of punishment is to deter rather than to
+reform; to prevent crime, not to take vengeance on the criminal.
+And, if crime be more effectually prevented by moderate than by
+severe punishments, society has a right to demand, for its own
+security (as a matter of policy, not of justice), that the moderate
+punishment shall, on that ground, be preferred. That punishments
+disproportioned in their severity to the magnitude of the offence
+often defeated their object was certain. Not only had jurymen been
+known to confess that they had preferred violating their oaths to
+doing still greater violence to their consciences, by sending a man
+to the gallows for a deed which, in their opinion, did not deserve
+it, but the very persons who had been injured by thefts or
+forgeries were often deterred from prosecution of the guilty by the
+knowledge that the forfeiture of their lives must follow their
+conviction. It was almost equally certain that criminals calculated
+beforehand on the chance of impunity which the known prevalence of
+these feelings afforded them. Wherever the sympathy of the public
+does not go along with the law, it must, to a great extent, fail;
+and that the terrible frequency of sanguinary punishment had failed
+in all its objects, was proved by the fact that, in spite of the
+numerous executions which took place, crimes increased in a still
+greater proportion than the population. Under the reformed system,
+now first inaugurated on an extensive scale, crimes have become
+rarer, detection and punishment more certain&mdash;a combination of
+results which must be the object equally of the law-giver and the
+philanthropist.</p>
+<p>It is not quite foreign to this subject to relate that, a year
+or two before, a mode of trial had been abolished which, though
+long disused, by some curious oversight had still been allowed to
+remain on the statute-book. In the feudal times either the
+prosecutor or the prisoner, in cases of felony, had a right to
+claim that the cause should be decided by "wager of battle;" but it
+was an ordeal which, with one exception in the reign of George II.,
+had not been mentioned for centuries. In 1817, however, the
+relatives of a woman who had been murdered, being dissatisfied with
+the acquittal of a man who had been indicted as her murderer, sued
+out "an appeal of murder" against him, on which he claimed to have
+the appeal decided by "wager of battle," and threw down a glove on
+the floor of the court to make good his challenge. The claim was
+protested against by the prosecutor; but Lord Ellenborough, the
+Chief-justice, pronounced judgment that, "trial by battle having
+been demanded, it was the legal and constitutional mode of trial,
+and must be awarded. It was the duty of the judges to pronounce the
+law as it was, and not as they might wish it to be."[<a href=
+"#note-188">188</a>] He gave sentence accordingly; and, had the two
+parties been of equal stature and strength, the Judges of the
+Common Pleas might have been seen, in their robes, presiding from
+sunrise till sunset over a combat to be fought, as the law
+prescribed, with stout staves and leathern shields, till one should
+cry "Craven," and yield up the field. Fortunately for them, the
+alleged murderer was so superior in bodily strength to his
+adversary, that the latter declined the contest. But the public
+advancement of the claim for such a mode of decision was fatal to
+any subsequent exercise of it; and, in spite of the Common Council
+of London, who, confiding, perhaps, in the formidable appearance
+presented by some of the City Champions on Lord Mayor's Day,
+petitioned Parliament to preserve it, the next year the
+Attorney-general brought in a bill to abolish it, and the judges
+were no longer compelled to pronounce an absurd sentence in
+obedience to an obsolete law, framed at a time when personal
+prowess was a virtue to cover a multitude of sins, and might was
+the only right generally acknowledged.</p>
+<p>The foundation, too, was laid for other reforms. Lord Liverpool
+was more thoroughly versed than any of his predecessors, except
+Pitt, in the soundest principles of political economy; and in one
+of the first speeches which he made in the new reign he expressed a
+decided condemnation, not only of any regulations which were
+designed to favor one trade or one interest at the expense of
+another, but generally of the whole system and theory of
+protection; and one of his last measures made an alteration in the
+manner of taxing corn imported from foreign countries, which was
+greatly to the advantage of the consumer. It was known as the
+"sliding-scale," the tax on imported corn varying with the price in
+the market, rising when the price fell, and falling when it rose;
+the design with which it was framed being to keep the price to the
+consumer at all times as nearly equal as possible. At first,
+however, it was vehemently denounced by the bulk of the
+agriculturists, who were re-enforced on this occasion by a large
+party from among the Whigs, and especially by some of those
+connected with Ireland. But a more suitable period for discussing
+the establishment of Free-trade as the ruling principle of our
+financial policy will occur hereafter.</p>
+<p>The introduction of the sliding-scale was almost the last act of
+Lord Liverpool's ministry. At the beginning of 1827 he was
+preparing a fresh measure on the same subject, the effect of which
+was intended to diminish still farther the protection which the
+former act had given, and which was in consequence denounced by
+many landholders of great wealth and influence, led, on this
+subject, by the King's favorite brother, the Duke of York.[<a href=
+"#note-189">189</a>] But, a few days after the meeting of
+Parliament, he was struck down by an attack of paralysis, from
+which he never recovered.</p>
+<p>In his post as Prime-minister he was succeeded by Canning, not
+without great reluctance on the part of the King; not, probably, so
+much because he feared to find in him any desire to depart from the
+policy of Lord Liverpool, except on the Catholic question (for even
+on matters of foreign policy, on which Canning had always been
+supposed most to fix his attention, he had adopted the line which
+Lord Liverpool had laid down for the cabinet with evident
+sincerity),[<a href="#note-190">190</a>] as because his Majesty had
+never wholly forgiven him for the attitude which he had taken,
+differing on one or two points from that of his colleagues on the
+Queen's case. And, as has been mentioned in <a href="#endeavors">a
+former chapter</a>, he even, with the object of evading the
+necessity of appointing him, suggested to the Duke of Wellington
+the singular scheme of allowing the remaining members of Lord
+Liverpool's cabinet to select their own chief,[<a href=
+"#note-191">191</a>] which the Duke, though coinciding with him in
+his dislike of Canning, of whom he entertained a very causeless
+suspicion, rejected without hesitation, as an abandonment of the
+royal prerogative in one of its most essential duties or
+privileges. Another of his Majesty's notions, if it had been
+carried out, would have been one of the strangest violations of
+constitutional principle and practice which it is possible to
+conceive. The Duke of York, who had for many years been
+Commander-in-chief, died in January of the same year, and on his
+death the King actually proposed to take that office on himself.
+For the moment Lord Liverpool was able to induce him to abandon the
+idea, and to confer the post on the Duke of Wellington. But it had
+taken such possession of his mind that he recurred to it again
+when, on Canning becoming Prime-minister, the Duke resigned the
+office; and he pressed it on the Cabinet with singular pertinacity
+till, on Canning's death, the Duke was prevailed on to resume the
+command. It is evident that no arrangement could possibly be more
+inconsistent with every principle of the constitution. The very
+foundation of parliamentary government is, that every officer of
+every department is responsible to Parliament for the proper
+discharge of his duties. But the investiture of the sovereign with
+ministerial office of any kind must involve either the entire
+withdrawal of that department from parliamentary control, or the
+exposure of the sovereign to constant criticism, which, however
+essential to the efficiency of the department, and consequently to
+the public service, would be wholly inconsistent with the respect
+due to the crown. The first alternative it is certain that no
+Parliament would endure for a moment; the second, by impairing the
+dignity of the monarch, could scarcely fail in some degree to
+threaten the stability of the monarchy itself.</p>
+<p>Canning's ministry was too brief to give time for any
+transaction of internal importance. That of Lord Goderich, who
+succeeded him, though longer by the almanac, was practically
+briefer still, since it never met Parliament at all, but was formed
+and fell to pieces between the prorogation and the next meeting of
+the Houses. But that which followed, under the presidency of the
+Duke of Wellington, though after a few months its composition
+became entirely Tory, is memorable for the first great departure
+from those maxims of the constitution which had been reckoned among
+its most essential principles ever since the Revolution. Of the
+measures which bear that character, one was carried against the
+resistance of the ministry, the other by the ministers themselves.
+And it may at first sight appear singular that the larger measure
+of the two was proposed by the Duke after those members of his
+cabinet who had originally been supposed to give it something of a
+Liberal complexion had quitted it. The Reform Bill of 1832&mdash;to
+which we shall come in the <a href="#CH9">next
+chapter</a>&mdash;has been often called a peaceful revolution. The
+Toleration Acts, as we may call the bills of 1828 and 1829, are
+scarcely less deserving of that character.</p>
+<p>The constitution, as it had existed for the last hundred and
+forty years, had been not only a Protestant but a Church of England
+constitution. Not only all Roman Catholics, but all members of
+Protestant Non-conforming sects, all who refused to sign a
+declaration against the doctrine of Transubstantiation, and also to
+take the Sacrament according to the rites of the one Established
+Church, were disqualified for any appointment of trust. That the
+object with which the Test Act had been framed and supported was
+rather political than religious is notorious; indeed, it was
+supported by the Protestant Dissenters, though they themselves were
+to suffer by its operation, so greatly at that time did the dread
+of Popery and the French King overpower every other
+consideration.[<a href="#note-192">192</a>] On the Roman Catholics,
+after the reign of James II. had increased that apprehension, the
+restrictions were tightened. But those which inflicted disabilities
+on the Protestant Non-conformists had been gradually relaxed. The
+repeal of two, the Five Mile and the Conventicle Acts, had, as we
+have seen in the <a href="#CH7">last chapter</a>, been recent
+measures of Lord Liverpool. But the Test Act still remained, though
+it had long been practically a dead letter. The Union with
+Scotland, where the majority of the population was Presbyterian,
+had rendered it almost impossible to maintain the exclusion of
+Englishmen resembling the Scotch in their religious tenets from
+preferments, and even from seats in the House of Commons, to which
+Scotchmen were admissible. And though one Prime-minister (Stanhope)
+failed in his attempt to induce Parliament to repeal the Test Act,
+and his successor (Walpole) refused his countenance to any
+repetition of the proposal, even he did not reject such a
+compromise as was devised to evade it; and in the first year of
+George II.'s reign (by which time it was notorious that many
+Protestant Non-conformists had obtained seats in municipal
+corporations, and even in the House of Commons, who yet had never
+qualified themselves by compliance with the act of 1673) a bill of
+indemnity was introduced by the minister, with at least the tacit
+consent of the English bishops, to protect all such persons from
+the penalties which they had incurred. And the bill, which was only
+annual in its operation, was renewed almost every year, till, in
+respect of all such places or dignities (if a seat in the House of
+Commons can be described by either of those names), no one thought
+of inquiring whether a man, so long as he were a Protestant,
+adhered to the Established Church or not; members of the House of
+Commons even openly avowing their nonconformity, and at times
+founding arguments on the fact.</p>
+<p>The practical nullification of the Test Act by these periodical
+bills of indemnity had been for some time used by two opposite
+parties&mdash;both that which regarded the maintenance of the
+exclusive connection of the constitution with the Church of England
+as of vital importance to both Church and constitution, and that
+which was opposed to all restrictions or disqualiflcations on
+religious grounds&mdash;as an argument in their favor. The one
+contended that there could be no sufficient reason for repealing a
+law from which no one suffered; the other, that it was a needless
+provocation of ill-feeling to retain a law which no one ever
+dreamed of enforcing. Hitherto the latter had been the weaker
+party. One or two motions for the repeal of the Test Act, which had
+been made in former years,[<a href="#note-193">193</a>] had been
+defeated without attracting any great notice; but in the spring of
+1828 Lord John Russel, then a comparatively young member, but
+rapidly rising into influence with his party, carried a motion in
+the House of Commons for leave to bring in a bill to repeal the
+act, so far as it concerned the Protestant Non-conformists, by a
+very decisive majority,[<a href="#note-194">194</a>] in spite of
+all the efforts of Peel and his colleagues.</p>
+<p>The ministry was placed in a difficult position by his success,
+since the usual practice for a cabinet defeated on a question of
+principle was to resign; and it is probable that they would not
+have departed from that rule now, had not this defeat occurred so
+early in their official life. But on this occasion it seemed to
+them that other questions had to be considered besides the
+constitutional doctrine of submission on the part of a ministry to
+the judgment of the Parliament.[<a href="#note-195">195</a>] Theirs
+was now the fourth administration that had held office within
+twelve months; and their resignation, which would compel the
+construction of a fifth, could hardly fail not only to embarrass
+the sovereign, but to shake public confidence in government
+generally. It was also certain that they could rely on a division
+in the House of Lords being favorable to them, if they chose to
+appeal from one House to the other. Under these circumstances, they
+had to consider what their line of conduct should be, and there
+never were two ministers better suited to deal with an
+embarrassment of that kind than the Duke of Wellington and Mr.
+Peel. The Duke's doctrine of government was that "the country was
+never governed in practice according to the extreme principles of
+any party whatever;"[<a href="#note-196">196</a>] while Peel's
+disposition at all times inclined him to compromise. He was quite
+aware that on this and similar questions public feeling had
+undergone great alteration since the beginning of the century.
+There was a large and increasing party, numbering in its ranks many
+men of deep religious feeling, and many firm supporters of the
+principle of an Established Church, being also sincere believers in
+the pre-eminent excellence of the Church of England, who had a
+conscientious repugnance to the employment of the most solemn
+ordinance of a religion as a mere political test of a person's
+qualifications for the discharge of civil duties. In the opinion of
+the Bishop of Oxford (Dr. Lloyd), this was the feeling of "a very
+large majority of the Church itself," and of the
+University.[<a href="#note-197">197</a>] Peel, therefore, came to
+the conclusion&mdash;to which he had no difficulty in bringing his
+colleague, the Prime-minister&mdash;that "it might be more for the
+real interests of the Church and of religion to consent to an
+alteration in the law" than to trust to the result of the debate in
+the House of Lords to maintain the existing state of things.
+Accordingly, after several conferences with the most influential
+members of the Episcopal Bench, he framed a declaration to be
+substituted for the Sacramental test, binding all who should be
+required to subscribe it&mdash;a description which included all who
+should be appointed to a civil or corporate office&mdash;never to
+exert any power or influence which they might thus acquire to
+subvert, or to endeavor to subvert, the Protestant Church of
+England, Scotland, or Ireland, as by law established. The
+declaration was amended in the House of Lords by the addition of
+the statement, that this declaration was subscribed "on the true
+faith of a Christian," introduced at the instigation of Lord Eldon,
+who had not held the Great Seal since the dissolution of Lord
+Liverpool's administration, but who was still looked up to by a
+numerous party as the foremost champion of sound Protestantism in
+either House.</p>
+<p>Not that the addition of these words at all diminished the
+dissatisfaction with which the great lawyer regarded the bill. On
+the contrary, he believed it to be not only a weapon wilfully put
+into the hands of the enemies of the Established Church, but a
+violation of the constitution, of which, as he regarded it "the
+existing securities were a part." He pointed out that "the King
+himself was obliged to take the sacrament at his coronation;" and
+he argued from this and other grounds that "the Church of England,
+combined with the state, formed together the constitution of Great
+Britain; and that the acts now to be repealed were necessary to the
+preservation of that constitution."</p>
+<p>With every respect for that great lawyer, his argument on this
+point does not appear sustainable. For the bill in question did not
+sweep away securities for the Established Church, but merely
+substituted, for one which long disuse and indemnity had rendered
+wholly inoperative, a fresh security, which, as it would be
+steadily put in force, might fairly be expected to prove far more
+efficacious. And it can hardly be contended that it was not within
+the province of the Legislature to modify an existing law in this
+spirit and with this object, however important might be the purpose
+for which that law had originally been framed. Nay, it might fairly
+be argued that the more important that object was, the more were
+they who strengthened the means of attaining that object entitled
+to be regarded as faithful servants and supporters of the principle
+of the constitution.</p>
+<p>The measure, however, relieved the Protestant Dissenters alone.
+Not only did Lord Eldon's amendment preserve the Christian
+character of the Legislature, but the requirement to sign the
+declaration against Transubstantiation, which was unrepealed, left
+the Roman Catholics still under the same disqualifications as
+before. But the days of those disqualifications were manifestly
+numbered. Indeed, many of those who had followed the ministers in
+their original resistance to the repeal of the Test Act had been
+avowedly influenced by the conviction that it could not fail to
+draw after it the removal of the disabilities affecting the Roman
+Catholics. As has been said before, the disabilities in question
+had originally been imposed on the Roman Catholics on political
+rather than on religious grounds. And the political reasons for
+them had been greatly weakened, if not wholly swept away, by the
+extinction of the Stuart line of princes. Their retention or
+removal had, therefore, now become almost wholly a religious
+question; and the late bill had clearly established as a principle
+that, though the state had a right to require of members of other
+religious sects that they should not abuse the power which might
+arise from any positions or employments to which they might be
+admitted, to the subversion or injury of the Established Church of
+England, yet, when security for their innocuousness in this respect
+was provided, it was not justified in inquiring into the details of
+their faith. And if this were to be the rule of government for the
+future, the conclusion was irresistible that a similar security was
+all that the state was justified in demanding from Roman Catholics,
+and that it could have no warrant for investigating their opinion
+on Transubstantiation, or any other purely theological tenet. There
+could be no doubt that the feelings of the public had been
+gradually and steadily coming round to this view of the question.
+The last House of Commons had not only passed a bill to remove
+Roman Catholic disabilities (which was afterward thrown out in the
+House of Lords), but had also passed, by a still larger majority, a
+resolution, moved by Lord Francis Leveson Gower (who was now the
+Secretary for Ireland), in favor of endowing the Roman Catholic
+priests in Ireland. And at the late general election the opinions
+of the candidates on what was commonly called Catholic Emancipation
+had been the great cardinal question with a great number, probably
+a majority, of the constituencies.</p>
+<p>It may be remarked that it was not the Test Act which excluded
+Roman Catholics from Parliament, but a bill which, fifteen years
+later, had been passed (probably under the influence of Lord
+Shaftesbury) at the time when the whole kingdom was excited by the
+daily expanding revelations of the Popish Plot.[<a href=
+"#note-198">198</a>] And this bill had a loop-hole which was never
+discovered till now but the discovery of which totally changed the
+whole aspect of the question. Even before the bill repealing the
+Test Act had passed through all its stages, Sir Francis Burdett had
+again induced the House of Commons to pass a resolution condemning
+the continuance of the Roman Catholic disabilities; to which,
+however, the peers, by a far larger majority, refused their
+concurrence.[<a href="#note-199">199</a>] But, within a month of
+this division, the aspect of the whole question was changed by the
+shrewdness of an Irish barrister, who had discovered the loop-hole
+or flaw in the bill of 1678 already alluded to, and by the energy
+and promptitude with which he availed himself of his discovery. Mr.
+O'Connell had a professional reputation scarcely surpassed by any
+member of the Irish Bar. He was also a man of ancient family in the
+county of Kerry. And, being a Roman Catholic, he had for several
+years been the spokesman of his brother Roman Catholics on most
+public occasions. He now, on examination of the bill of 1678,
+perceived that, though it forbade any Roman Catholic from taking a
+seat in either House of Parliament, it contained no prohibition to
+prevent any constituency from electing him its representative. And
+when, on the occasion of some changes which were made in the
+cabinet, the representation of the County Clare was vacated by its
+member, Mr. Vesey Fitzgerald, accepting the office of President of
+the Board of Trade, O'Connell instantly offered himself as a
+candidate in opposition to the new minister, who, of course, sought
+re-election.</p>
+<p>Mr. Fitzgerald was a man who had always supported the demands of
+the Roman Catholics; he was also personally popular, and had the
+undivided support of nearly all the gentlemen and principal
+land-owners of the county, in which he himself had large property.
+But O'Connell's cause was taken up by the entire Roman Catholic
+priesthood; addresses in his favor were read at the altars of the
+different churches; and, after five days' polling, Mr. Fitzgerald
+withdrew from the contest. The Sheriff, in great perplexity, made a
+special return, reporting that "Mr. Fitzgerald was proposed, being
+a Protestant, as a fit person to represent the county in
+Parliament; that Mr. O'Connell, a Roman Catholic, was also
+proposed; that he, Mr. O'Connell, had declared before the Sheriff
+that he was a Roman Catholic, and intended to continue a Roman
+Catholic; and that a protest had been made by several electors
+against his return."</p>
+<p>It was accepted as a return of O'Connell, who, however, made no
+attempt to take his seat, though when he first stood he had assured
+the electors that there was no law to prevent him from doing so;
+but the importance of his success was not to be measured by his
+actual presence or absence in the House of Commons for the
+remainder of a session. It had made it absolutely impossible to
+continue the maintenance of the disabilities; what one Irish
+constituency had done, other Irish constituencies might be depended
+on to do.[<a href="#note-200">200</a>] And it was quite certain
+that, as opportunity offered, almost every constituency in Munster
+and Connaught, and many in Leinster, would follow the example of
+Clare, and return Roman Catholic representatives; while to retain a
+law which prevented forty or fifty men duly elected by Irish
+constituencies from taking their seats must have appeared
+impossible to all but a few, whom respect for the undoubted
+sincerity of their attachment to their own religion and to the
+constitution, as they understood it, is the only consideration
+which can save them from being regarded as dangerous fanatics. At
+all events, the ministers were not among them. And the Duke of
+Wellington, though he had previously hoped, by postponing the
+farther consideration of the question for a year or two, to gain
+time for a calmer examination of it when the existing excitement
+had cooled down,[<a href="#note-201">201</a>] at once admitted the
+conviction that the result of the Clare election had rendered
+farther delay impossible. In his view, and that of those of his
+colleagues whose judgment he estimated most highly, the Irish
+constituencies and their probable action at future elections were
+not the only parties whose opinions or feelings must be regarded by
+a responsible statesman; but to them must be added the
+constituencies of the larger island also, since, while, to quote
+the language of Mr. Peel, "the general election of 1826 had taken
+place under circumstances especially calculated to call forth the
+manifestation of Protestant feeling throughout the country," they
+had returned a majority of members in favor of concession, as was
+proved by the recent division on Sir F. Burdett's motion. Moreover,
+apart from the merits or demerits of concession, taken by itself,
+there was a manifest danger that the keeping up of the excitement
+on the subject by a continued adherence to the policy of
+restriction might, especially among such a people as the Irish, so
+impulsive, and, in the lower classes, so absolutely under the
+dominion of the priests, kindle an excitement on other subjects
+also, still more difficult to deal with. It was even already
+certain that the Roman Catholic priests were endeavoring to tamper
+with the loyalty of the soldiers of their persuasion. Nor was it
+clerical influence alone that the government had to dread. A year
+or two before a Catholic Association had been formed, which
+included among its members all the wealthiest and ablest of the
+Roman Catholic laymen, noblemen, squires, and barristers. Its
+organization had been so skilfully conducted, and all its measures
+had been so carefully kept within the requirements of the law, that
+the crown lawyers, on being consulted, pronounced it impossible to
+interfere with it; and, by what may be called a peaceful agitation,
+it had attained such extraordinary power over the minds of the bulk
+of the Roman Catholics, that the Lord-lieutenant reported that "he
+was quite certain that they could lead on the people to open
+rebellion at a moment's notice, and that their organization was
+such that, in the hands of desperate and intelligent leaders, they
+would be extremely formidable[<a href="#note-202">202</a>]."</p>
+<p>Under all these circumstances, the Duke had no hesitation in
+deciding that it had become absolutely necessary to concede the
+demands of the Roman Catholics and their supporters for a removal
+of their political disabilities. And it was equally obvious that,
+the more promptly the concession was made, the more gracious it
+would seem, and the greater was the probability of its having the
+conciliatory and tranquillizing effect the hope of which made it so
+desirable. He was not a man to lose time when he had once made up
+his mind. It was already too late in the session for anything to be
+done in 1828; but the Parliament had scarcely been prorogued before
+he put his views on the subject before the King, and began, in
+concert with the Home-secretary, to frame a bill such as he hoped
+might settle the long-agitated question, without doing more
+violence than was necessary to the feelings of those whose
+opposition or reluctance he was aware he should have to encounter:
+among whom was the King himself, who, though thirty years before he
+had, with an ostentation rather unbecoming, considering his
+position, put himself forward as an advocate of Emancipation, had
+subsequently changed his opinion, and had recently taken more than
+one occasion to declare that he had never doubted that, as the head
+and protector of the Protestant religion, he was bound to refuse
+his assent to any relaxation of the existing law.[<a href=
+"#note-203">203</a>] The Duke, however, was too well acquainted
+with his royal master's character to apprehend any real firmness of
+resistance from him; but he knew that a great majority of the
+clergy, and no small portion of the country gentlemen, were
+conscientiously and immovably fixed in opposition to any concession
+at all, some refusing to regard the question in any but a purely
+religious light, and objecting to associate in the task of
+legislation for those whom they regarded as adherents of an
+idolatrous superstition; while those who mingled political
+reasoning with that founded on theology dwelt also on the danger to
+be apprehended to the state, if political power were given to those
+whose allegiance to the King was divided with another allegiance
+which they acknowledged to a foreign prelate. And he had presently
+an unmistakable proof afforded him how great was the strength of
+this party in the country. Peel was one of the representatives of
+the University of Oxford; and, as from his earliest enjoyment of a
+seat in Parliament he had been a prominent opponent of the Roman
+Catholic claims, he considered that it was to that maintenance of a
+policy identified in their eyes with that Protestant ascendency
+which his supporters took to be both the chief bulwark and one of
+the most essential parts of the constitution that he owed his
+position as their member. With a conscientiousness which was rather
+overstrained, and not quite consistent with the legitimate position
+of a member of the House of Commons as a representative, and not a
+delegate, he now conceived that his change of view on the subject
+made it proper for him to give his constituents an opportunity of
+making choice of some one else who should more faithfully represent
+them. He accordingly resigned his seat, offering himself at the
+same time for re-election. But he was defeated by a very large
+majority, though his competitor was one who could not possibly be
+put on a level with him either for university distinction or for
+parliamentary eminence.</p>
+<p>Not the less, however, for all their difficulties and
+discouragements, did the ministers proceed in the course on which
+they had resolved. They inserted in the speech with which the King
+opened the session of 1829 a recommendation to the Houses "to take
+into consideration the whole condition of Ireland, and to review
+the laws which imposed civil disabilities on his Majesty's Roman
+Catholic subjects." And with as little delay as possible they
+introduced a bill to remove those disabilities. But there was
+another measure which they felt it to be indispensable should
+precede it. A previous sentence of the royal speech had described
+the Catholic Association as one "dangerous to the public peace, and
+inconsistent with the spirit of the constitution, keeping alive
+discord and ill-will among his Majesty's subjects, and one which
+must, if permitted to continue, effectually obstruct every effort
+permanently to improve the condition of Ireland." And the ministers
+naturally regarded it as their first duty to suppress a body which
+could deserve to be so described. They felt, too, that the large
+measure of concession and conciliation which they were about to
+announce would lose half its grace, and more than half its effect,
+if it could possibly be represented as a submission to an agitation
+and intimidation which they had not the power nor the courage to
+resist. They determined, therefore, to render such an imputation
+impossible, by previously suppressing the Association. It was
+evident that it could not be extinguished by any means short of an
+act of Parliament. And the course pursued, with the discussions
+which took place respecting it, show in a very clear and
+instructive manner the view taken by statesmen of the difference
+between what is loyal or illegal, constitutional or
+unconstitutional; their apprehension that conduct may be entirely
+legal, that is to say, within the letter of the law, but at the
+same time perfectly unconstitutional, outside of and adverse to the
+whole spirit of the constitution. The royal speech had not ventured
+to describe the Association as illegal. The Duke of Wellington
+expressly admitted that "in the original institution and formation
+of the society there was nothing strictly illegal."[<a href=
+"#note-204">204</a>] And its founder and chief, Mr. O'Connell, had
+been at all times careful to inculcate on his followers the
+necessity of avoiding any violation of the law. But the speech had
+also declared the association to be "inconsistent with the spirit
+of the constitution." And its acts, as the Duke proceeded to
+describe them, certainly bore out that declaration. "Those acts
+consisted principally in levying a tax upon certain of his
+Majesty's subjects called Catholic rent, and this by means and acts
+of extreme violence; by appointing persons to collect these rents;
+and farther by adopting measures to organize the Catholic
+population; by appointing persons to superintend that organization;
+and by assuming to themselves the government of the country; and,
+still more, affecting to assume it. Besides, they expended this
+rent in a manner contrary to, and utterly inconsistent with, all
+law and order and the constitution of the country." No member of
+either House denied the accuracy of this description of the
+Association's proceedings. And if it were correct, it was
+incontrovertible that the denunciation of it as an utterly
+unconstitutional body was not too strong. Indeed, the fact of its
+"levying a tax" upon a portion of the King's subjects (to say
+nothing of the intimidation, amounting to compulsion, by which, as
+was notorious, it was in many instances exacted) was the assumption
+of one of the most important functions of the Imperial Parliament;
+it was the erection of an <i>imperium in imperio</i>, which no
+statesmen intrusted with the government of a country can be
+justified in tolerating. And this was felt by the Opposition as
+well as by the ministers; by the Whigs as fully as by the Tories.
+The most eloquent of the Whig party, Mr. Stanley, was as decided as
+Mr. Peel himself in affirming that the existence of the Association
+was "inconsistent with the spirit of the constitution," and that it
+was "dangerous that the people of a country should look up to any
+public body distinct from the government, opposed to the
+government, and monopolizing their attachment and
+obedience."[<a href="#note-205">205</a>]</p>
+<p>It was, therefore, with the almost unanimous approval of both
+parties that the bill framed for the suppression of the Association
+was received. The framing of such a bill was not unattended by
+difficulties, as Peel acknowledged,[<a href="#note-206">206</a>]
+since "no one wished to declare that every political meeting was
+illegal;" while at the same time it was necessary to guard against
+"having its enactments evaded, since a more dangerous precedent
+than the successful evasion of acts of the Legislature could
+scarcely be conceived." But the measure, as it was proposed,
+skilfully steered clear of these difficulties. It met them by
+intrusting "the enforcement of the law to be enacted to one person
+alone." The bill proposed "to give to the Lord-lieutenant, and to
+him alone, the power of suppressing any association or meeting
+which he might think dangerous to the public peace, or inconsistent
+with the due administration of the law; together with power to
+interdict the assembly of any meeting of which previous notice
+should have been given, and which he should think likely to
+endanger the public peace, or to prove inconsistent with the due
+administration of the law." And farther, "to interdict any meeting
+or association which might be interdicted from assembling, or which
+might be suppressed under this act, from receiving and placing at
+their control any moneys by the name of rent, or any other name."
+But the act was not to be one of perpetual duration. It could not
+be concealed that such a prohibition or limitation of the general
+right of public meeting and public discussion was a suspension of a
+part of the constitution; and therefore the ministers were content
+to limit its operation "to one year and the end of the then next
+session of Parliament," feeling "satisfied that there would be no
+objection to continue it, if there should be any necessity for its
+continuance." And this limitation was a substantial mitigation of
+its severity. It made the bill, as Mr. Stanley correctly described
+it, "not a permanent infringement on the constitution, but a
+temporary deviation from it, giving those powers which were
+necessary at the moment," but not maintaining them an hour longer
+than they were necessary.</p>
+<p>And this seems to be the course most in accordance with the
+spirit of the constitution, with former practice, with
+common-sense. Deeds which violate the letter of the law can be
+dealt with by the law. But actions or courses of action which, even
+if they may be thought to overstep the law, transgress it so
+narrowly as to elude conviction, can only be reached by enactments
+which also go in some degree beyond the ordinary law; and, so going
+beyond it, are to that extent encroachments on the ordinary
+privileges and rights of the subject, and suspensions of the
+constitution. But the very term "suspension" shows that the power
+conferred is but temporary, otherwise it would be synonymous with
+abrogation. And all parties may wisely agree, as they did in this
+instance, to a temporary suspension of the people's rights, though
+there would be none to whom their permanent abrogation would not be
+intolerable.</p>
+<p>The bill, then, for the suppression of the Association passed
+with universal approval, and it may be regarded as furnishing a
+model for dealing with similar associations, if ever they should
+arise. And as soon as it was passed Mr. Peel introduced the greater
+measure, that for the repeal of the disabilities. In drawing the
+necessary bill the ministers had had two questions of special
+importance to consider: firstly, whether it should be unlimited
+concession which should be granted, such as would throw open to the
+Roman Catholics every kind of civil office; and, secondly, whether
+it should be accompanied by any other measure, which might render
+it more palatable to its adversaries, as diminishing a portion at
+least of the dangers which those who regarded the question in a
+purely political light most apprehended. On the first point it was
+determined that, with the exception of three civil offices, those
+of the Lord Chancellors of England and Ireland and the
+Lord-lieutenant of Ireland,[<a href="#note-207">207</a>] and some
+of a purely ecclesiastical character, such as the Judge of the
+Court of Arches, every kind of preferment should be opened to the
+Roman Catholics.[<a href="#note-208">208</a>] The declaration
+against Transubstantiation and the oath of supremacy, certain
+expressions in which were the obstacles which had hitherto kept the
+Roman Catholics out of office and out of Parliament, were to be
+repealed, and another to be substituted for them which should
+merely bind him who took it to defend the King, to maintain the
+Protestant succession, and to declare that "it was not an article
+of his faith, and that he renounced, rejected, and abjured the
+opinion, that princes excommunicated or deposed by the Pope might
+be deposed and murdered; and that he disclaimed, disavowed, and
+solemnly abjured any intention to subvert the present Church
+Establishment as settled by law within this realm, and that he
+would never exercise any privilege to which he was or might become
+entitled to disturb or weaken the Protestant religion or Protestant
+government in this kingdom."[<a href="#note-209">209</a>]</p>
+<p>The second question was, it will probably be confessed, even
+more important. Pitt, who had always contemplated, and had
+encouraged the Irish Roman Catholics to contemplate, the abolition
+of their political disabilities as an indispensable appendage to,
+or, it may be said, part of the Union, had designed, farther, not
+to confine his benefits to the laymen, but to endow the Roman
+Catholic clergy with adequate stipends, a proposal which was
+received with the greatest thankfulness, not only by the Irish
+prelates and clergy themselves, but also by the heads of their
+Church at Rome, who were willing, in return, to give the crown a
+veto on all the ecclesiastical appointments of their Church in the
+two islands.[<a href="#note-210">210</a>] The justice of granting
+such an endowment could hardly be contested. The Reformation in
+Ireland, if what had taken place there could be called a
+reformation at all, had been wholly different from the movement
+which had almost extinguished Popery in England. The great majority
+of the Irish people had never ceased to adhere to the Romish forms,
+and the Reformation there had been simply a transfer of the
+property of the Romish Church to the Church of England,
+unaccompanied by any corresponding change of belief in the people,
+who had an undeniable right to claim that the state, while making
+this transfer, should not deprive of all provision the clergy to
+whose ministrations they still clung with a zeal and steadiness
+augmented rather than diminished by the discouragements under which
+they adhered to them.</p>
+<p>The policy of granting such endowment was equally conspicuous.
+No measure could so bind the clergy to the government; and no such
+security for the loyalty and peaceful, orderly behavior of the
+poorer classes could be provided, as might be expected from the
+attachment to the government of those who had over them an
+influence so powerful in its character and so unbounded in its
+strength as their priests. And the Duke of Wellington, who had at
+one time been himself the Irish Secretary, and, as an intimate
+friend of Lord Castlereagh, who held that office at the time of the
+Union, had a perfect knowledge of what had been intended at that
+time&mdash;and who was, of course, aware of the very decided favor
+which the House of Commons had so lately shown to the
+project&mdash;proposed to follow out Pitt's plan in that
+particular, and to connect a provision[<a href="#note-211">211</a>]
+for the Roman Catholic clergy with the removal of their political
+disabilities from the laymen. Unluckily, Peel, who, throughout the
+whole transaction, was, of all the cabinet, the counsellor on whose
+judgment he most relied, took a different view of the expediency of
+making such a provision, having, indeed, "no objection to it in
+point of principle." But he saw many practical difficulties, which
+he pressed on the Duke with great earnestness. He argued that for
+the government "to apply a sum of money to the payment of the
+ministers of the Church of Rome in Ireland, granting a license for
+the performance of their spiritual functions, would be a virtual
+and complete supersession, if not repeal, of the laws which
+prohibit intercourse with Rome;" and asked, "Could the state affect
+to be ignorant that the bishop whom it paid derived his right to be
+a bishop from the See of Rome?" Another difficulty he found in the
+apprehension that "the admission of the right of the Roman Catholic
+clergy to an endowment might produce similar claims on the part of
+the Dissenters in England, who contribute in like manner to the
+support of their own religion and of the established religion
+also." He suggested, farther, that, if the Roman Catholic priest
+were allowed, in addition to his stipend, "to receive dues, Easter
+offerings, etc., from his parishioners, his condition would then be
+better than that of the ministers of the Established Church in many
+of the parishes in Ireland." And, finally, he urged the practical
+objection, that the endowment would greatly strengthen the
+opposition to the whole measure, by the reluctance which, "on
+purely religious grounds," many would feel to the endowment of the
+Roman Catholic faith, who would yet be inclined to acquiesce in the
+removal of the disabilities, "on grounds rather political than
+religious." He was "not insensible to the importance of
+establishing some bond of connection between the Roman Catholic
+clergy and the state;" but he believed that the omission of a
+provision for their endowment "was important to the ultimate
+success of the government in proposing the measure before
+them."</p>
+<p>It is not probable that the Duke was greatly influenced by the
+first, or what may be called the constitutional,
+objection&mdash;that any concert with the Papal Court with respect
+to the appointments or endowments of its clergy would be a
+violation of the act which prohibited any intercourse with Rome.
+The removal of the disabilities required the repeal of one act of
+Parliament; and, if the holding communications with Rome on the
+subject of clerical appointments should be so construed as to
+require the repeal of another, it would hardly seem that there
+could be any greater violation of or departure from the principles
+of the constitution in repealing two acts than in repealing one. As
+to the second of Peel's objections, the English Dissenters could
+not possibly be said to stand on the same ground as the Irish Roman
+Catholics, since their ministers had certainly never been deprived
+by any act of the state of any provision which they had previously
+enjoyed; but their position as unendowed ministers was clearly one
+of their own making. The possible inferiority in point of emolument
+of some of the Protestant cures in Ireland to that which might be
+enjoyed by some of the Roman Catholic clergy could hardly be
+regarded as the foundation of any argument at all, since no law had
+ever undertaken, or ever could undertake, to give at all times and
+under all circumstances equal remuneration to equal labors. But the
+consideration last suggested was exactly the one to influence such
+a mind as that of the Duke of Wellington, generally contented to
+deal with a present difficulty. He was determined to carry
+Emancipation, because he saw that the Clare election had made it
+impossible to withhold or even to delay it; and, being so
+determined, he was desirous to avoid encumbering it with any
+addition which might increase the opposition to it. At the same
+time he was far from being sanguine of its effect, "with whatever
+guards or securities it might be accompanied, to pacify the country
+or to avert rebellion,"[<a href="#note-212">212</a>] which, in his
+apprehension, was undoubtedly impending; and, under the influence
+of these combined feelings, he eventually withdrew that clause from
+the bill. It was accompanied by another bill, disfranchising the
+forty-shilling freeholders in Ireland. They were a class of voters
+sunk in the deepest poverty, and such as certainly could not well
+be supposed capable of forming, much less of exercising, an
+independent judgment on political matters. Yet this bill is
+remarkable as having been the only enactment passed since the
+Revolution to narrow the franchise. It had no opposition to
+anticipate from English or Scotch members, and was accepted by the
+Irish members as the price of Emancipation.</p>
+<p>No measure that had ever been framed since the Revolution had
+caused such excitement in the country; but the preponderance of
+feeling in its favor was equally marked in both Houses of
+Parliament. In the House of Commons 320 supported it, while only
+142 could be marshalled against it. In the House of Lords 213
+divided for it against 109. And in April it received the royal
+assent.</p>
+<p>The general policy of removing the disabilities it is not
+necessary to discuss here. It is quite clear that the Clare
+election had rendered it impossible to maintain them. And if some
+of those who judge of measures solely by their effects still
+denounce this act, as one which has failed in its object of
+tranquillizing Ireland, many of those who admit the failure ascribe
+it to the omission to accompany it by one securing a state
+endowment for the Roman Catholic clergy, pronouncing it, without
+that appendage, a half measure, such as rarely succeeds, and never
+deserves success. However that may be, it is certain that the
+measure, coupled with the repeal of the Test Act of the previous
+year, was one which made a great and permanent change in the
+practical working of the constitution of the kingdom, as it had
+been interpreted for the last one hundred and fifty years. Of that
+constitution one of the leading features, ever since the
+Restoration, had been understood to be the establishment and
+maintenance of the political as well as the ecclesiastical
+ascendency of the Church of England. On that ascendency the repeal
+of the Test Act in 1828 had made the first, and that a great,
+inroad, and the present statute entirely abolished it as a
+principle of government. So far as political privileges went, every
+Christian sect was now placed on a footing of complete equality.
+But so to place them may fairly be regarded as having been required
+not only by justice and expediency, but by reasons drawn from the
+history of the nation and from the circumstances under which these
+disabilities had been imposed. Before the Rebellion no one was
+excluded from the English Parliament on account of his religion,
+whether he was a Roman Catholic, a Presbyterian, or a member of any
+other of the various sects which were gradually arising in the
+country. It was not till after the Restoration that a recollection
+of the crimes of the Puritans, when they had got the upper-hand,
+and the fear of machinations and intrigues, incompatible with the
+freedom and independence of the people, which were imputed to the
+Roman Catholics, gave birth to the statutes depriving both
+Protestant and Roman Catholic Non-conformists of all legislative
+and political power. The restrictions thus imposed on the
+Presbyterians and other Protestant sects had, as we have seen, been
+gradually relaxed by a periodical act of indemnity. Indeed, after
+the Union with Scotland, it was impossible with any show of
+consistency to maintain them, since, as it has been already pointed
+out, after Presbyterianism had been recognized as the established
+religion of Scotland, it would have seemed strangely unreasonable
+to regard it as a disqualification on the southern side of the
+Border. But, as long as the Stuart princes were from time to time
+disquieting the government by their open invasions or secret
+intrigues, no such relaxation could with safety be granted to the
+Roman Catholics, since it could hardly be expected that they would
+forbear to employ any power which they might acquire for the
+service of a prince of their own religion. That danger, however,
+which ever since 1745 had been a very shadowy one, had wholly
+passed away with the life of the last Stuart lay prince, Charles
+Edward; and his death left the rulers of the kingdom and advisers
+of the sovereign free to take a different and larger view of their
+duty to the nation as a whole.</p>
+<p>It was notorious that the number of Non-conformists was large.
+In the middle of the last century it had received a considerable
+accession through the institution of the new sect of Wesleyan
+Methodists; which, through the supineness of the clergy of the
+Established Church in that generation, had gradually increased,
+till it was estimated that the various Dissenting sects in England
+equalled at least half the number of the members of the Established
+Church. In Wales they were believed to form the majority. In
+Scotland three-fourths of the people were Presbyterians; and in
+Ireland the Roman Catholics outnumbered the Protestants in nearly
+the same proportion. Taking England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland
+together, a calculation which reckoned the different sects of
+Protestant and Roman Catholic Non-conformists united at half the
+entire population would probably not have erred very widely from
+the truth.</p>
+<p>It must have been the aim of every statesman deserving of the
+name to weld these different religious parties into one harmonious
+whole, as far as their civil position went. And measures which had
+that tendency could not be foreign to the constitution, properly
+understood. A constitution which confines its benefits to one-half
+of a nation hardly merits the title of a constitution at all. For
+every constitution ought to extend its protection and its
+privileges equally to every portion of the people, unless there be
+some peculiarity in the principles or habits of any one portion
+which makes its participation in them dangerous to the rest. It had
+undoubtedly been the doctrine of Pitt, and of the greater part of
+those who since his time had held the reins of government, that if
+any portion of the King's subjects did cherish a temper dangerous
+to the rest, it was because they were debarred from privileges to
+which they conceived themselves to have a just right, and that
+their discontent and turbulence were the fruit of the restrictions
+imposed on them. In proposing to remove such a grievance Pitt
+certainly conceived himself to be acting in accordance with the
+strictest principles of the constitution, and not so much
+innovating upon it as restoring it to its original
+comprehensiveness. And so of the measure, as it was now carried, it
+will apparently be correct to say that, though it did make an
+important change in the practical working of the constitution, it
+made it only by reverting to the fundamental principles of civil
+and religious liberty, to which every subject had a right; which
+had only been temporarily restrained under the apprehension of
+danger to the state, and which the cessation of that apprehension
+made it a duty to re-establish in all their fulness.</p>
+<p>But it is by no means clear that in the conduct of the measure
+the constitution was not violated in one very important point, the
+proper relation subsisting between a constituency and its
+representative, by Mr. Peel's resignation of his seat for the
+University of Oxford. That he was sensible that the act stood in
+need of explanation is proved by the careful statement of the
+motives and considerations that determined him to it, which he drew
+up twenty years afterward. They were of a twofold character. To
+quote his own words: "When I resolved to advise, and to promote to
+the utmost of my power, the settlement of that question, I resolved
+at the same time to relinquish, not only my official
+station,[<a href="#note-213">213</a>] but the representation of the
+University of Oxford. I thought that such decisive proofs that I
+could have no object, political or personal, in taking a course
+different from that which I had previously taken, would add to my
+influence and authority, so far, at least, as the adjustment of the
+particular question at issue was concerned." "I cannot deny that in
+vacating my seat I was acting upon the impulse of private feelings,
+rather than upon a dispassionate consideration of the
+constitutional relations between a representative and his
+constituents. I will not seek to defend the resolution to which I
+came by arguments drawn from the peculiar character of the academic
+body, or from the special nature of the trust confided to its
+members; still less will I contend that my example ought to be
+followed by others to whom may be offered the same painful
+alternative of disregarding the dictates of their own consciences,
+or of acting in opposition to the opinions and disappointing the
+expectations of their constituents. I will say no more than that my
+position was a very peculiar one, that I had many painful
+sacrifices to make, and that it would have been a great aggravation
+of them, if it could have said with truth that I was exercising an
+authority derived from the confidence of the University to promote
+measures injurious, in her deliberate judgment, either to her own
+interests or to those of the Church."</p>
+<p>No one would willingly censure too severely an act dictated by a
+sense of honor, even if somewhat overstrained and too scrupulously
+delicate; but when Mr. Peel speaks of "defending" or not defending
+his deed, he clearly admits it to be one open to impeachment. And
+when he forbears to "contend that his example ought to be
+followed," he seems practically to confess a consciousness that any
+defence against such impeachment must fail; while the last sentence
+quoted above involves an assertion that a constituency (in this
+instance one of the two most important constituencies in the
+kingdom) could be justified in regarding a measure required by the
+safety, or at least by the welfare, of the state, as injurious to
+its own interests; and so far admits a possible severance between
+the interests of a particular class or body and those of the whole
+community, which can have no real existence. That, however, is not
+the point to be investigated here. The charge, as it seems, to
+which Mr. Peel's deed lays him open is, that by it he lowered the
+position and character of a member of Parliament from those of a
+representative to those of a delegate. It was an adoption of the
+principle laid down for his own guidance by a colleague of Mr.
+Burke above fifty years before, and indignantly repudiated by that
+great political philosopher, as proceeding from an entire
+misapprehension of the rights of a constituency and of a
+member[<a href="#note-214">214</a>] of Parliament. He told the
+electors of Bristol that "when they had chosen their member, he was
+not a member of Bristol, but a member of Parliament; and that if
+the local constituent should have an interest, or should form an
+opinion, evidently opposite to the real good of the rest of the
+community, the member for that place ought to be as far as any
+other from any endeavor to give it effect;" that a representative
+"owes to his constituents, not his industry only, but his judgment,
+and betrays instead of serving them, if he sacrifices it to their
+opinion." And in so saying he carried with him the concurrence and
+approval of all his contemporaries whose sentiments on such a
+question were entitled to weight.</p>
+<p>In the States-general of France each member was, by the original
+constitution of that body, a delegate, and not a representative. He
+could not even remonstrate against the most oppressive grievance of
+which the previous instructions of the constituent body had not
+instructed him to complain; and this limitation of his duties and
+powers was, undoubtedly, one very principal cause which led to the
+States-general so rapidly falling into utter disrepute. It was no
+light thing to take a step which had a tendency to bring down the
+British Parliament to the level of the despised and long-disused
+States-general. And it is the more necessary to put the case in a
+clear and true light, because at the present day there is an
+evident disposition on the part of constituencies to avail
+themselves of Peel's conduct in this instance as a precedent, in
+spite of his protest against its being so regarded, and to fetter
+their representatives with precise instructions; and a
+corresponding willingness on the part of candidates to purchase
+support at elections by a submissive giving of pledges on a variety
+of subjects, so numerous as to leave themselves no freedom of
+judgment at all. On the great majority of subjects which come
+before Parliament, a member of Parliament, if he be a sensible and
+an honest man, has a far better opportunity of obtaining correct
+information and forming a sound opinion than can be within reach of
+any constituency, whose proneness to misjudge is usually in exact
+proportion to the magnitude of its numbers. Every elector
+justifiably may, and naturally will, seek to ascertain that between
+the candidate whom he supports and himself there is a general
+conformity of opinion; an absolute identity he will never find, and
+he has no right to ask.[<a href="#note-215">215</a>]</p>
+<p>Notes:</p>
+<p><a name="note-182" id="note-182">
+<!-- Note Anchor 182 --></a>[Footnote 182: &pound;118,776,000.
+Alison, c. lxxvi.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-183" id="note-183">
+<!-- Note Anchor 183 --></a>[Footnote 183: See Lord Malmesbury's
+account of their first interview.&mdash;<i>Diaries of Lord
+Malmesbury</i>, iii., 218.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-184" id="note-184">
+<!-- Note Anchor 184 --></a>[Footnote 184: "Parliamentary Debates,"
+series 2, ii., 632.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-185" id="note-185">
+<!-- Note Anchor 185 --></a>[Footnote 185: Mr. Brougham gave his
+opinion that if the Duke of York, or any other member of the royal
+family, had been named, it would have been offensive to the Queen;
+but the measure adopted he regarded as of a neutral character.
+(Mentioned by Lord Liverpool, "Life of Lord Liverpool," iii.,
+55.)]</p>
+<p><a name="note-186" id="note-186">
+<!-- Note Anchor 186 --></a>[Footnote 186: "Minutes of Cabinet,"
+dated 10th and 14th February, 1820, forwarded the King by Lord
+Liverpool ("Life of Lord Liverpool," iii., 35-88).]</p>
+<p><a name="note-187" id="note-187">
+<!-- Note Anchor 187 --></a>[Footnote 187: "Life of Sir J.
+Mackintosh," by R.J. Mackintosh, ii., 110, 116.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-188" id="note-188">
+<!-- Note Anchor 188 --></a>[Footnote 188: "Lives of the
+Chief-justices," iii., 171.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-189" id="note-189">
+<!-- Note Anchor 189 --></a>[Footnote 189: In a letter on the
+subject to Lord Liverpool, the Duke goes the length of calling the
+proposed bill "an experiment which, should it fail, must entail the
+dreadful alternative of the entire ruin of the landed interests of
+the empire, with which he is decidedly of opinion that the nation
+must stand or fall."&mdash;<i>Life of Lord Liverpool</i>, iii.,
+434.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-190" id="note-190">
+<!-- Note Anchor 190 --></a>[Footnote 190: At one time it was the
+fashion with writers of the Liberal party to represent Lord
+Liverpool as led by Lord Castlereagh in the earlier, and by Canning
+in the later, part of his administration; but Lord Liverpool's
+correspondence with both these ministers shows clearly that on
+every subject of foreign as well as of home policy he was the real
+guide and ruler of his cabinet. Even the recognition of the
+independence of the South American provinces of Spain&mdash;which
+is so often represented as exclusively the work of
+Canning&mdash;the memorandum on the subject which Lord Liverpool
+drew up for the cabinet proves that the policy adopted was entirely
+his own, and that as such he adhered to it resolutely, in spite of
+the avowed disapproval of the Duke of Wellington and the known
+unwillingness of the King to sanction it; and it may be remarked
+(as he and Lord Castlereagh have sometime been described as
+favoring the Holy Alliance), that the concluding sentence of his
+letter to the Duke on the subject expresses his hostility, not only
+to that celebrated treaty, but to the policy which dictated and was
+embodied in it. (See Lord Liverpool's memorandum for the cabinet
+and letter to the Duke of Wellington, December 8,
+1824.)&mdash;<i>Life of Lord Liverpool</i>, iii., 297-305.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-191" id="note-191">
+<!-- Note Anchor 191 --></a>[Footnote 191: See ante, <a href=
+"#endeavors">p. 222</a>.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-192" id="note-192">
+<!-- Note Anchor 192 --></a>[Footnote 192: "With much prudence or
+laudable disinterestedness," says Hallam ("Constitutional History,"
+ii., 532).]</p>
+<p><a name="note-193" id="note-193">
+<!-- Note Anchor 193 --></a>[Footnote 193: The last time had been
+in 1790, when there had been a majority of 187 against
+it.&mdash;<i>Peel's Memoirs</i>, i., 99.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-194" id="note-194">
+<!-- Note Anchor 194 --></a>[Footnote 194: 237 to 193.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-195" id="note-195">
+<!-- Note Anchor 195 --></a>[Footnote 195: "Peel's Memoirs," i.,
+68.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-196" id="note-196">
+<!-- Note Anchor 196 --></a>[Footnote 196: "Wellington's Civil
+Despatches," iv., 453.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-197" id="note-197">
+<!-- Note Anchor 197 --></a>[Footnote 197: See his letter to Peel,
+March 23 ("Peel's Memoirs," i., 92-100).]</p>
+<p><a name="note-198" id="note-198">
+<!-- Note Anchor 198 --></a>[Footnote 198: The entry of this bill
+in Cobbett's "Parliamentary History" is: "The House of Commons
+testified a very extraordinary zeal in unravelling the Popish Plot,
+and, to prevent mischief in the interval, passed a bill to disable
+Papists from sitting in either House of Parliament," to which the
+Lords, when the bill came up to their House, added a proviso
+exempting the Duke of York from its operation. An. 1678; October 26
+to November 21.&mdash;-<i>Parliamentary History</i>, iv.,
+1024-1039.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-199" id="note-199">
+<!-- Note Anchor 199 --></a>[Footnote 199: In the House of Commons
+the majority for Sir F. Burdett's resolution was six&mdash;372 to
+266. But, in the House of Lords, Lord Lansdowne, moving the same
+resolution, was defeated by forty-five&mdash;182 to 137.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-200" id="note-200">
+<!-- Note Anchor 200 --></a>[Footnote 200: See Fitzgerald's letter
+to Peel ("Peel's Memoirs," i., 114).]</p>
+<p><a name="note-201" id="note-201">
+<!-- Note Anchor 201 --></a>[Footnote 201: "Peel's Memoirs," i.,
+121.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-202" id="note-202">
+<!-- Note Anchor 202 --></a>[Footnote 202: See "Lord Anglesey's
+Letters," <i>ibid.</i>, pp. 126, 147.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-203" id="note-203">
+<!-- Note Anchor 203 --></a>[Footnote 203: As early as the year
+1812, on the negotiations (mentioned in <a href="#endeavors">a
+former chapter</a>) for the entrance of Lord Grenville and Lord
+Grey into the ministry, the Duke of York mentioned to both those
+noblemen that the Regent had an insuperable objection to the
+concession of Emancipation. And it seems probable that it was the
+knowledge of his sentiments on that point that greatly influenced
+the course which Lord Liverpool subsequently pursued in regard to
+that question.&mdash;See <i>Life of Lord Liverpool</i>, i,
+381.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-204" id="note-204">
+<!-- Note Anchor 204 --></a>[Footnote 204: Speech on moving the
+second reading of the bill in the House of Lords, February 19, 1829
+("Hansard," xx., 389).]</p>
+<p><a name="note-205" id="note-205">
+<!-- Note Anchor 205 --></a>[Footnote 205: Speech on the first
+reading of the bill, February 10 ("Hansard," xx., 208).]</p>
+<p><a name="note-206" id="note-206">
+<!-- Note Anchor 206 --></a>[Footnote 206: Speech on the first
+reading ("Hansard," xx., 198).]</p>
+<p><a name="note-207" id="note-207">
+<!-- Note Anchor 207 --></a>[Footnote 207: An amendment was
+proposed by Lord Chandos to add the office of Prime-minister to
+these three, on the ground that if a Roman Catholic were
+Prime-minister "he might have the disposal of all the patronage of
+the state and the Church vested in his hands." But Mr. Peel pointed
+out that the law of England "never recognized any such office as
+that of Prime-minister. In the eyes of the law the ministers were
+all on an equality." And the position, such as it was, being a
+conventional one, was not necessarily connected with the office of
+First Lord of the Treasury. "In a recent instance his late right
+honorable friend, Mr. Canning, had determined to hold the office of
+Prime-minister with that of Secretary of State. And when Lord
+Chatham was Prime-minister, he did not hold the office of First
+Lord of the Treasury." At the same time he explained that the
+impropriety of intrusting a Roman Catholic with Church patronage
+was already guarded against in the bill, a clause of which provided
+that "it should not be lawful for any person professing the Roman
+Catholic religion directly or indirectly to advise the crown in any
+appointment to or disposal of any office or preferment, lay or
+ecclesiastical, in the united Church of England and Ireland, or of
+the Church of Scotland."&mdash;<i>Hansard</i>, xx., 1425.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-208" id="note-208">
+<!-- Note Anchor 208 --></a>[Footnote 208: Many years afterward the
+restriction as to the Lord Chancellorship of Ireland was
+abolished.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-209" id="note-209">
+<!-- Note Anchor 209 --></a>[Footnote 209: The plan which Pitt had
+intended to propose was to substitute in lieu of the Sacramental
+test a political test, to be imposed indiscriminately on all
+persons sitting in Parliament, or holding state or corporation
+offices, and also on all ministers of religion, of whatever
+description, etc., etc. This test was to disclaim in express terms
+the sovereignty of the people, and was to contain an oath of
+allegiance and "fidelity to the King's government of the realm, and
+to the established constitutions of Church and state."&mdash;Letter
+of Lord Grenville, given in <i>Courts and Cabinets of George
+III.</i>, and quoted by Lord Stanhope, <i>Life of Pitt</i>, iii.,
+270. This plan seems very preferable to that now adopted, since it
+removed every appearance of making a distinction between the
+professors of the different creeds, when the same oath was to be
+taken by all indifferently.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-210" id="note-210">
+<!-- Note Anchor 210 --></a>[Footnote 210: The question had been
+discussed with the highest Papal authorities more than once since
+the beginning of the century. In 1812 Mgr. Quarantotti, the prelate
+who, during the detention of the Pope in France by Napoleon, was
+invested with the chief authority in ecclesiastical affairs at
+Rome, in a letter to the Vicar-apostolic, Dr. Poynter, formally
+announced the consent of the Papal See to give the King a veto on
+all ecclesiastical appointments within the United Kingdom; and,
+after his return to Rome, Pio VII. himself confirmed the former
+title by a second addressed, by his instructions, to the same Dr.
+Poynter, which letter, in 1816, was read by Mr. Grattan in the
+House of Commons, it being throughout understood that this
+concession of the veto to the King was conditional on the abolition
+of the disabilities and the endowment of the priesthood. And in
+1825, after Lord Francis Egerton's resolution had been carried in
+the House of Commons, Dr. Doyle, one of the most eminent of the
+Roman Catholic bishops in Ireland, in an examination before a
+committee of the House of Lords, expressed the willingness of the
+Roman Catholic clergy to accept a state provision, if it were
+permanently annexed to each benefice, and accompanied with a
+concession of an equality of civil rights to the Roman Catholic
+laity.&mdash;See <i>Life of Lord Liverpool</i>, ii, 145; <i>Diary
+of Lord Colchester, March</i> 17, 1835, iii., 373; <i>Peel's
+Memoirs</i>, i., 306, 333 <i>seq.</i>]</p>
+<p><a name="note-211" id="note-211">
+<!-- Note Anchor 211 --></a>[Footnote 211: The sum to be thus
+employed seems to have been intended to be &pound;300,000 a
+year.&mdash;<i>Peel's Memoirs</i>, i., 197. On the whole question
+of the payment and Peel's objections to it, see <i>ibid.</i>, pp.
+197, 306.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-212" id="note-212">
+<!-- Note Anchor 212 --></a>[Footnote 212: See his "Civil
+Despatches," iv., 570. In February, 1829, he said to Lord Sidmouth,
+"It is a bad business, but we are aground." "Does your Grace think,
+then," asked Lord Sidmouth, "that this concession will tranquillize
+Ireland?" "I can't tell; I hope it will," answered the Duke, who
+shortly discovered, and had the magnanimity to admit, his
+mistake.&mdash;<i>Life of Lord Sidmouth</i>, iii., 453. It is
+remarkable that the question of endowing the Roman Catholic clergy
+was again considered by Lord John Russell's ministry in 1848. A
+letter of Prince Albert in October of that year says, with
+reference to it: "The bishops have protested against Church
+endowment, being themselves well off; but the clergy would
+gratefully accept it if offered, but dare not avow
+this."&mdash;<i>Life of the Prince Consort</i>, ii., 186.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-213" id="note-213">
+<!-- Note Anchor 213 --></a>[Footnote 213: This first extract
+refers in part to the proposal which he made to the Duke to resign
+his office as Secretary of State, and to support the Emancipation
+as a private member, a design which he only relinquished at the
+Duke's earnest entreaty. The second extract refers to the seat in
+Parliament alone.&mdash;See <i>Peel's Memoirs</i>, i., 310,
+312.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-214" id="note-214">
+<!-- Note Anchor 214 --></a>[Footnote 214: Speech to the electors
+of Bristol on being declared by the sheriffs duly elected member
+for that city, November 3, 1774.&mdash;<i>Burke's Works</i>, iii.,
+11, ed 1803.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-215" id="note-215">
+<!-- Note Anchor 215 --></a>[Footnote 215: It is worth pointing
+out, however, that, as if it were one of the natural fruits of the
+Reform Bill, the Liberal Committee of the Livery of London in 1832
+passed a series of resolutions asserting the principle of
+delegation without the slightest modification; one resolution
+affirming "that members chosen to be representatives in Parliament
+ought to do such things as their constituents wish and direct them
+to do;" another, "that a signed engagement should be exacted from
+every member that he would at all times and in all things act
+conformably to the wishes of a majority of his constituents, or
+would at their request resign the trust with which they had honored
+him."&mdash;<i>Annual Register</i>, 1832, p. 300; <i>quoted by
+Alison</i>, 2d series, v., 355.]</p>
+<hr />
+<a name="CH9" id="CH9"><!-- CH9 --></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER IX.</h2>
+<p class="blockquote">Demand for Parliamentary Reform.&mdash;Death
+of George IV., and Accession of William IV.&mdash;French Revolution
+of 1830.&mdash;Growing Feeling in Favor of Reform.&mdash;Duke of
+Wellington's Declaration against Reform.&mdash;His Resignation:
+Lord Grey becomes Prime-minister.&mdash;Introduction of the Reform
+Bill.&mdash;Its Details.&mdash;Riots at Bristol and
+Nottingham.&mdash;Proposed Creation of Peers.&mdash;The King's
+Message to the Peers.&mdash;Character and Consequences of the
+Reform Bill.&mdash;Appointment of a Regency.&mdash;Re-arrangement
+of the Civil List.</p>
+<p>One of Pitt's great measures of domestic, apart from financial
+or commercial, policy having become law, it seemed in some degree
+natural to look for the accomplishment of the other, a reform of
+the House of Commons, which, indeed, after the conclusion of the
+war, had been made at times the subject of earnest petition, being
+one in which a far greater number of people had a lively interest
+than that excited by Catholic Emancipation. The Englishmen who had
+advocated that measure had been striving for the adoption of a
+principle rather than for a concession from which they could expect
+any personal benefit, since very few in any English or Scotch
+constituency were Roman Catholics, or desired to return a Roman
+Catholic representative. But thousands in every county, including
+the whole body of citizens of some of the largest and most
+flourishing towns, felt a personal concern in the attainment of
+Parliamentary Reform, as the measure which would give them, and
+which could alone give them, that voice in the affairs of the
+kingdom to which they felt themselves entitled, but which they had
+never yet enjoyed.</p>
+<p>And before the end of the next session the prospect of the early
+success of their aspirations was greatly increased by the death of
+the King. George IV., who in his early manhood had attached himself
+to the Whigs with an ardor and ostentation altogether unbecoming
+his position as heir to the throne, had formally separated himself
+from them after the death of Fox in 1806, and had gradually come to
+regard their adversaries with a favor as exclusive as he had
+formerly shown to themselves. But the Duke of Clarence, who now
+succeeded to the throne, had always shown a leaning toward the
+Whigs, who of late had been commonly regarded as the reforming
+party. While the war lasted, and during the few remaining years of
+the reign of George III., no active steps toward Reform were taken
+in Parliament; but under George IV. more than one borough convicted
+of gross and habitual corruption, as has been mentioned, was
+disfranchised. Grampound was so punished in the time of Lord
+Liverpool, and its members were transferred to Yorkshire, so as to
+give that largest of the counties four representatives; and it may
+be remarked that this arrangement caused the Prime-minister to
+suggest an improvement in the details of an election&mdash;which
+was afterward universally adopted&mdash;when, in reply to a remark
+on the great inconvenience that was found to exist in taking the
+poll at once in so large a county as Yorkshire, he hinted at the
+possibility of obviating that difficulty by allowing polls to be
+taken in different parts of the county. And, since the Duke had
+been in office, two more boroughs, Penrhyn and East Retford, had
+also been disfranchised; though the Reformers failed in their
+endeavor to get the seats thus vacated transferred to Manchester
+and Birmingham. With the accession of the new sovereign, however,
+they became more active. They found encouragement in other
+circumstances also. Many of those who were commonly called the
+Ultra Tories had been so alienated from the Duke's government by
+the Emancipation Act, that they were known to be ready to coalesce
+with almost any party for the sake of overturning his
+administration. Moreover, as forty years before, the French
+Revolution of 1789 had caused great political excitement in
+England, so now the new French revolution of July acted as a strong
+stimulus on the movement party in this as well as in other
+countries; and altogether there was a very general feeling that the
+time for important changes had come. The Duke of Wellington was not
+blind to the prevalence of the idea; and, being by no means willing
+to admit that his own policy of the preceding year had in the least
+contributed to strengthen it, he conceived it to be his duty to
+discountenance it by every means in his power; but the steps which
+he took with that object only invigorated and inflamed it. As
+Prime-minister, he inserted in the speech with which the new
+sovereign opened his first Parliament in the autumn after his
+accession a general panegyric on that "happy form of government
+under which, through the favor of Divine Providence, this country
+had enjoyed for a long succession of years a greater share of
+internal peace, of commercial prosperity, of true liberty, of all
+that constitutes social happiness, than had fallen to the lot of
+any other country of the world." And in his own character, a few
+nights afterward, he added a practical commentary on those
+sentences of the royal speech, when, in allusion to Lord Grey's
+expression of a hope that the ministers would prepare "to redress
+the grievances of the people by a reform of the Parliament," he
+repudiated the suggestion altogether, avowing that the government
+were contemplating no such measure, and adding that "he would go
+farther, and say that he had never read or heard of any measure up
+to that moment which in any degree satisfied his mind that the
+state of the representation could be improved or rendered more
+satisfactory to the country at large than at that moment. He was
+fully convinced that the country possessed at that moment a
+Legislature which answered all good purposes of legislation to a
+greater degree than any Legislature had ever answered them in any
+country whatever.... And he would at once declare that, as far as
+he was concerned, as long as he held any station in the government
+of the country, he should always feel it his duty to resist any
+measure of Reform when proposed by others."</p>
+<p>Such uncompromising language was, not unnaturally, regarded by
+the Opposition in both Houses as a direct defiance, and the
+challenge was promptly taken up both in and out of Parliament. It
+happened that at this moment the ministry was extremely unpopular
+in the City; not, indeed, on account of his hostility to Reform,
+but in consequence of the recent introduction by the Home-secretary
+of a police force in London, on the model of one which the Duke
+himself, when Irish Secretary, had established in Dublin. The old
+watchmen had been so notoriously inefficient that it might have
+been expected that the change would have been hailed with universal
+approval and gratitude, but it met with a very different reception.
+Many of the newspapers which had not yet forgiven the passing of
+Catholic Emancipation made it a ground for the strongest
+imputations on the Duke himself, some of them even going the length
+of affirming that he aimed at the throne, and that the organization
+of this new force was the means on which he reckoned for the
+attainment of his object. No story is too gross for the credulity
+of the populace. To hear of such a plot was to believe it; to
+believe it was to resolve to defeat it; and at the beginning of
+November the government received several warnings that a plan was
+in agitation to raise a formidable riot on Lord Mayor's Day, when
+the King and the Duke himself were expected to dine with the Lord
+Mayor. The Lord Mayor even wrote to the Duke to suggest the
+prudence of his coming "strongly and sufficiently guarded," and the
+result of this advice was certainly strange. The Duke cared little
+enough about personal danger to himself, but he regarded himself as
+specially bound by his office to watch over the public
+tranquillity, and to do nothing that might be expected to endanger
+it. He was at least equally solicitous that a new reign should not
+open with a tumult which could in any way be regarded as an insult
+to the King; and, under the influence of these feelings, he took
+the responsibility of giving the King the unprecedented advice of
+abandoning his intention of being present at the Guildhall banquet.
+Such a step had an inevitable tendency to weaken the ministry still
+farther by the comments which it provoked. Even his own brother,
+Lord Wellesley, did not spare his sarcasms, pronouncing it "the
+boldest act of cowardice he had ever heard of;" while the Reformers
+ascribed the unpopularity which it confessed to the Duke's
+declaration against any kind or degree of Reform; and, to test the
+correctness of this opinion, Mr. Brougham, who, in the House of
+Commons, was the most eloquent champion of Reform, gave notice of a
+motion on the subject for the 16th of November. Before that day
+came, however, the ministry had ceased to exist. On the preceding
+evening it had been defeated on a proposal to refer to a select
+committee the consideration of the Civil List, a new settlement of
+which was indispensable at the beginning of a new reign, and on the
+morning of the 16th the Duke resigned, not only advising the King
+to intrust the formation of the new cabinet to Lord Grey&mdash;who
+was universally recognized as the head of the Whig party&mdash;but
+recommending his Majesty also to be prepared to consent to a
+measure of moderate Reform, which, though he could not bring
+himself to co-operate in it, he was satisfied that the temper of
+the House of Commons, if not of the people out-of-doors also,
+rendered unavoidable.[<a href="#note-216">216</a>] The advice was
+taken. Lord Grey had no difficulty in forming a ministry in which
+the Whigs were aided by the junction of several of the more
+moderate Tories, who had regarded Canning as their leader; and from
+the very beginning Parliamentary Reform was proclaimed to be the
+one great object of his government. It would be more correct to
+call it a Reform of the House of Commons, since there was no idea
+of interfering with the House of Lords, even in those parts of it
+which were of a representative character, the Scotch and Irish
+peers. But, by whatever title the ministerial policy was
+designated, no one misunderstood what was intended; and as
+Parliament was, after a few days, adjourned over the Christmas
+holidays, the recess was spent by a sub-committee of the cabinet in
+framing a measure.</p>
+<p>The great extension of our trade, which was the fruit partly of
+his wise commercial policy, and partly of the long war; the rapid
+and prodigious growth of our manufactures, developed by the
+inventive ingenuity of our mechanics and engineers, had given a
+consideration and influence to the commercial, manufacturing, and
+moneyed classes which could not be disregarded. The land-owners,
+who had previously almost monopolized the representation, no longer
+constituted the wealthiest class of the community. Pitt himself had
+raised a banker to the peerage. More recently, men closely
+connected with the commercial classes had become cabinet ministers,
+one of whom had even subsequently sacrificed office to his feeling
+of the propriety of enfranchising a single town, Birmingham. But
+there were other towns at least equal in importance to Birmingham
+which were unrepresented, and it was clearly impossible to maintain
+a system which gave representatives to boroughs like Gatton, Old
+Sarum, or Corfe Castle&mdash;where the electors scarcely
+outnumbered the members whom they elected&mdash;and withheld them
+from large and opulent manufacturing centres like Manchester,
+Leeds, and Sheffield. The enfranchisement, therefore, of these
+towns, and of others whose population and consequent importance,
+though inferior to theirs, was still vastly superior to those of
+many which had hitherto returned representatives, was so manifestly
+reasonable and consistent with the principles of our parliamentary
+constitution, that it was impossible to object to it. And their
+enfranchisement unavoidably led to the disfranchisement of the
+smaller boroughs, unless the House of Commons were to be enlarged
+to a number which was not likely to tend to the facilitation of
+business. Indeed, in the opinion of the framers of the bill, the
+House was <i>already too large</i>, and they proposed to reduce its
+number by upward of sixty&mdash;a step to which it is probable that
+many of those whose opposition contributed to defeat it
+subsequently repented of their resistance. Nevertheless, the line
+adopted by the Duke of Wellington's ministry showed that there was
+still a large party to whom reform on a large scale was altogether
+distasteful; and accordingly the bill which, under the influence of
+these considerations, Lord Grey's administration brought forward in
+the spring of 1831, gave rise to the fiercest struggles in both
+Houses of Parliament that had been witnessed for many generations.
+One Parliament was dissolved; two sessions of that which followed
+were opened in a single year; once the ministry itself was
+dissolved, though speedily reconstructed; and three bills were
+framed, each in some degree differing from its predecessor in some
+of its details, though all preserved the same leading principles of
+disfranchising wholly or partially the smaller boroughs; of
+enfranchising several large and growing towns; of increasing the
+number of county representatives; and of enfranchising also some
+classes which previously had had no right of voting. It would be a
+waste of time to specify the variations in the three bills. It is
+sufficient to confine our attention to that which eventually became
+law. Fifty-six boroughs were wholly disfranchised; those in which
+the population fell short of a certain number (2000), and where the
+amount of assessed taxes paid by the inhabitants was
+correspondingly small. Thirty more were deprived of one of their
+members, being those in which the population was between 2000 and
+4000. And the seats thus vacated were divided between the towns
+which since the Revolution had gradually grown into importance, the
+suburbs of the metropolis, and the counties, the majority of which
+were now divided into two halves, each half returning two members,
+as many as had previously represented the whole. The boundaries of
+the boroughs, too, were in most cases extended.</p>
+<p>More important, perhaps, in its influence on subsequent
+legislation was the alteration made in the qualifications which
+constituted an elector. Hitherto the franchise, the right of voting
+at elections, had been based on property. The principle had not,
+indeed, been uniformly adhered to in the boroughs, where, as Lord
+John Russell, in the speech with which he introduced the bill,
+pointed out, a curious variety of courses had been adopted. "In
+some," as he described the existing practice, "the franchise was
+exercised by 'a select corporation;' that is to say, it was in the
+possession of a small number of persons, to the exclusion of the
+great body of the inhabitants who had property and interest in the
+place represented. In ancient times, he believed, every freeman,
+being an inhabitant householder resident in the borough, was
+competent to vote. As, however, this arrangement excluded villeins
+and strangers, the franchise always belonged to a particular body
+in every town&mdash;a body undoubtedly possessed of property, for
+they bore the charges of their members, and on them were assessed
+the subsidies and taxes voted by Parliament. But when villeinage
+ceased, various and opposite courses seemed to have been pursued in
+different boroughs. In some, adopting the liberal principle that
+all freemen were to be admitted, householders of all kinds, down to
+the lowest degree, and even sometimes beyond, were admitted. In
+others, adopting the exclusive principle that villeins and
+strangers were no part of the burgesses, new corporations were
+erected, and the elective franchise was more or less confined to a
+select body." But all these diversities and varieties were now
+swept away, and a uniform franchise was established, all tenants
+whose rent amounted to &pound;10 receiving the franchise in
+boroughs, while by a kindred amendment, which was forced on the
+ministers at a very early stage of the measure, tenants at will
+whose tent amounted to &pound;50 became entitled to vote in the
+counties.</p>
+<p>The arrangements for taking the poll were also greatly changed.
+Instead of the fifteen days which had of late been allowed for a
+county election, two were now thought sufficient.[<a href=
+"#note-217">217</a>] In boroughs the time was abridged in a similar
+proportion, and the arrangement was facilitated by a division of
+counties into several convenient polling districts, so that no
+elector should require to travel more than a few miles to record
+his vote.</p>
+<p>This last change was universally accepted as a great practical
+improvement, from its tendency to lessen the expense of election
+contests, which had risen to an enormous and ruinous height. But
+every other part of the scheme was viewed with the greatest
+repugnance, not to say dread, by the Opposition; and every one of
+the bills was fought step by step in the House of Commons. The
+first bill was only carried by a majority of one; the second was
+absolutely rejected by the House of Lords; and on the third the
+ministers, after carrying it triumphantly through the Lower House,
+were defeated in the Upper House on a point of detail, which,
+though of no great importance in itself, they regarded as an
+indication that the peers, though they had consented to read it a
+second time, would insist on remodelling it to a great degree, and,
+if they were not allowed to do so, would again reject it
+altogether.</p>
+<p>Meanwhile, the people were wrought up to a pitch of frenzy
+absolutely unprecedented. Never had agitators, among whom some of
+the ministers themselves were not ashamed to appear, been so
+unscrupulous in their endeavors to excite discontent. One cabinet
+minister wrote inflammatory articles in the newspapers; another
+publicly called the legitimate opposition of the peers "the whisper
+of a faction." And their exertions soon bore fearful fruit. In
+London some of the peers who had been most prominent in their
+objections to the bill were hooted and pelted, and one, Lord
+Londonderry, was nearly murdered. The King and Queen were insulted
+by mobs in the Park, some of the rioters even openly threatening
+the Queen with death, because she was believed to be favorable to
+the anti-Reformers. In some of the most important provincial towns
+the discontent broke out into actual insurrection. At Bristol a
+tumultuous mob, whose numbers were swelled by crowds of the worst
+ruffians of the metropolis, sought to murder the Recorder, Sir
+Charles Wetherall, when he came down to that city to hold the
+quarter-sessions; and, when defeated in their attack on him,
+stormed the Mansion House, and set it, with the Bishop's Palace and
+other public buildings, and scores of private houses, on fire,
+several of the rioters themselves, who had got drunk, perishing in
+the flames. A similar mob rose in arms at Derby, but did less
+mischief, as there the magistrates knew their duty better. But
+Nottingham almost equalled Bristol in its horrors. Because the Duke
+of Newcastle was a resolute anti-Reformer, a ferocious gang
+attacked and set on fire the fine old Castle; and, not content with
+committing fearful ravages in the town, roamed over the adjacent
+district, attacked the houses of many of the leading country
+gentlemen, plundering and burning the dwellings, and in more than
+one instance murdering some of the inhabitants.</p>
+<p>The King had hitherto borne himself between the contending
+parties in the state with scrupulous fairness to both. Though, he
+had, probably, been taken by surprise by the sweeping character of
+the changes his ministers had proposed, he had given them a frank
+support, consenting, even at a moment's notice, to dissolve the
+Parliament after the unfavorable division in the House of Commons
+on the first bill; but he had, at the same time, warned them that
+he would never consent to employ any means of coercion to overbear
+the free decision of the House of Lords. And he had more than once
+rejected as unconstitutional their solicitations to allow them to
+make peers with that object. At last they endeavored to compel his
+consent by resigning their offices, though the ground for so
+decided a step can hardly be deemed sufficient, since the
+provocation which they alleged was only Lord Lyndhurst's success in
+carrying an amendment to take the enfranchising clauses of the bill
+before those of disfranchisement, so as to give the latter a more
+gracious appearance, as if the boroughs to be extinguished were
+made to suffer, not so much for their own positive unworthiness as
+in order to make room for others which had become of undeniably
+greater importance. The King took the strictly constitutional line
+of accepting their resignation and intrusting the Duke of
+Wellington with the task of forming a new administration, warning
+the Duke, at the same time, that he considered himself now pledged
+to grant a large measure of Reform; but the Duke found the task
+impracticable, and then, as the only means of averting farther
+insurrectionary tumults, which bore no slight resemblance to civil
+war, and might not impossibly end in it, the King did at last
+consent to permit the creation of a sufficient number of peers to
+insure the passing of the bill. But he could not overcome his
+repugnance to the measure as a severe blow to the
+constitution&mdash;one which would in effect be tantamount to the
+extinction of the independence of the Upper House as a legislative
+body; and, thinking no means unjustifiable that would avert the
+necessity of such a creation, he conceived the idea of authorizing
+his private secretary, Sir Herbert Taylor, to request the chief
+peers on the Opposition side to absent themselves from the division
+on the third reading. It seemed to him, and indeed to many of them,
+the only thing that could be done. Their judgment of the character
+and eventual consequences of the ministerial bill was unaltered;
+but they saw the violence of the public feeling on the subject, and
+the danger to the state of too stubborn and uncompromising a
+resistance to it, and, yielding loyal obedience to their royal
+master's wish, they retired from the House without voting. Those
+who remained passed the bill, and in the beginning of June, 1832,
+it became law.</p>
+<p>We have ventured in a previous chapter to call in question the
+propriety of the conduct of the King's father, George III., in
+using his personal entreaties to influence the House of Lords
+against the India Bill of Mr. Fox. The transaction which has been
+related here is the second and only other instance since the
+Revolution of a sovereign having recourse to such a device to sway
+the votes of members of either House. But the circumstances were so
+entirely different, nay, so diametrically opposite, that an opinion
+of the impropriety of the sovereign's deed in the former case
+imposes no obligation on the ground of consistency to censure it in
+the later instance. The interference of George III. was designed to
+thwart and defeat his ministers on a measure of which he had not
+previously intimated any disapproval. William IV., on the other
+hand, was exerting himself to support his ministers, not, as it
+seems probable, without some sacrifice of his own judgment. His
+father acted as he did to avert an inroad on his prerogative and
+independence, which he had been persuaded to apprehend, but the
+danger of which can hardly be said to have been proved beyond all
+question; so that even those who think the result of his action
+fortunate for the nation cannot defend the action as one that on
+any constitutional principle can be justified. The son, at a far
+more critical moment, adopted the course which he did adopt as the
+only means which he saw of extricating the state and the nation
+from an alternative of great calamities: the extinction of, or at
+least a deep wound to, the legislative independence of the House of
+Lords, by the following of a single precedent[<a href=
+"#note-218">218</a>] which had ever since been universally
+condemned; or, on the other hand, a continuance of outrages and
+tumults which had already disgraced the nation in the eyes of the
+world, and which, if renewed and continued, could not fail to
+imperil the safety of the state. Such a motive may certainly be
+allowed to excuse the irregularity of the act.</p>
+<p>When, however, we come to consider the proposal to create peers,
+which drove the King to take such a step, that is a question on
+which, while it is still more important, it is also more difficult
+to form a satisfactory judgment. It was denounced by the Duke of
+Wellington and other peers as utterly unconstitutional and
+revolutionary; as a destruction of the great principle of the
+equality of the two Houses; as a denial to the peers of their right
+to form and act upon their own deliberate judgment; and as a
+reduction of their position to that of a body existing merely to
+register the decrees of the other House. Indeed, that it had this
+character was admitted by Lord Grey himself, with no abatement
+beyond such mitigation as might be found in the idea that it was
+only intended to affect their decision on a single question. So far
+it may be said that even while defending it he condemned it;
+<i>Habemus confitentem reum</i>. But the task of a ruler or
+legislator is often but a choice between difficulties, or even
+between manifest evils. And, even if an act or course be admitted
+to be intrinsically evil, taken by itself, yet, if the evil which
+it is calculated or designed to avert be a greater evil still, the
+defence is complete, or, at all events, sufficient. And this, in
+fact, is the principle of the justification which Lord Grey
+alleged. He was, perhaps, unconsciously referring to a passage in
+Mr. Hallam's great work on "Constitutional History" (then very
+recently published), in which, while discussing Sunderland's
+Peerage Bill, and admitting that "the unlimited prerogative of
+augmenting the peerage is liable to such abuses, at least in
+theory, as might overthrow our form of government," he proceeds to
+point out that in the exercise of this, as of every other power,
+"the crown has been carefully restrained by statutes, and by the
+responsibility of its advisers;" but that, while "the Commons, if
+they transgress their boundaries, are annihilated by a
+proclamation" (that is, by a dissolution) "against the ambition,
+or, what is much more likely, the perverse haughtiness of the
+aristocracy, the constitution has not furnished such direct
+securities.... The resource of subduing an aristocratical faction
+by the creation of new peers could never be constitutionally
+employed, except in the case of a nearly equal balance; but it
+might usefully hang over the heads of the whole body, and deter
+them from any gross excesses of faction or oligarchical spirit. The
+nature of our government requires a general harmony between the two
+Houses of Parliament."[<a href="#note-219">219</a>] In the present
+case no one could impute the difference between the two Houses to
+any "perverse haughtiness" on the part of the peers. But the
+difference existed, and was too deeply founded on the cautious
+principles of the Tory party to be surmountable by ordinary means.
+It was certain also that the Commons would not give way; that,
+without danger to the public peace, they could not give way. And
+this was, in fact, Lord Grey's contention: that a crisis had arisen
+in which compulsion must be exercised on one or other of the
+disagreeing parties; and that coercion of the peers by an
+augmentation of their number, or a threat of it, was the only
+compulsion practicable. In upholding this position, however, it
+must be remarked that he was betrayed into the use of language
+which was as great a violation of constitutional and parliamentary
+principle and usage as the action which he was recommending;
+language, too, which was quite unnecessary to strengthen his
+argument. He accused the Lords of "opposing the declared and
+decided wishes both of the crown and the people;" of "acting
+adversely to the crown;" and this introduction of the sovereign's
+name to overawe the assembly was unconstitutional in the highest
+degree. For, constitutionally, the sovereign has no right to
+signify his opinion, nor, indeed, any recognized means of
+signifying it but by giving or withholding his royal assent to
+measures which the two Houses have passed. On any bill which has
+not yet been passed by them he has, as has been already implied, no
+legitimate means whatever of expressing his judgment. The time has
+not come for him to do so. Moreover, the statement was, probably,
+not believed by any one to be strictly true, for it was pretty
+generally understood that the King would have preferred a far more
+moderate measure. But, indeed, in the very speech in which the
+Prime-minister made this use of the King's name he presently added
+an observation which was a sufficient condemnation of his previous
+language. For, in denouncing the "vile attacks which had been made
+on his Majesty in the public press," and disclaiming all share in
+them (a disclaimer which however true of himself, could not, it is
+believed, have been uttered with equal truth by all his
+colleagues), he pointed out that "it ought always to be recollected
+that it is contrary to the principles of the constitution to
+arraign the personal conduct of the sovereign." It follows, as a
+matter of course, that it is equally contrary to those principles
+to allege his personal opinions in either House on any measure
+before it, since, if alleged, they must be open to criticism;
+unless, indeed, the mere allegation of the royal sentiments were to
+be taken as decisive of the question, in which case all freedom of
+discussion would be at once extinguished.</p>
+<p>But this irregularity, into which the Prime minister was
+apparently betrayed by his desire of victory, must not be allowed
+to affect our verdict on the main question; and, now that the lapse
+of time has enabled us to contemplate dispassionately the case on
+which he had to decide, it will, probably, be thought that his
+justification of his conduct in recommending a creation of peers is
+fairly made out. That, under any pressure short of that, the peers
+would have again rejected the Reform Bill, or at least would have
+pared it down to much smaller proportions than would have satisfied
+the popular demand for Reform, may be regarded as certain; and
+equally certain that such a line of conduct would have led to a
+renewal of disgraceful and dangerous tumults. The minister,
+therefore, as has been said before, had to choose between two
+evils. It was a grievous dilemma; but those who had to deal with it
+(even while it may be admitted that they cannot be held wholly free
+from blame, as having themselves contributed by their own language
+to the popular excitement and irritation)[<a href=
+"#note-220">220</a>] may be excused for thinking the wound
+inflicted on the constitution, by thus overbearing the voice of one
+House of Parliament on a single occasion, less formidable in its
+immediate fruit, and more capable of being remedied and retrieved,
+than that which would have followed from a renewal of
+insurrectionary tumults, even if they should have come short of
+actual civil war.</p>
+<p>One critic of these transactions[<a href="#note-221">221</a>]
+whose experience and high reputation entitle his opinion to
+respectful consideration, after reminding his readers that,
+"although Parliament is said to be dissolved, a dissolution
+extends, in fact, no farther than to the Commons, and that the
+Peers are not affected by it; no change can take place in the
+constitution of their body, except as to a small number of Scotch
+representative peers," proceeds to argue that, "so far as the House
+of Peers is concerned, a creation of peers by the crown on
+extraordinary occasions is the only equivalent which the
+constitution has provided for the change and renovation of the
+House of Commons by a dissolution. In no other way can the opinions
+of the House of Lords be brought into harmony with those of the
+people." But it may be feared that this comparison is rather
+ingenious than solid. Indeed, the writer himself limits such an
+expedient as a creation of peers to insure the passing of a
+particular measure to "extraordinary occasions." But a dissolution
+of the House of Commons is so far from being so limited, that it is
+the natural and inevitable end of every House of Commons after an
+existence which cannot exceed seven years, and which is very rarely
+so protracted. And though it may be, and probably has been, the
+case that a House of Commons has passed measures to which it had no
+great inclination, lest it should provoke a minister to a premature
+dissolution, yet no submission on its part can long postpone it;
+and a threat or apprehension of a dissolution would certainly fail
+to overcome the opposition of the House of Commons, or of a party
+within it, if the measure before them seemed open to serious
+objection. The presumed or presumable immortality of the one body,
+and the limited existence of the other, seem to constitute so
+essential a difference between them as must prevent the measures
+adopted toward one being fairly regarded as any guide to a
+justification of those employed in the case of the other.</p>
+<p>The Reform Bill of 1832 has sometimes been called a new
+Revolution, and to some extent it deserved the name; for it was
+not, like the Catholic Emancipation Act, a mere restoration of
+privileges to any class or classes of the people which had once
+been enjoyed by them, and had subsequently been withdrawn, but it
+was a grant of a wholly new privilege to places and to classes
+which had never enjoyed it; while it was manifest that the
+political power thus conferred on these classes involved a
+corresponding diminution of the powers of those who had hitherto
+monopolized it. It was also the introduction of a new principle.
+The old doctrine of the constitution had been, that the possession
+of freehold property, as the only permanent stake in the country,
+was the only qualification which could entitle a subject to a voice
+in the government and legislation of the kingdom. The new doctrine
+was that, as others besides owners of land contributed to the
+revenue by the payment of taxes, those who did so contribute to a
+sufficient amount had a right to a voice, however indirect or
+feeble, in the granting of those taxes; and so far it was the
+extension and application to subjects at home of the principle for
+which Lord Chatham and Burke had contended sixty years before in
+the case of the American Colonies, that taxation and a right to
+representation went together; a principle which, many ages before,
+had been laid down by the greatest of our early kings as the
+foundation of our parliamentary constitution and rights. But this
+principle, however generally it may have been asserted, had
+hitherto been but very partially carried out in practice, and the
+old borough system had been skilfully devised by successive kings
+and ministers to keep the political power in the hands of the crown
+and the aristocracy. It was with that object that most of the
+boroughs which were first allowed to return members under the
+Tudors had been enfranchised,[<a href="#note-222">222</a>] a great
+noble or landholder, whose affection to the government could not be
+doubted, being often able to obtain the promotion of some village
+or petty town in the neighborhood of his estates to the dignity of
+a parliamentary borough, and thus acquiring a great addition to his
+political and social importance by his power of influencing the
+election. No one could deny that the existence of such boroughs was
+an abuse, or at least an anomaly, rendered the more conspicuous as
+time went on by the denial of representatives to towns which
+contained as many thousands of citizens as they could boast single
+burgesses. At the same time it was equally undeniable that the
+aristocracy, generally speaking, exerted their influence
+advantageously for the state. A peer or great squire who could
+return the members for a borough took a worthy pride in the
+abilities and reputation of those whom he thus sent to Parliament;
+especially the leaders of the two parties sought out promising
+young men for their seats; and it has often been pointed out that,
+of the men who in the House of Commons had risen to eminence in the
+country before the Reform Bill, there was scarcely one who had not
+owed his introduction to Parliament to the patron of one of those
+boroughs which were now wholly or partially disfranchised; while on
+one or two occasions these "rotten boroughs," as, since Lord
+Chatham's time, they were often derisively called, had proved
+equally useful in providing seats for distinguished statesmen who,
+for some reason or other, had lost the confidence of their former
+constituents. So, when Bristol had disgraced itself by the
+rejection of Burke, Malton had averted the loss with which
+Parliament and the country were threatened by again, through the
+influence of Lord Rockingham, returning the great statesman as
+their representative. So, to take a later instance, Westbury, under
+the influence of Sir Manasseh Lopes, had provided a refuge for Sir
+Robert Peel, when the course which he had taken on Catholic
+Emancipation had cost him his seat for Oxford. And these practical
+uses of these small boroughs&mdash;anomalies in a representative
+system, as they were called in the debates on the subject, and as
+they must be confessed to have been&mdash;were so important, that
+some even of those who felt compelled by their principles to vote
+for their parliamentary extinction have, nevertheless, confessed a
+regret for the sacrifice, lamenting especially that it has, in a
+great degree, closed the doors of the House of Commons against a
+class whose admission to it is on every account most desirable, the
+promising young men of both parties.</p>
+<p>In one point of great importance the framers of the Reform Bill
+of 1832 proved to be mistaken. They justified the very
+comprehensive or sweeping range which they had given it by their
+wish to make it a final settlement of the question, and by the
+expression of their conviction that the completeness with which it
+had satisfied all reasonable expectations had effectually prevented
+any necessity for ever re-opening the question. Their anticipations
+on this head were not shared by their opponents, who, on the
+contrary, foretold that the very greatness of the changes now
+effected would only whet the appetite for a farther extension of
+them; nor by a growing party, now beginning to own the title of
+Radicals, which till very recently had only been regarded as a
+reproach, and who, even before the bill passed,[<a href=
+"#note-223">223</a>] expressed their discontent that it did not go
+farther, but accepted it as an instalment of what was required, and
+as an instrument for securing "a more complete improvement." And
+their expectations have been verified by subsequent events. Indeed,
+it may easily be seen that the principles on which one portion of
+the bill&mdash;that which enfranchised new classes of
+voters&mdash;was framed were such as, in shrewd hands, might easily
+be adduced as arguments in favor of the necessity of
+reconsideration of the question from time to time. So long as the
+right of voting was confined to owners of property, or members of
+corporate bodies, the line thus laid down was one which was not
+liable to be crossed. But the moment that tenancy was added to
+ownership, and a line was drawn distinguishing electors from
+non-electors, not by the nature of their qualifications, but by the
+amount of their rent, detail was substituted for principle; and the
+proposer or maintainer of the rule that the qualification should be
+a yearly rental of &pound;10 might be called on to explain why, if
+&pound;10 were a more reasonable limit than &pound;15, &pound;8
+were not fairer than &pound;10. Or again, if the original argument
+were, that a line must of necessity be drawn somewhere, and that
+&pound;10 was the lowest qualification which seemed to guarantee
+such an amount of educated intelligence in the voter as would
+enable him to exercise the franchise conferred on him judiciously
+and honestly, such reasoning would from time to time invite the
+contention that the spread of education had rendered &pound;8
+tenants now as enlightened as &pound;10 tenants had been some years
+before. And thus the measure of 1832, instead of forever silencing
+the demand for Reform by the completeness of its concessions, did
+in fact lay the foundation for future agitation, which has been
+farther encouraged and fed by farther submission to it, and which
+its leaders, who have so far triumphed, show no purpose to
+discontinue. To discuss whether such extensions of the franchise as
+have already been adopted, and those farther steps in the same
+direction which are generally understood to be impending, will
+eventually be found compatible with the preservation of our ancient
+monarchical constitution, is a fitting task for the statesmen and
+senators whose duty it is to examine in all their bearings the
+probable effects of the measures which may be proposed. But the
+historian's business is rather "to compile the records of the past"
+than to speculate on the future.[<a href="#note-224">224</a>] And
+the course which was too perilous or difficult for Mr. Hallam to
+undertake we will follow his example in avoiding. But it cannot be
+denied that, if the Reform Bill of 1832 transferred the chief
+political power of the state from the aristocracy to the middle
+classes, a farther lowering of the qualification for the exercise
+of the franchise must transfer it from the middle to the lower
+classes; and that those who view such transfer with alarm, and
+deprecate it as fraught with peril to all our ancient institutions,
+maintain their opinions by arguments as old, indeed, as the days of
+the Roman republic,[<a href="#note-225">225</a>] but which have not
+lost strength by lapse of time, if indeed, they have not been
+fortified by events in the history of more than one modern
+nation.</p>
+<p>Even before the introduction of the first Reform Bill one
+measure had been passed of constitutional importance, though the
+concurrence of both parties in its principle and details prevented
+it from attracting much notice. Two daughters who had been born to
+the King and Queen had died in their infancy, and the royal pair
+were now childless; and, as some years had elapsed since the birth
+of the last, it was probable that they might remain so. The
+presumptive heiress to the throne was, therefore, the daughter of
+the deceased Duke of Kent, the Princess Victoria, our present most
+gracious sovereign, and, as she was as yet only eleven years of
+age, it was evidently necessary to provide for the contingency of
+the death of the King before she should attain her majority. A
+Regency Bill for that purpose had, therefore, been prepared by the
+Duke of Wellington's cabinet, and had been introduced by Lord
+Chancellor Lyndhurst in the House of Lords before the resignation
+of the ministry. It could not be so simple in its arrangements as
+such bills had sometimes been, since there was more than one
+contingency possible, for which it was requisite to provide. It was
+possible not only that William IV. might die within the next seven
+years, but also that at his death he might leave a child, or his
+widow in a state which warranted the expectation of one, the latter
+case being the more difficult to decide upon, since no previous
+Regency Bill furnished any precedent for the ministers'
+guidance.</p>
+<p>The first point, however, to be settled was, who was the most
+proper person to administer the affairs of the kingdom as Regent,
+in the event of the heiress to the crown being still a minor at the
+King's death. It was a question on which it was evidently most
+desirable that no difference of opinion should be expressed. And,
+in fact, no difference existed. The leaders of both
+parties&mdash;the Duke and his colleagues, who had framed the bill,
+and Lord Grey, with his colleagues, who adopted it&mdash;agreed
+that the mother of the young sovereign would be the fittest person
+to exercise the royal authority during the minority; and, farther,
+that she should neither be fettered by any limitations to that
+authority, nor by any councillors appointed by Parliament nominally
+to advise and assist, but practically to control her. It was felt
+that a Regent acting for a youthful daughter would need all the
+power which could be given her; while, as she could never herself
+succeed to the throne, she could be under no temptation, from views
+of personal ambition, to misuse the power intrusted to her.</p>
+<p>At first sight it seemed a more difficult and delicate question
+what course should be pursued with reference to the possible event
+of the King dying while the Queen, his widow, was expecting to
+become a mother. As has been said above, no precedent was to be
+found in any former bill; yet it seemed to be determined by the old
+constitutional maxim, that the King never dies. Not even for a
+moment could the throne be treated as vacant, and, therefore, it
+was proposed and determined that in such a case the Princess
+Victoria must instantly be proclaimed Queen, and the Duchess of
+Kent must instantly assume the authority of Regent; but that, on
+the birth of a posthumous child to the Queen Dowager, the Princess
+and the Duchess, as a matter of course, should resume their
+previous rank, and Queen Adelaide become Regent, and govern in the
+name of her new-born infant and sovereign. The strict
+constitutional correctness of the principle elaborately and
+eloquently expounded to the peers by Lord Lyndhurst was unanimously
+admitted, and the precedent now set was followed, with the needful
+modification, when, ten years afterward, it became necessary to
+provide for the possibility of Queen Victoria dying during the
+minority of her heir. The parent of the infant sovereign, Prince
+Albert, was appointed Regent, with the cordial approval of the
+nation; the dissent of the Queen's uncle, the Duke of Sussex who,
+with a very misplaced ambition, urged instead the appointment of a
+Council of Regency, of which he hoped to become the most
+influential member, only serving to make the unanimity of the rest
+of the Parliament more conspicuous.</p>
+<p>A somewhat kindred question, inasmuch as it affected the
+personal arrangements, if they may be so termed, of the sovereign,
+was settled in the same session, and on a new principle. What was
+called the Civil List had hitherto been placed on a footing which
+was at once unintelligible and misleading. The expression was first
+used at the Revolution, and was applied not only to that portion of
+the revenue which was devoted to the personal expenses of the
+sovereign, but also to many branches of the civil expenditure of
+the state, with which, in fact, he had no concern whatever. Not
+only the salaries of the great officers of the household, but those
+also of the ministers, ambassadors, and of the judges, were paid
+out of it, as well as those of many place-holders of various
+classes, and pensions to a large amount. Amounts embracing such a
+variety of miscellaneous and unconnected expenses could hardly be
+expected to be kept with regularity, and there was lavish waste in
+every department. Burke's bill had rectified some of the abuses,
+and had also pointed out the way to some other reforms which were
+gradually adopted; but still numbers of charges were left
+untouched, and there was scarcely any one subject which afforded
+more topics to unscrupulous demagogues than the amount of the Civil
+List, which the ignorant multitude were constantly assured that the
+King enjoyed to squander on his own pleasures, though, in fact, the
+greater part of it was expended in the service of the state, and
+was entirely free from his control. Only a portion of the sum which
+went under this name was voted annually by the Parliament. A
+portion was derived from the Crown Lands, from duties known as
+Droits of the Crown and Droits of the Admiralty, etc., the amount
+of which fluctuated, and with which Parliament was admitted to have
+no right to interfere. But the working of the whole was
+satisfactory to no one&mdash;neither to the King himself, nor to
+those who upheld the right of the Parliament to have a predominant
+control of every branch of expenditure of the public money. The
+feeling that the whole of the royal income and expenditure should
+be placed on a different footing was general, and the fall of the
+Duke of Wellington's ministry had been immediately caused by the
+success of a proposal that, before fixing the new sovereign's Civil
+List, Parliament should refer the matter to a committee, that
+inquiry might be made into every part of it. Lord Grey's ministry
+were bound to act in conformity with a resolution on which they
+had, as it were, ridden into office; and the arrangement which they
+ultimately effected was one in which common-sense and the royal
+convenience and comfort were alike consulted. That portion of the
+Civil List of his predecessor which was voted by Parliament
+amounted to nearly &pound;850,000 a year; but, besides that sum,
+George IV. enjoyed the income already mentioned as derived from
+Crown Lands, Droits, etc., while a farther large sum was furnished
+by the ancient revenue of the crown of Scotland, and another was
+received from Ireland. The ministers now proposed that all these
+sources of income should be handed over to the Treasury, and that
+the Civil List should henceforward be fixed at &pound;510,000,
+being at the same time relieved from all the foreign and extraneous
+charges on it which had invidiously swelled the gross amount,
+without being in any way under the control of the sovereign, or in
+any way ministering to his requirements, either for personal
+indulgence or for the maintenance of the state and magnificence
+imposed on him by his position.</p>
+<p>Such a change was on every ground most desirable. It was clearly
+in accordance with our parliamentary constitution that grants of
+money made by the Parliament should express distinctly and
+unmistakably the objects to which they were really to be applied;
+and that the charges of departments connected with the government,
+the administration of justice, or the foreign service of the
+country, should not be mixed up with others of a wholly different
+character, so as to make what was, in fact, the expenditure of the
+nation wear the appearance of being the expenditure of the
+sovereign. Moreover, the assignment of many of the charges to the
+Civil List even gave a false character to the appointments
+themselves. If a sovereign was to pay ambassadors and judges out of
+what seemed to be his private income, the logical conclusion could
+hardly be avoided that he had a right to lower those salaries, or
+even to diminish the number of those appointments. And it may even
+be said that the less any real danger of such a right being so
+exercised was to be apprehended, the more unadvisable was it to
+retain an arrangement which in theory could be described as liable
+to such an abuse.</p>
+<p>Notes:</p>
+<p><a name="note-216" id="note-216">
+<!-- Note Anchor 216 --></a>[Footnote 216: But it may be remarked
+that till very recently the people out-of-doors had ceased to show
+any great anxiety about Reform. Two or three years before, Lord
+Althorp, who, in Lord Grey's ministry, was Chancellor of the
+Exchequer and leader of the House of Commons, told Peel that the
+people had become so indifferent to it, that he never meant to
+bring forward the question again, and in the last seven years only
+fourteen petitions had been presented to Parliament in favor of it.
+In reality, such a feeling in the people would have been eminently
+favorable to a calm framing of a Moderate measure; but this
+indifference was soon changed into a more violent and widely
+diffused excitement than there was any record of since the days of
+the Popish Plot; that excitement, however, according to the
+confession of the historian of the Whig ministry and the Reform
+Bill, himself an ardent reformer, being "no spontaneous result of
+popular feeling, but being brought about by the incessant labors of
+a few shrewd and industrious partisans forming a secret, but very
+active and efficient, committee in London."&mdash;Roebuck's
+<i>History of the Whig Ministry</i>, etc., ii., 309.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-217" id="note-217">
+<!-- Note Anchor 217 --></a>[Footnote 217: In 1835 the two days
+were reduced to one.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-218" id="note-218">
+<!-- Note Anchor 218 --></a>[Footnote 218: The creation of twelve
+peers, in the reign of Queen Anne, to secure a majority in favor of
+the Peace of Utrecht.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-219" id="note-219">
+<!-- Note Anchor 219 --></a>[Footnote 219: "Constitutional
+History," iii., 331. See the whole passage.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-220" id="note-220">
+<!-- Note Anchor 220 --></a>[Footnote 220: Lord John Russell had
+publicly described the language of the Tory Peers in the debate on
+Lord Lyndhurst's amendment as "the whisper of a faction." And many
+articles of most extreme violence which appeared in the
+<i>Times</i> about the same time were generally believed to have
+been written (in part at least) by the Lord Chancellor, Lord
+Brougham.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-221" id="note-221">
+<!-- Note Anchor 221 --></a>[Footnote 221: "Constitutional History
+of England," by Sir J.E. May, 1., 262.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-222" id="note-222">
+<!-- Note Anchor 222 --></a>[Footnote 222: Elizabeth enfranchised
+no fewer than sixty-two in the course of her reign, "a very large
+proportion of them petty boroughs, evidently under the influence of
+the crown or the peerage."&mdash;Hallam, <i>Constitutional
+History</i> i., 360.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-223" id="note-223">
+<!-- Note Anchor 223 --></a>[Footnote 223: Sir A. Alison, "History
+of Europe," xxiii., 55, quotes a paragraph from the <i>Examiner</i>
+newspaper, which says: "The ground, limited as it is, which it is
+proposed to clear and open to the popular influence, will suffice
+as the spot desired by Archimedes for the plant of the power which
+must ultimately govern the whole system. Without reform, convulsion
+is inevitable. Upon any reform farther reform is inevitably
+consequent, and the settlement of the constitution on the
+democratic basis certain."]</p>
+<p><a name="note-224" id="note-224">
+<!-- Note Anchor 224 --></a>[Footnote 224: Hallam, "Constitutional
+History," c. xvi., <i>in fin.</i>]</p>
+<p><a name="note-225" id="note-225">
+<!-- Note Anchor 225 --></a>[Footnote 225: "Semper in
+republic&acirc; timendum est ne plurimum valeant
+plurinn."&mdash;Cicero.]</p>
+<hr />
+<a name="CH10" id="CH10"><!-- CH10 --></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER X.</h2>
+<p class="blockquote">Abolition of Slavery.&mdash;Abridgment of the
+Apprenticeship.&mdash;The East India Company's Trade is Thrown
+Open.&mdash;Commencement of Ecclesiastical Reforms.&mdash;The New
+Poor-law.&mdash;State of Ireland.&mdash;Agitation against
+Tithes.&mdash;Coercion Bill.&mdash;Beginning of Church
+Reform.&mdash;Sir Robert Peel becomes Prime-minister.&mdash;Variety
+of Offices held Provisionally by the Duke of Wellington.&mdash;Sir
+Robert Peel Retires, and Lord Melbourne Resumes the
+Government.&mdash;Sir Robert Peel Proposes a Measure of Church
+Reform.&mdash;Municipal Reform.&mdash;Measures of Ecclesiastical
+Reform.</p>
+<p>Apart from the consideration of the abstract principle, on which
+the advocates of Parliamentary Reform had insisted, of the light of
+many classes hitherto unrepresented to representation, they had
+also dwelt on the practical advantage which might be expected to
+ensue from the greater degree in which public opinion would
+henceforth be brought to bear on the action of the Houses, and, by
+a natural consequence, on the administrative government also. And
+the bill had hardly passed when this result began to show itself,
+not only in transactions of domestic legislation, but in others
+which affected our most remote dependencies, both in the East and
+West. We have seen in a <a href="#composition">previous chapter</a>
+how Wilberforce, after twenty years of labor and anxiety, reaped
+the reward of his virtuous exertions in the abolition of the
+slave-trade. But he had not ventured to grapple with the
+institution which gave birth to that trade, the employment of
+slaves in our West India Islands. Yet it was an evil indefensible
+on every ground that could possibly be alleged. It was not only a
+crime and an injustice, but it was an anomaly, and a glaring
+inconsistency, in any British settlement. The law, as we have seen,
+had been laid down as absolutely settled, that no man within the
+precincts of the United Kingdom could be a slave; that, even had
+such been his previous condition, the moment his foot touched
+English soil he became a free man. By what process of reasoning,
+then, could it be contended that his right to liberty according to
+English law depended on what portion of the British dominion he was
+in&mdash;that what was incompatible with his claims as a human
+being in Kent ceased to be so in Jamaica? The sentiment that what
+was just or unjust in one place was just or unjust in every place;
+that a man's right to freedom did not depend on the country of his
+birth or the color of his skin, had naturally and logically been
+widely diffused and fostered by the abolition of the slave-trade.
+It was but a small step from admitting that there could be no
+justification for making a man a slave, to asserting that there was
+an equal violation of all justice in keeping one in slavery; and
+this conclusion was strengthened by tales, which were continually
+reaching those most interested in the subject, of oppression and
+cruelty practised by the masters, or oftener by their agents and
+overseers, on the unfortunate beings over whom they claimed power
+and right as absolute as any owner could pretend to over any
+description of property. They made so general an impression that,
+ten years before the time at which we have now arrived, a society
+had been formed in London whose object was the immediate extinction
+of slavery in every British settlement; and Canning, then Secretary
+of State, had entered warmly into the general object of the
+society; not, indeed, thinking the instant abolition practicable,
+but inducing Parliament to pass a body of resolutions in favor of
+at once improving the condition of the slaves, as the best and
+necessary preparation for their entire enfranchisement;[<a href=
+"#note-226">226</a>] and the next year, 1824, the subject was
+recommended to the attention of the Houses in the King's speech,
+and an Order in Council was issued enjoining the adoption of a
+series of measures conceived in the spirit of those resolutions,
+among which one was evidently meant as a precursor of the slaves'
+entire emancipation, since it gave the "negro who had acquired
+sufficient property" a title "to purchase his own freedom and that
+of his wife and family." And it was, probably, from regarding it in
+this light that the planters (as the owners of estates in the West
+Indies were generally called) selected that provision as the object
+of their most vehement remonstrances. But, though they were not so
+open in their remonstrances against the other clauses of the order,
+they did worse, they disregarded them; and the stories of the
+ill-treatment of the slaves were neither less frequent nor less
+revolting than before.</p>
+<p>Fresh Orders in Council, avowedly designed as the
+stepping-stones to eventual emancipation, were issued; and one
+which reached the West Indies at the end of 1831 was, unhappily, so
+misconstrued by the slaves in Jamaica, who regarded it as
+recognizing their right to instant liberation, that, when their
+masters refused to treat it as doing so, they broke out into a
+formidable insurrection, which was not quelled without great loss
+of life and destruction of property. The planters were
+panic-stricken; many of them, indeed, were almost ruined. The
+colonial Legislatures,[<a href="#note-227">227</a>] which had been
+established in the greater part of the islands, addressed the
+ministers with strong protests against the last Order in Council;
+and the mischief which had confessedly been already done, and the
+farther mischief which was not unreasonably dreaded, were so great
+that the cabinet consented to suspend it for a while; and the House
+of Commons made a practical confession that the planters were
+entitled to sympathy as well as the slaves, by voting nearly a
+million of money to compensate those of Jamaica for their recent
+losses.</p>
+<p>But out-of-doors the feeling rather was that the insurrection
+had been caused, not by the unreasoning though natural impatience
+for freedom entertained by the negro&mdash;whom Canning had truly
+described as "possessing the form and strength of a man, but the
+intellect of a child"&mdash;but by the slackness and supineness of
+the local Legislature, too much under the influence of the timid
+clamors of the planters to listen to the voice of justice and
+humanity, which demanded to the full as emphatically, if somewhat
+less vociferously, the immediate deliverance of the slave. The
+object, however, thus desired was not so free from difficulty as it
+seemed to those zealous but irresponsible advocates of universal
+freedom; for, in the first place the slaves were not the only
+persons to be considered; the planters also had an undoubted right
+to have their interests protected, since, however illegitimate
+property in human beings might be, it was certain that its
+existence in that portion of the King's dominions had been
+recognized by Parliament and courts of justice for many
+generations, and that suddenly to withdraw a sanction and abrogate
+a custom thus established, and, as it might fairly be believed,
+almost legalized by time, would be not only ruinous to the
+planters, who would have no other means of cultivating their lands,
+but, as being ruinous to them, would also manifestly be most
+unjust. Even in the interests of the slaves themselves, instant
+emancipation before they were fit for it might prove to them a very
+doubtful blessing. The state, too, and the general interests of the
+kingdom had to be considered, for the shipping employed in the West
+India trade, and the revenue derived by the Imperial Exchequer from
+it, were both of great amount. It was a very complicated question,
+and required very cautious handling; but it was plain that the
+people were greatly excited on the subject. One or two of the
+ministers themselves had deeply pledged themselves to their
+constituents to labor for the cessation of slavery; and eventually,
+though by no means blind to the difficulty of arriving at a
+thoroughly safe solution of the question, the ministry decided that
+"delay was more perilous than decision," and they brought in a
+bill, in which they endeavored to combine the three great
+objects&mdash;justice to the slave, by conferring on him that
+freedom to which he, in common with all mankind, had an inviolable
+right; justice to the slave-owner, by compensating him fairly for
+the loss of what (however originally vicious the practice may have
+been) he was entitled by long usage and more than one positive law
+to regard as property; and a farther justice to the slave, that
+justice which consists in being careful so to confer benefits as to
+do the greatest amount of good to the recipient. The first object
+was attained by enacting that those who had hitherto been slaves
+should be free; the third was arrived at by making the freedom thus
+given, not instantaneous, but by leading them to it, and preparing
+them for its proper and useful enjoyment, by a system of
+apprenticeship. The slave was to be apprenticed to his master for
+seven years, receiving, partly in money and partly in kind, a
+certain fair amount of wages, and having also one-fourth of his
+time absolutely at his own disposal. And the second was secured by
+granting the planters the magnificent sum of twenty millions of
+money, as compensation for the injury done to them; or, in other
+words, as purchase-money for the property they were compelled to
+surrender. The apprenticeship system did not wholly succeed. The
+slaves were not sufficiently enlightened to appreciate the
+character of the new arrangement; and, as the light in which it
+appeared to them was rather that of deferring than of securing
+their emancipation, it made them impatient rather than thankful. In
+the majority of cases it proved difficult to induce them to work
+even three-fourths of their time, and eventually the planters
+themselves were driven to the conclusion that it was best to
+abridge the period of apprenticeship. By the act of the colonial
+Legislatures themselves it was shortened by two years, and the
+emancipation was completed on the 1st of August, 1838.</p>
+<p>Still, though on this single point the success of the scheme did
+not fully correspond to the hopes of those who had framed it, it
+was one which did great honor to their ingenuity as well as to
+their philanthropy (Lord Stanley, as Colonial Secretary, being the
+minister to whose department it belonged). And the nation itself is
+fairly entitled to no small credit for its cordial, ungrudging
+approval of a measure of such unprecedented liberality. Indeed, the
+credit deserved was frankly allowed it by foreign countries. To
+quote the language of an eloquent historian of the period, "the
+generous acquiescence of the people under this prodigious increase
+of their burdens has caused the moralists of other nations to
+declare that the British Act of Emancipation stands alone for moral
+grandeur in the history of the world."[<a href="#note-228">228</a>]
+And, in respect of the personal liberty of the subject, it may be
+said to have completed the British constitution; establishing the
+glorious principle, that freedom is not limited to one part of our
+sovereign's dominions, to these islands alone, but that in no part
+of the world in which the British flag is erected can any sort of
+slavery exist for a single moment.</p>
+<p>The abolition of the political authority of the East India
+Company, which took place some years after the time at which we
+have arrived, and which will be mentioned in a <a href=
+"#firstweek">subsequent chapter</a>, would make it unnecessary to
+mention the renewal of its charter, which took place at this time,
+were it not that the force of public opinion again made itself felt
+in some important limitations of its previous rights. The monopoly
+of the trade with China which the Company had hitherto enjoyed was
+resented as an injustice by the great body of our merchants and
+ship-owners, who contended that all British subjects had an equal
+right to share in advantages which had been won by British arms.
+The government and Parliament adopted their view, and the renewed
+charter extinguished not only that monopoly, but even the Company's
+exclusive trading privileges in India itself, though these, like
+the rights of the West India planters over their slaves, were
+purchased of it by an annuity for forty years, which was estimated
+as an equivalent for the loss of profit which must result to the
+proprietors of the Company's stock from the sudden alteration. It
+cannot be said that any constitutional principle was involved in
+what was merely a commercial regulation, or relaxation of such
+regulations. Yet it may not be thought inopportune to mention the
+transaction thus briefly, as one important step toward the
+establishment of free-trade, which, at the end of fifty years from
+the time when Pitt first laid the foundation of it, was gradually
+forcing itself on all our statesmen, as the only sound principle of
+commercial intercourse between nations. The laborious historian of
+Europe during these years finds fault with the arrangements now
+made, but only on the ground that they did not go far enough in
+that direction; that, while "everything was done to promote the
+commercial and manufacturing interests of England, nothing was done
+for those of Hindostan;"[<a href="#note-229">229</a>] that, "while
+English cotton goods were admitted for a nominal duty into India,
+there was no corresponding advantage thought of to the industry of
+India in supplying the markets of the country." The objection was
+not unfounded; but the system of which it complains was too
+one-sided to be long maintained, and in less than ten years a great
+financial reform had swept away the great mass of import duties,
+and so far had placed the Indian manufacturer on the same level
+with his fellow-subjects of English blood.</p>
+<p>The disturbances which agitated the first years of the reign of
+William IV. were not caused solely by the excitement attendant on
+the passing of the Reform Bill. There had been extensive
+agricultural distress in England, which had shown itself in an
+outbreak of new crimes, the burning of ricks in the farm-yards, and
+the destruction of machinery, to which the peasantry were persuaded
+by designing demagogues to attribute the scarcity of employment.
+But statesmen of both parties were agreed in believing that a great
+deal of the poverty which, especially in the agricultural counties,
+had become the normal condition of the laborer, might be ascribed
+to the pernicious working of the Poor-law, which subsisted with
+scarcely any alteration as it had been originally enacted in the
+reign of Elizabeth. There was even reason to doubt whether the
+slight changes which had been made had been improvements. If they
+had been in the direction of increased liberality to the poor man
+who needed parish relief, and had to some extent lessened his
+discomforts, they had at the same time tended greatly to demoralize
+both him and his employer, by introducing a system of out-door
+relief, which, coupled with the practice of regarding such relief
+as a legitimate addition to wages, led the former to feel no shame
+at underpaying his workmen, and the workman to feel no shame at
+depending on the parish for a portion of his means of subsistence.
+It was not to be wondered at that under such a system the
+poor-rates gradually rose to the prodigious amount of seven
+millions and a quarter of money; or that the rate-payers began to
+clamor against such a state of things, as imposing on them a burden
+beyond their power to bear. It was evident that it was an evil
+which imperatively demanded a remedy; and accordingly one of the
+first objects to which Lord Grey's Cabinet turned its attention
+after the completion of the Reform Bill was the amendment of the
+Poor-law.</p>
+<p>The scheme which in the spring of 1834 they introduced to
+Parliament was the first instance of the adoption in this country
+of that system of centralization which has long been a favorite
+with some of the Continental statesmen, but which is not equally in
+harmony with the instincts of our people, generally more attached
+to local government. But, if ever centralization could commend
+itself to the English mind, it might well be when a new law and a
+new principle of action were to be introduced, in the carrying out
+of which uniformity of practice over the whole kingdom was
+especially desirable. Accordingly, the government bill proposed the
+establishment of a Board of Commissioners to whom the general
+administration of the Poor-laws over the whole kingdom was to be
+intrusted. They were to have power to make rules and regulations as
+to the mode or modes of relief to be given, subject to the approval
+of the Secretary of State, that thus the establishment of one
+uniform system over the whole country might be secured. Power was
+to be given to unite several parishes into one union, and to erect
+large workhouses for the several parishes thus massed
+together;[<a href="#note-230">230</a>] and every union was to be
+under the management of boards of guardians, elected by the
+rate-payers of the different parishes, with the addition of the
+resident magistrates as ex officio guardians. Lord Althorp, who
+introduced the bill, admitted that such extensive powers as he
+proposed to confer on the Board of Commissioners were "an anomaly
+in the constitution," but pleaded the necessity of the case as
+their justification, since it was indispensable to vest a
+discretionary power somewhere, and the government was too fully
+occupied with the business of the nation, while the local
+magistrates would be destitute of the sources of information
+requisite to form a proper opinion on the subject. The
+commissioners alone, being exclusively devoted to the subject, and
+being alone in possession of all the information that could be
+collected, were really the only body who could fairly be trusted to
+form correct opinions on it.[<a href="#note-231">231</a>] The fact
+of the creation of such a board being "an anomaly," or, as it might
+rather have been called, a novelty in the constitution, does not
+seem an insuperable objection, unless it were also inconsistent or
+at variance with the fundamental principles of the constitution,
+and that can hardly be alleged in this instance. It is true that
+local management, whether its range were wide or narrow, whether
+covering the business of a county or limited to a single parish,
+had been the general rule; but, like every other arrangement for
+the conduct of affairs of any kind, that local management was
+inherently subject to the supreme authority and interference of
+Parliament. Nor, as the maintenance of this Parliamentary
+authority, as the supreme referee in the last resource, was
+provided for by the subordination of the commissioners for the
+approval of their regulations to the Secretary of State, does it
+seem that the arrangement now proposed and adopted can be said to
+have been inconsistent with constitutional principle. And the
+necessity for some change of that nature was clearly made out by
+the abuses which, undeniably, had been suffered to grow up under
+the old system.</p>
+<p>If the habitual condition of the Irish peasant were to be taken
+into account, it would be correct to say that there was less
+distress at this time in England than in Ireland; but there was
+still greater discontent, and infinitely more of dangerous
+disturbance. Catholic Emancipation had stimulated the agitators,
+not pacified them; they regarded it as a triumph over the English
+government; and, being so, as at once a reason for demanding, and a
+means of extorting, farther concessions. But this notion of theirs,
+when inculcated on the peasantry, bore terrible fruit, in such an
+increase of crime as had probably never been known in any country
+in the world. In the provinces of Leinster, Munster, and Connaught
+murders, deeds of arson, and rapine were of far more than daily
+occurrence.[<a href="#note-232">232</a>] Lord Althorp asserted in
+the House of Commons that more lives had been sacrificed in Ireland
+by murder in the preceding year than in one of Wellington's
+victories. And what was, if possible, a still worse symptom of the
+disposition of the common people, was exhibited in the
+impossibility of bringing the criminals, even when well known, to
+justice. Jurors held back from the assizes, witnesses who had seen
+murders committed refused to give evidence. The Roman Catholic
+prelates, and the higher class of the Roman Catholic
+clergy&mdash;most of whom, greatly to their credit, exerted
+themselves to check this fearful progress of wickedness&mdash;found
+their denunciations unheeded; while O'Connell, in his place in the
+House of Commons, used language which to an ignorant and ferocious
+peasantry looked almost like a justification of it, affirming it to
+be caused wholly by the "unjust and ruinous policy of the
+government" in refusing to abolish tithes. It was not the first
+time that the existence of tithe had been alleged as an Irish
+grievance. In the three southern provinces by far the greater
+portion of the tenantry were Roman Catholics, and they had long
+been complaining that they were forced to pay for the support of
+the Protestant clergyman of their parish, whose ministrations they
+could not attend, as well as for the maintenance of their own
+priest, whose livelihood depended on their contributions. According
+to strict political economy, there could be no doubt that the
+burden of the tithe fell, not on the tenant, but on the landlord,
+in the calculation of whose rent the amount of tithe to which each
+holding was liable was always taken into consideration; and that
+being the true doctrine, it was equally plain that in reality the
+Protestant clergy were paid, not by Roman Catholics, but by
+Protestants, since it was not disputed that by far the greater part
+of the land-owners in every province were Protestants.[<a href=
+"#note-233">233</a>] But an ignorant peasant is no student of
+political economy or of logic; and the fact that the payment of the
+tithe passed through his hands was in his eyes, an incontrovertible
+proof that it came out of his pocket. The discontent had gradually
+begotten an organized resistance to the payment, and the mischief
+of allowing the continuance of such a state of feeling and conduct,
+which was manifestly likely to impair the respect for all law, made
+such an impression on the government that, in the royal speech with
+which he opened the session of 1832, the King recommended the whole
+subject to the consideration of Parliament, urging the Houses to
+inquire "whether it might not be possible to effect improvements in
+the laws respecting this subject."</p>
+<p>In compliance with this recommendation, committees were
+appointed by both Houses; and the result of their investigations
+was a recommendation that a new arrangement should be made, under
+which the tithe should be commuted to a rent-charge. Accordingly,
+the next year the ministers proceeded to give effect to this
+recommendation. But they reasonably judged that an alteration of a
+particular law in compliance with the clamor raised against it
+would be a concession pregnant with mischief to the principle of
+all government, if it were not accompanied, or rather preceded, by
+a vindication of the majesty of all law; and therefore the first
+measure affecting Ireland, which they brought in in 1833, was a
+"Coercion Bill," which empowered the Lord-lieutenant not only to
+suppress the meetings of any assembly or association which he might
+consider dangerous to the public peace, but also to declare by
+proclamation any district in which tumults and outrages were rife
+to be "in a disturbed state;" and in districts thus proclaimed no
+person was to be permitted to be absent from his house from an hour
+after sunset to sunrise. Houses might be searched for arms, martial
+law was to be established, and courts-martial held for the trial of
+all offences except felonies; and the <i>Habeas Corpus</i> Act was
+suspended for three months. O'Connell and his party protested with
+great vehemence against such an enactment, as a violation of every
+right secured to the subject by the constitution. And a bill which
+suspended the ordinary courts of justice must be admitted to have
+been incompatible with the constitution as commonly understood and
+enjoyed. But if the measure thus proposed was extraordinary, the
+state of affairs which had led to its proposal was so also in a far
+greater degree. The records of no nation had ever presented such a
+fearful catalogue of crimes as was now laid before the Parliament,
+and at such a crisis the statesmen to whom the tranquillity of the
+country and the safety of the citizens were intrusted were
+undoubtedly called upon to go back from the letter of the
+constitution to that which is the primary object of every
+constitution&mdash;the safety of those who live under it. <i>Salus
+populi suprema lex</i>. And the argument of necessity was regarded,
+and rightly regarded, by both Houses of Parliament as a sufficient
+and complete justification of even so exceptional an enactment.</p>
+<p>And concurrently with this enactment, which, however
+indispensable for the repression of crime, no one could deny to be
+severe, the ministers endeavored also to remove the causes of
+discontent by a large measure of Church reform, not confining their
+aim to settling the tithe question, but dealing with the whole
+question of the Irish Church in such a way as to lay down, as an
+undoubted principle of the constitution, the doctrine that the
+Church existed for the benefit of the nation; that its property was
+bestowed on it for the same object; and that, consequently, the
+nation, or in other words the Parliament, had a perfect right to
+deal with its property and endowments of all kinds, always keeping
+the same end in view, the general advantage of the whole nation.
+Proceeding on these maxims, they introduced a Church Reform Bill,
+in which, perhaps, the most remarkable circumstance of all was,
+that the evil which had been the original cause of their taking up
+the subject at all was the last thing settled, not, indeed, being
+finally arranged for four years; while the principal detail in the
+way of reform which was completed in this first session was one
+which, however reasonable, had hitherto received but little
+attention, and had certainly provoked no great outcry. It could not
+be denied that the Episcopal Establishment in Ireland was out of
+all proportion to the extent of the country and the number of the
+Protestant population, or of the parishes. The entire population in
+communion with the Church fell short of 900,000. The number of
+parishes scarcely exceeded 1400. But over this comparatively scanty
+flock were set no fewer than eighteen bishops and four archbishops;
+while England, with 12,000 parishes, was contented with twenty-four
+bishops and two archbishops. It was proposed to consolidate these
+bishoprics into ten, the archbishoprics into two, a reduction which
+could hardly fail to commend itself to all. But with this reduction
+was combined a variety of other details relating to the Episcopal
+revenues, to the right of the bishops to grant leases, and other
+matters of finance, which the ministers proposed so to remodel as
+to create a very large fund to be at the disposal of the state. On
+this point the greater part of the ministerial scheme was wrecked
+for the time. They succeeded in carrying that part of it which
+consolidated the bishoprics, and in inducing the House of Commons
+to grant, first as a loan, which was originally turned into a gift,
+a million of money to be divided among the incumbents of the
+different parishes, who were reduced to the greatest distress by
+the inability to procure payment of their tithes, the arrears of
+which amounted to a far larger sum.</p>
+<p>But the assertion that any surplus fund arising from
+redistribution of the Episcopal revenues ought to belong to the
+state, not only called forth a vigorous resistance from the whole
+of the Tory party at its first promulgation, but, when the subject
+was revived the next year, and one of the supporters of the
+ministry, Mr. Ward, proposed a resolution that any such surplus
+might be legitimately applied to secular purposes, it produced a
+schism in the ministry itself. The resolution was cordially
+accepted by Lord John Russell, but was so offensive to four of his
+colleagues, Mr. Stanley and Sir James Graham being among the
+number, that they at once resigned their offices. The breach thus
+made was not easily healed; and before the end of the session other
+dissensions of a more vexatious and mortifying character led to the
+retirement of the Prime-minister himself. All attempts to deal with
+the tithe question failed for the time, four more years elapsing
+before it was finally settled. But, curtailed as it was, the bill
+of 1833 still deserves to be remembered as a landmark in
+constitutional legislation, since it afforded the first instance of
+Parliament affirming a right to deal with ecclesiastical dignities
+and endowments, thus setting a precedent which, in the next reign,
+was followed with regard to the Church of England.</p>
+<p>Lord Melbourne succeeded Lord Grey at the Treasury; but every
+one saw that the ministry was greatly weakened. The King, too, had
+become greatly dissatisfied both with their general policy,
+especially in regard to the Irish Church&mdash;which he took an
+opportunity of assuring the Irish bishops he was unalterably
+resolved to uphold&mdash;and also with the language and conduct of
+one or two individual ministers, to which it is not necessary to
+refer more particularly; and when, on the death of Lord Spencer,
+father of Lord Althorp, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, which took
+place in November, 1834, it became necessary for Lord Melbourne to
+propose to him a re-arrangement of some of the cabinet offices, he
+at once dismissed the whole body of the ministers. It was a
+somewhat singular step to take, for they had not been defeated in
+Parliament, and he did not himself allege any special
+dissatisfaction with anything which they had yet done, though he
+did apprehend that some of them would press upon him measures
+disadvantageous to "the clergy of the Church of England in
+Ireland," to which he had an insuperable objection; and, moreover,
+that the subject would cause fresh divisions in the ministry, and
+the resignation of one or two more of its most important members.
+He had, indeed, six months before, given a practical proof of his
+distrust of the ability of Lord Melbourne and the colleagues who
+remained to him to carry on the government of the kingdom
+satisfactorily, by desiring the new Prime-minister to enter into
+communication with the leaders of the Opposition, "to endeavor at
+this crisis to prevail upon them to afford their aid and
+co-operation toward the formation of an administration upon an
+enlarged basis, combining the services of the most able and
+efficient members of each" party.[<a href="#note-234">234</a>] Nor
+had he relinquished the idea of bringing about such a coalition,
+till he learned that both Lord Melbourne and Sir Robert Peel
+considered the differences which divided them to be too deeply
+founded on principle to render their union in one administration
+either beneficial to the state or creditable to themselves. And it
+may be said that the letter in which Lord Melbourne had in November
+announced to his Majesty the death of Lord Spencer, and the
+necessity for new arrangements which that event had created, by the
+expression that "in these new and altered circumstances it was for
+his Majesty to consider whether it were his pleasure to authorize
+Viscount Melbourne to attempt to make such fresh arrangements as
+might enable his present servants to continue to conduct the
+affairs of the country, or whether his Majesty deemed it advisable
+to adopt any other course," and that "Lord Melbourne earnestly
+entreated that no personal consideration for him might prevent his
+Majesty from taking any measures or seeking any other advice which
+he might think more likely to conduce to his service and to the
+advantage of the country," did not only contemplate, but to a
+certain degree even suggested, the possibility of his Majesty's
+preferring to have recourse to fresh advisers.</p>
+<p>The King's subsequent acts and their result, however, certainly
+took the kingdom by surprise. He applied to the Duke of Wellington
+to undertake the formation of a new ministry; and the Duke,
+explaining to the King that "the difficulty of the task consisted
+in the state of the House of Commons, earnestly recommended him to
+choose a minister in the House of Commons," and named Sir Robert
+Peel as the fittest object for his Majesty's choice. Sir Robert was
+in Italy at the time; but, on receiving the royal summons, he at
+once hastened to England, the Duke of Wellington in the mean time
+accepting the offices of First Lord of the Treasury and Secretary
+of State, as a provisional arrangement, till he should arrive in
+London.</p>
+<p>Sir Robert reached England early in December; and though, if "he
+had been consulted beforehand, he would have been inclined to
+dissuade the dismissal of the last ministry as premature and
+impolitic," he did not consider it compatible "with his sense of
+duty" to decline the charge which the King laid upon him, and at
+once accepted the office of Prime-minister, being fully aware that
+by so doing he "became technically, if not morally, responsible for
+the dissolution of the preceding government, though he had not had
+the remotest concern in it."[<a href="#note-235">235</a>] In the
+formation of his ministry he so far endeavored to carry out the
+views which the King had suggested to Lord Melbourne in the summer
+as to invite the co-operation of Mr. Stanley (who, by the death of
+his grandfather, had recently become Lord Stanley) and Sir J.
+Graham, who, as has been mentioned before, had retired from Lord
+Grey's cabinet. A new name, that of "Conservative," had recently
+been invented for the more moderate section of the old Tory party;
+and it was one which, though Lord Grey had taunted them with it, as
+betraying a sense of shame at adhering to their old colors, Peel
+was inclined to adopt for himself, as characteristic of his
+feelings and future objects; and perhaps he thought it might help
+to smooth the way for a junction with him of those who would flinch
+from proclaiming so decided a change in their opinions as would be
+implied by their becoming colleagues of one who still cherished the
+name of Tory. But they declined his offers; and consequently he was
+forced to select his cabinet entirely from the party of
+anti-Reformers. He dissolved Parliament, a step as to which it
+seemed to him that the universal expectations of, and even
+preparation for, a dissolution, left him practically scarcely any
+option;[<a href="#note-236">236</a>] but he soon found, as, indeed,
+he had feared he should find, the attempt to establish a
+Conservative government premature. The party of the late ministry,
+following the example set by Mr. Fox in 1784 with better fortune,
+divided against him in the House of Commons on every occasion,
+defeating him in every division; and at the beginning of April he
+retired, and Lord Melbourne and his former colleagues resumed their
+offices with very little change.</p>
+<p>They had, as was natural, not been contented with opposing the
+Conservative ministry in its general policy, but in both Houses
+they had attacked it with great energy. They had begun the battle
+in both Houses in the debate on the address, in which they selected
+three points in the recent transactions for special condemnation,
+affirming that in every one of them the royal prerogative had been
+unconstitutionally exercised&mdash;the dismissal of the late
+ministry, the dissolution of Parliament, and the appointment of the
+Duke of Wellington to a variety of offices. In the House of Commons
+the attack was led by Lord Morpeth and Lord John Russell; in the
+House of Lords by Lord Melbourne himself. It was urged that, though
+the prerogative of the sovereign to dismiss his ministers was
+undoubted and inalienable, yet the Houses had a clear right to sit
+in judgment on any particular exercise of it; and that the
+circumstances of the late ministry having been but recently formed,
+of its possessing in a conspicuous degree the confidence of the
+great majority of the House of Commons, and of its being occupied
+at the moment of its dismissal with matters of high national
+concern, justified the House in calling on the new ministers to
+show valid reasons for its sudden dismissal. As to the dissolution,
+it was asked what misdemeanor the late House of Commons had
+committed? No difference had occurred between it and the other
+House of Parliament. It had passed no hostile vote against any
+administration. It had been in existence but a very short time. All
+these circumstances, they affirmed, made it reasonable for the
+Houses to express to his Majesty their disapprobation of the
+dissolution. Lord Morpeth argued, moreover, that the right of the
+House of Commons to inquire into such an exercise of the royal
+prerogative was proved by the example of Mr. Pitt, who, in 1784,
+had introduced into the speech from the throne a paragraph inviting
+Parliament to approve of the recent dissolution; and what
+Parliament could be asked to approve of, it manifestly had an equal
+right to censure. But the most vehement of the censures of the
+Opposition were directed against what Lord Morpeth called "the most
+unseemly huddling of offices in the single person of the Duke of
+Wellington; an unconstitutional concentration of responsibility and
+power, at which there was hardly an old Whig of the Rockingham
+school whose hair did not stand on end." He admitted that in the
+present instance the arrangement had only been provisional and
+temporary, and that "no harm had been done;" but, he asked, "what
+harm might not have been done? If the country had been suddenly
+obliged to go to war, who would have been responsible for the
+Foreign Department? If an insurrection of the negroes had occurred,
+who was responsible for the Colonial Office? If in Ireland any
+tithe dispute had arisen, who was responsible as Home-secretary?"
+And Lord Melbourne, though a speaker generally remarkable for
+moderation, on this subject went much farther; and, after urging
+that, "if one person held the situation of First Lord of the
+Treasury, and also that of Secretary of State for the Home
+Department, it would not only place in his hands without any
+control the appointment to every great office in the state, but a
+person so situated would also have the pecuniary resources of the
+state at his disposal without check or investigation," he proceeded
+to assert that "an intention to exercise those offices would amount
+to a treasonable misdemeanor." He did not, indeed, go so far as his
+late Attorney-general, Sir J. Campbell, who, in vexation at his
+loss of office, had even threatened the Duke with impeachment; but,
+though he admitted that the Duke had been free from the guilty
+intention of exercising the authority of these offices, he
+suggested that "the Lords ought to pass some resolution calculated
+to prevent so great a breach of the constitution from being drawn
+into a precedent."</p>
+<p>On the first point thus raised, for the dismissal of the late
+ministry without any such cause as is usually furnished by an
+adverse vote of one of the Houses of Parliament, Peel frankly
+admitted that his acceptance of office rendered him
+constitutionally responsible, though, as he also said, it was
+notorious that in fact he had, and could have had, no previous
+knowledge of it; but he denied that any constitutional question
+whatever was involved in it, since the King's right was denied by
+no one; and he could, therefore, only consent to discuss it as a
+question of policy and expediency. And, looking at it in this
+light, he regarded his defence as easy and complete. He contended
+that the events of the past year, the resignation of several of the
+subordinate ministers, and finally of Lord Grey himself, and the
+proposal which had been made to him (Peel) and several of his
+friends to coalesce with Lord Melbourne, rendered the act by which
+the late government had been removed perfectly justifiable on the
+part both of the King and of himself; that the King was justified
+in thinking a wholly fresh arrangement preferable to a
+re-arrangement of Lord Melbourne's cabinet; and he himself in
+obeying his sovereign's commands to form a new administration.</p>
+<p>The wisdom and propriety of the dissolution, too, could only be
+examined as a question of expediency; but in this instance every
+consideration not only recommended but compelled it. "When he
+undertook the arduous duties now imposed upon him, he did determine
+that he would leave no constitutional effort untried to enable him
+satisfactorily to discharge the trust imposed in him. He did fear
+that if he had met the late Parliament he should have been
+obstructed in his course, and obstructed in a manner and at a
+season which might have precluded an appeal to the people. It was
+the constant boast of the late government that the late Parliament
+had unbounded confidence in them. And, if that Parliament was, as
+had been constantly asserted, relied upon as ready to condemn him
+without a hearing, could any one be surprised at his appeal to the
+judgment of another, a higher and a fairer tribunal, the public
+sense of the people?" Precedent, too, was in his favor on this
+point, since, "whenever an extensive change of government had
+occurred, a dissolution of Parliament had followed;" and he
+referred to the year 1784, and to 1806, when the administration of
+which Lord Grey was the leading member at once dissolved the
+existing Parliament on coming into office; though he believed "the
+present to be the first occasion on which a House of Commons had
+been invited to express its dissatisfaction at the exercise of the
+prerogative of dissolution."</p>
+<p>To the strictures of Lord Melbourne and Lord Morpeth on the Duke
+of Wellington's temporary assumption of a combination of offices,
+it was replied by Sir Robert and the Duke that, though there might
+be inconvenience from the assumption of all those powers by one
+individual, it was so far from being unconstitutional, that it was
+a common practice for the Secretary for one department to act for
+another during intervals of recreation, or periods of ill-health;
+that there was ample precedent for such a proceeding. In the last
+week of the life of Queen Anne, the Duke of Shrewsbury had united
+three of the greatest posts of the kingdom, those of Lord
+Treasurer, Lord Chamberlain, and Lord-lieutenant of Ireland, with
+the sanction of that great constitutional lawyer, Lord Somers. And
+in 1827 Mr. Canning had retained the seals of the Foreign Office
+for some weeks after his appointment as First Lord of the Treasury.
+Moreover, there was actually a law which provided that when the
+office of Chancellor of the Exchequer is vacant the seals of that
+office shall be delivered to the Chief-justice; and under this
+rule, in the latter part of the reign of George II., Chief-justice
+Lord Mansfield had continued finance-minister for above three
+months. And, as to the practical result of what had been done in
+the present instance, the Duke affirmed, what, indeed, was
+universally admitted, that the arrangement had from the first been
+understood to be merely temporary; that no inconvenience had
+resulted from it; indeed, that "not a single act had been done in
+any one of the offices which had not been essentially necessary for
+the service of the country."</p>
+<p>The first two points on which the ministry was assailed it seems
+superfluous to examine, since it is clear that the position taken
+up by Sir Robert Peel is impregnable: that, on every view of the
+principles and practice of the constitution, there was no doubt of
+the right of the sovereign to dismiss his ministers or to dissolve
+the Parliament at his pleasure; and that those acts can only be
+judged of by a consideration of their expediency. Inexpedient,
+indeed, the dismissal of the preceding ministry is generally
+considered to have been, even in the interest of the Conservatives
+themselves. But inexpedient the dissolution can hardly be
+pronounced to have been, since, though the new election failed to
+give them a majority in the House of Commons, it beyond all doubt
+greatly strengthened their minority. On the other hand, though it
+cannot be denied that the House of Commons has a perfect right to
+express its disapproval of any or every act of the minister, it is
+not so clear that Lord Morpeth's invitation to it to express its
+dissatisfaction with this particular act of dissolution was, on
+general principles, expedient or safe; since such a vote is making
+a perilous approach to claiming for the House the right of being
+asked for its consent to its own dissolution, a claim the admission
+of which had been one of the most fatal, if not the most fatal, of
+all the concessions of Charles I.</p>
+<p>As to the Duke of Wellington's assumption of a variety of
+offices, it is probable that when he first proposed to the King to
+confer them on him, he anticipated no objection whatever from any
+quarter, since he had so little idea of there being any impropriety
+in holding two offices, were they ever so apparently incongruous,
+if his Majesty should have directed him to do so, that seven years
+before, when he became Prime-minister, he had at first designed
+permanently to retain the command of the army in conjunction with
+the Treasury, and had only been induced to abandon the intention by
+the urgent remonstrance of Sir Robert Peel; and, constitutionally,
+there does not seem to be any limitation of the sovereign's power
+to confer offices, to unite or to divide them. Indeed, the
+different Secretary-ships of State seem to owe their existence
+entirely to his will, and not to any act of Parliament. He can
+diminish the number, if he should think fit, as he did in 1782,
+when, on the termination of the American war, he forbore to appoint
+a successor to Lord George Germaine, in Lord Rockingham's
+administration; or he can increase the numbers, as he did in 1794,
+when he revived the third Secretaryship, which he had suppressed
+twelve years before, without any act of Parliament being passed to
+direct either the suspension or the revival. He can even leave the
+most important offices vacant, and intrust the performance of their
+duties to a commission, as was done in this very year 1835, when
+the Great Seal was put in commission, and the duties, for above two
+years, were performed by commissioners, who had other duties also
+to discharge; and these instances may, perhaps, warrant the
+conclusion that the distribution of the different posts in what is
+generally known as the cabinet is dictated by considerations of
+what is practicable and expedient rather than by any positive and
+invariable rule or principle.</p>
+<p>Yet it does not follow that, because the constitution was not
+violated or endangered by such an arrangement, the leaders of the
+Opposition did other than their duty in calling attention to it.
+Unquestionably, it is historically true that the liberties of the
+people owe their preservation, growth, and vigor to the jealous
+watchfulness to check the first and slightest appearance of any
+attempt to encroach upon them, which has been constantly exercised
+from the very earliest times by an almost unbroken series of
+fearless and independent patriots. And in this instance the very
+novelty of such an arrangement as had taken place did of itself
+make criticism a duty; though it may also be thought that the
+critics acted wisely in contenting themselves with calling notice
+to it, and abstaining from asking Parliament to pronounce a formal
+judgment on it, since any express censure would have been
+unwarranted either by the facts of the case or by any inference to
+be drawn from previous usage, while an approval of it would wear
+the appearance not only of sanctioning, but even of inviting a
+repetition of an arrangement which, if ever attempted to be carried
+out in actual practice, must tend to grave inconvenience, if not to
+discredit.</p>
+<p>Lord Melbourne resumed office, and, being strengthened by the
+manifest inability of the opposite party to command the confidence
+of the House of Commons, began to apply himself with vigor to the
+carrying out of several measures of internal reform, some of which
+involved not only the property but the long-established rights of
+very considerable bodies, and, as so doing, have an importance in a
+constitutional point of view, besides that arising from their
+immediate effects. Peel had been equally alive to the
+desirableness, so cogent as almost to amount to a moral necessity,
+of introducing reforms into more than one old institution, such as
+should bring them more into harmony with the spirit of the age,
+remodelling or terminating some arrangements which were manifest
+abuses, and others which, though, if dispassionately examined and
+properly understood, they, perhaps, were not really grievances, yet
+in their operation caused such discontent and heart-burnings that
+they were as mischievous as many others far more indefensible in
+theory. And, short-lived as his administration had been, he had
+found time to frame and introduce an extensive measure of Church
+reform, not only dealing with the question of tithes, the levy and
+collection of which in some of their details had long been made
+subjects of bitter complaints by the farmers, but including also
+provision for the creation of two new bishoprics, those of Ripon
+and Manchester. No part of his measure was more imperatively called
+for by the present circumstances of the nation, or of greater
+importance in its future operation. There had been no increase in
+the number of bishops since the reign of Elizabeth; but since her
+time not only had the population of the entire kingdom been
+quadrupled, but some districts which had then been very scantily
+peopled had become exceedingly populous. These districts had
+hitherto been almost destitute of Episcopal supervision, which now
+was thus to be supplied to them. But the new legislation did more.
+It might be expected that the growth of the population would
+continue, and would in time require a farther and corresponding
+increase of the Episcopate; and the erection of these new dioceses
+was, therefore, not only the supplying of a present want, but the
+foundation of a system for increasing the efficiency of the Church
+which should be capable of gradual progressive expansion, as the
+growth of the population in various districts might be found to
+require additional facilities for supervision. And the judgment
+with which the new arrangement met the requirements of the
+community may be regarded as proved by the circumstance that now,
+after the lapse of nearly half a century, it is maintained in
+active operation, and is admitted by all parties not only to be of
+the greatest practical benefit, but also to have a moral effect
+scarcely less valuable in the degree in which it has stimulated the
+application of private munificence to the great work of Church
+extension.</p>
+<p>But before Lord Grey quitted office his government had also
+called the attention of Parliament to the necessity of a large
+municipal reform, which, indeed, it seemed to them that the Reform
+Bill had bound them, in all consistency, to introduce. In the
+speech with which the King had closed the session of 1833, he had
+informed the Houses that he had "directed commissions to be issued
+for investigating the state of the municipal corporations
+throughout the United Kingdom, the result of whose inquiries would
+enable them to mature some measure which might seem best fitted to
+place the internal government of corporate cities and towns upon a
+solid foundation in respect of their finances, their judicature,
+and their police." He reminded them that they had recently passed
+acts "for giving constitutions upon sound principles to the royal
+and parliamentary boroughs of Scotland," and warned them that
+"their attention would hereafter be called to the expediency of
+extending similar advantages to the unincorporated towns in England
+which had now acquired the right of returning members to
+Parliament." The commission of which his Majesty thus spoke had now
+presented its report, strongly condemnatory of the existing system
+in almost every point of view; of the constitution and mode of
+election of the existing corporations, and of their government of
+the towns over which they presided. It declared that "even where
+they existed in their least imperfect form, and were most
+rightfully administered, they were inadequate to the wants of the
+present state of society." But they charged them also with positive
+offences of no venial kind. "They had perverted their powers to
+political ends, sacrificing local interests to party purposes. They
+had diverted from their legitimate use revenues which ought to have
+been applied for the public advantage, wasting them in many
+instances for the benefit of individuals; sometimes even employing
+for purposes of corruption funds originally intended for charitable
+uses." And they asserted that this too common misconduct of these
+bodies had engendered "among a great majority of the inhabitants of
+the incorporated towns a general and just dissatisfaction with
+their municipal institutions, a distrust of the self-elected
+municipal councils, and of the municipal magistracy, tainting with
+suspicion the local administration of justice." And therefore they
+"felt it their duty to represent to his Majesty that the existing
+municipal corporations of England and Wales neither possessed nor
+deserved the confidence and respect of his Majesty's subjects; and
+that a thorough reform must be effected before they could become
+what they ought to be, useful and efficient instruments of local
+government."</p>
+<p>It would be superfluous here to repeat the story of the rise of
+the boroughs, whose gradual acquisition of charters, with
+privileges and powers of various degrees, has been sufficiently
+investigated by Hallam.[<a href="#note-237">237</a>] What the
+Parliament had now to deal with was the way in which the system
+worked in the nineteenth century; and here it must be confessed
+that the report of the commissioners, severe as it was, did in no
+degree exaggerate the prevailing evils. The corporations had
+gradually become self-elected oligarchies of the worst kind. It
+must be admitted that, in perverting their authority to political
+purposes, they might plead the excuse that they were but following
+the example set them by the ministers of William III., who
+introduced into their bill for restoring the corporations which
+James II. had suppressed clauses manifestly intended to preserve
+the ascendency of the Whig party, "by keeping the Church or Tory
+faction out of"[<a href="#note-238">238</a>] them. But no such
+palliation (if, indeed, that had any right to be called a
+palliation) could be alleged for their abuse of the trusts
+committed to them; abuse which, if committed by single individuals,
+would have been branded, and perhaps punished, as malversation and
+fraud of the deepest dye. A sufficient specimen of the kind and
+extent of their misdeeds in one branch of their duties was afforded
+by a single paragraph of Lord John Russell's speech, in which he
+affirmed that, in some of the reports of their management of
+charitable estates committed to their care, it was proved that "the
+property, instead of being employed for the general benefit of the
+town, had been consumed for the partial benefit of a few
+individuals, and not unfrequently in the feastings and
+entertainments in which the mayor and other corporators had been in
+the habit of indulging. In some not very large boroughs these
+expenses had amounted to &pound;500 and &pound;600 a year; and the
+enjoyment had been confined to freemen of only one party." And the
+perpetuity of this mismanagement was in most instances secured by
+the members of the corporation themselves electing their new
+colleagues on the occasion of any vacancy.</p>
+<p>To put an end to this discreditable state of affairs, the
+government had prepared a very sweeping scheme of reform, though
+that it was not too sweeping was proved by the approval with which
+not only its principle but most of its details were received by the
+greater part of the Opposition; the leading principle being, to
+quote the words of the minister in introducing the bill, "that
+there should be one uniform government instituted, applicable to
+all; one uniform franchise for the purpose of election; and a like
+description of officers in each, with the exception of some of the
+larger places, in which there would be a recorder, or some other
+such magistrate. The first thing to be amended was the mode of
+election to the corporation, which was now to be intrusted to all
+such rate-payers in each borough as had paid poor-rates for three
+years, and resided within seven miles of the place." Lord John
+Russell had considered, he said, "whether this franchise should be
+limited to those paying a certain amount of rates; to the ten-pound
+householders, for instance, to whom the parliamentary franchise was
+confined;" but he decided on proposing to extend it to <i>all</i>
+rate-payers, because, according to the established principle, to
+the known and recognized principle of the constitution, it is right
+that those who contribute their money should have a voice in the
+election of the persons by whom the money is expended. The old
+modes of acquiring the freedom of a corporation, such as birth,
+apprenticeship, etc., were to be abolished, as also were all
+exclusive rights of trade, vested rights, however, being preserved.
+The next point to be decided was the composition of the corporation
+which these rate-payers were to elect, and the ministerial proposal
+was that each corporation should consist of a mayor, aldermen, and
+councillors, possessing a certain amount of property as a
+qualification, and varying in number according to the population of
+the borough; the larger towns being also divided into wards, with a
+certain number of common-councilmen and aldermen to be chosen in
+each ward. The mayor was to be a yearly officer; of the aldermen
+and councillors a certain number were to retire each year, being,
+however, capable of re-election. The mayor was to be elected by the
+councils, and was to be a magistrate during his year of office. And
+the body thus constituted was to have the entire government of the
+borough; of its police, its charities, and generally, and most
+especially, of the raising and expenditure of its funds,[<a href=
+"#note-239">239</a>] which had been too often dealt with in a
+manner not only wasteful, but profligate. Cases had been brought
+forward in which "corporations had been incurring debts year by
+year, while the members were actually dividing among themselves the
+proceeds of the loans they raised." The revenue derived from
+charitable estates had been "no less scandalously mismanaged." And
+the bill provided for the appointment of finance committees,
+trustees, auditors, and a regular publication of all the accounts,
+as the only efficient remedy and preventive of such abuses. The
+whole police of the town and administration of justice was also to
+be completely under the control of the council; and for the
+appointment of magistrates the council was to have the power of
+recommending to the crown those whom they thought fit to receive
+the commission of the peace; and in the large towns it should have
+power also to provide a salary for stipendiary magistrates. Another
+clause provided that towns which could not as yet be included in
+the bill, since they had never been incorporated, might obtain
+charters of incorporation by petition to the Privy Council.</p>
+<p>Such were the general provisions of this great measure of
+reform; a bill similar in principle having already been enacted for
+Scotland, and another being shortly after passed, with such
+variations of detail as the differences in the circumstances of the
+country required, for Ireland. Some of the clauses, especially
+those which preserved the vested rights of freemen and their
+families, and which required a certain amount of property or rating
+qualifications in the town councillors, were not originally
+included in the bill, but were inserted as amendments in the House
+of Lords; and it may be remarked that the result of the discussion
+in that House afforded a proof of the sagacity of those peers who,
+though conscientiously opposed to the Reform Bill, preferred
+allowing it to pass by their own retirement from the final
+divisions to driving the minister to carry his point by a creation
+of peers, since the avoidance of such an addition to their numbers
+as had been threatened enabled them now to force the adoption of
+these amendments on a reluctant minister. And it seems difficult to
+deny that the first was required by justice, and that the second
+was most desirable in the interests of the measure itself. Without
+it the town councillors, from among whom the mayor was to be
+chosen, might have been selected from the poorest, the least
+educated, and least independent class of the rate-payers. In some
+boroughs, or in some wards of many boroughs, it may be regarded as
+certain that they would have been so chosen; and such an admixture
+of unfit persons would have tended to bring some degree of
+discredit on the whole council, while to the successful
+inauguration of a new system the establishment of a general feeling
+of respect for it and confidence in it was of primary importance.
+The danger, too, of so ill-judged a selection would have been
+greatest in the larger boroughs, those being, at the same time, the
+very places in which the occasional difficulty of maintaining order
+and tranquillity made it even more necessary than in smaller towns
+that the council should enjoy the esteem and confidence of their
+fellow-citizens.</p>
+<p>The principle that every man who contributed to the rates had a
+right to claim a voice in the election of those who were to expend
+them, which the minister laid down as the justification of the
+clause conferring the municipal franchise on all the rate-payers,
+was strongly contested by Sir Robert Peel, though neither he nor
+those of his party in the Upper House proposed any alteration of
+the bill in this respect; but he pointed out that, though Lord John
+affirmed it to be the known and recognized principle of the
+constitution, he had not acted on it in the Reform Bill; and it is
+certainly open to question whether the adoption of some limitation
+would not have been an improvement on the present measure. The
+doctrine established in this instance by Lord John gave a
+preponderance at every municipal election to mere numbers, since
+the poorest class is everywhere the most numerous, and its
+admission led almost inevitably to a reduction of the parliamentary
+franchise at some future day, though certainly at this time, and
+for many years afterward, Lord John was far from contemplating any
+alteration of the Reform Bill, but, on the contrary, took every
+opportunity of proclaiming his adherence to it as a final solution
+of the question.</p>
+<p>But though in this particular it is possible that the bill might
+have been improved, it must be allowed to have been a measure very
+creditable to its framers. Few reforms have been conceived in a
+more judicious and more moderate spirit; few have been so carefully
+limited to the removal of real and proved abuses, and the
+prevention of their recurrence, while avoiding any concessions to
+the insidious demands of revolutionists, or the ill-regulated
+fancies of metaphysical theorists. It was a reform strictly in
+accordance with some of the most important principles of the
+constitution, as they have been gradually developed by the
+practical experience of successive generations. It combined with
+felicitous skill representative with local government; it secured
+uniformity in working, and that peculiarly English principle of
+publicity, without which the best-devised system cannot long be
+preserved from degeneracy.</p>
+<p>The Church reforms in England and Ireland, which were carried
+out about the same time, cannot be said to have involved any
+constitutional principle, though one of them greatly extended the
+principle of religious toleration and indulgence to the Dissenters
+of various sects. No alteration had been made in the Marriage Act
+of 1754, which declared it indispensable to the validity of a
+marriage that it should be performed in a church and by a clergyman
+of the Established Church. And it was not strange that this should
+be felt as a grievance by those who were not in communion with that
+Church. But some of the Dissenting sects had an additional cause of
+discontent in the words of the marriage service, which gave a
+religious character to the ceremony, while they regarded it as a
+civil contract. In his short administration Sir Robert Peel had
+recognized the validity of the arguments against the unmodified
+maintenance of the existing law, and had framed a measure
+calculated, in his view, to give the Dissenters the relief their
+title to which could not be denied. But his bill had been
+extinguished by his retirement. And Lord John Russell now availed
+himself of the machinery of another measure, which he introduced at
+the same time, to make the relief somewhat wider and more
+effective.</p>
+<p>Hitherto there was no record of births and marriages beyond that
+which was preserved in the registers of different parishes, which
+in former years had in many instances been carelessly and
+inaccurately kept. But at the beginning of 1836, the ministers,
+justly urging that it was important, in a national point of view,
+both with regard to the security of titles to property, and to that
+knowledge of the state of population the value of which was
+recognized by the establishment of the practice of taking a
+decennial census, that there should be a general register of all
+such occurrences, introduced a bill to establish a registry and
+registrar in every Poor-law union, with a farther registry for each
+county, and a chief or still more general one in London for the
+whole kingdom, subject to the authority of the Poor-law
+Commissioners. And by a second bill they farther proposed that the
+registries to be thus established should be offices at which those
+who desired to do so might contract purely civil marriages.
+Previous clauses in it provided that members of any sect of
+Protestant Dissenters might be married in their own chapels, and by
+ministers of their own persuasion. After enactments removing all
+the civil disabilities under which Nonconformists had labored for
+one hundred and fifty years had been placed on the statute-book, it
+was clearly inconsistent in the highest degree to retain still more
+offensive and unreasonable religious disabilities, and to deny to
+them the right of being married by their own ministers, according
+to the rites most agreeable to their consciences or prejudices. And
+though some of the details of the ministerial measure were objected
+to and slightly altered in its passage through Parliament, the
+general principle was admitted by the warmest friends and most
+recognized champions of the Established Church, who wisely felt
+that a bulwark which is too ill-placed or too unsubstantial to be
+defended, is often a treacherous source of weakness rather than
+strength, and that a temperate recognition of the validity of
+claims founded on justice was the best protection against others
+which had no such foundation, and that measures such as these
+adopted in a spirit of generous conciliation could only strengthen
+the Church by taking at least one weapon from the hands of its
+enemies.</p>
+<p>Another of the measures relating to the Church, of which Peel
+had prepared a sketch, had for its object the removal of a
+grievance of which the members of the Church itself had long been
+complaining, the mode of the collection of tithe. It would be
+superfluous here to endeavor to trace the origin of tithes, or the
+purposes beyond the sustentation of the clergymen to which they
+were originally applied.[<a href="#note-240">240</a>] They had
+undoubtedly been established in England some time before the
+Conquest, and the principle that the land should support the
+National Church was admitted by a large majority of the population;
+it may probably be said with something nearly approaching unanimity
+on the part of those who really paid it, namely, the land-owners.
+The objection to the tithe system was founded rather on the way in
+which it worked, operating, as Lord John Russell described it, as
+"a discouragement to industry; a penalty on agricultural skill; a
+heavy mulct on those who expended the most capital and displayed
+the greatest skill in the cultivation of the land." The present
+mode of levying the tithes forced the clergy to forbearance at the
+expense of what they deemed to be their rights, or led them to
+enforce them at the expense of the influence which they ought to
+possess with their parishioners, compelling them to lose either
+their income by their indulgence, or their proper weight and
+popularity in the parish by the exaction of what the law gave them
+for "the support of themselves and their families." And this
+dilemma was felt so keenly by the clergy themselves, that it had
+become a very general feeling with them that, "if any sort of
+commutation could be devised, they would be delighted to be
+delivered from this objectionable mode of payment." Indeed, Sir
+Robert Peel, whose measure of the preceding year had been chiefly
+directed to the encouragement of voluntary commutations, had stated
+to the House that there were already two thousand parishes in the
+kingdom in which a commutation between the clergyman and his
+parishioners had been agreed upon, and established as a durable
+settlement by separate acts of Parliament. Indeed, arrangements of
+this kind existed very generally; the parishes in which the tithe
+was taken in kind being comparatively few, and the plan usually
+adopted being for the occupier of land to pay the incumbent a fixed
+annual sum bearing a certain proportion to his rent. But
+arrangements which were optional were, of course, liable to be
+rescinded; and Peel desired to establish a system which should be
+universal and permanent. And with this view he had designed the
+appointment of a temporary commission, one member of which should
+be nominated by the Primate, as the representative of the Church,
+under whose supervision the tithes of every parish in the kingdom
+should be commuted into a rent-charge, regulated partly by the
+composition which had hitherto been paid, and partly by the average
+price of grain&mdash;wheat, barley, and oats. It was no new idea,
+since as far back as 1791 Pitt had proposed a general commutation
+of tithes for a corn rent, and had submitted a plan with that
+object to the Primate, though circumstances of which we have no
+accurate knowledge prevented him from proceeding with it.[<a href=
+"#note-241">241</a>] Objections[<a href="#note-242">242</a>] were
+taken to this last part of the arrangement, chiefly because it
+would render perpetual the terms of existing compositions, the
+extreme augmentation of them which was provided for in the bill
+being only ten per cent., while it was notorious that the majority
+of incumbents had shown such liberality in these matters that the
+compositions rarely amounted to two-thirds of the sum to which they
+were legally entitled. And it was hardly denied that the measure
+did involve some sacrifice of the extreme legal rights of the
+clergy; but it was urged and generally felt by the most judicious
+friends of the Church that the peace and harmony which might be
+expected to be the fruit of the measure was worth some sacrifice,
+and the bill was passed with very general approval; a bill on
+similar principles, with such variations as were required by the
+differences between the two countries, being also passed for
+Ireland.</p>
+<p>The last measure on ecclesiastical subjects was also chiefly of
+a financial character, though its details were calculated, some
+directly, others indirectly, to produce benefits of a still more
+important nature. The condition of the property of the bishops and
+the ecclesiastical chapters had long been a subject of censorious
+remark. The various dioceses differed greatly in extent, as did,
+therefore, the labors of the diocesans. Some sees contained above
+1000, one (London) even above 1200 parishes; others contained under
+150. The revenues of some were very large, in one or two instances
+approaching &pound;20,000 a year, while those of others scarcely
+exceeded &pound;1000 or &pound;1500 a year, thus affording incomes
+palpably inadequate to the support of the Episcopal dignity; so
+inadequate, indeed, that they were generally supplemented by the
+addition of some better endowed deanery or canonry. It was
+universally felt that such a deficiency and such a mode of
+supplying it were in themselves a scandal, which was greatly
+augmented by the system of translations to which it had given
+birth. The poorer bishoprics would hardly have been accepted at all
+had they not been regarded as stepping-stones to others of greater
+value; and the hope of such promotion had in some cases the not
+unnatural, however deplorable, effect of making the bishop anxious
+to please the minister of the day, to whom alone he could look for
+translation, by parliamentary subservience; and the still more
+mischievous result (if possible) of rendering the whole Bench
+liable to the same degrading suspicion; while the canonries and
+prebends in the different chapters, whose revenues also varied
+greatly, were in every diocese so numerous that they had become
+nearly sinecures, the duties rarely exceeding residence for a
+month, or, at the outside, six weeks in a year.</p>
+<p>These abuses (for such they could not be denied to be) had
+attracted the attention of Sir Robert Peel, who had appointed a
+commission, of which many of the highest dignitaries of the Church
+were members, and who, after very careful investigation and
+deliberation, presented a series of reports on which the ministry
+framed its measure. They proposed, as has already been mentioned in
+connection with the labors of Sir Robert Peel, an amalgamation of
+four of the smaller bishoprics at their next vacancy, in order
+hereafter to provide for the addition of two new ones at
+Manchester, or Lancaster, and Ripon, without augmenting the number
+of bishops. Lord Melbourne apparently feared to provoke the
+hostility of some of the extreme Reformers, who had recently
+proposed to deprive the bishops of their seats in the House of
+Lords, if he should attempt to increase the number of the spiritual
+peers; though, as their number had been stationary ever since the
+Reformation, while that of the lay peers had been quadrupled, such
+an objection hardly seemed entitled to so much consideration.
+Another clause was directed toward the establishment of greater
+equality between the revenues of the different bishoprics, a step
+which, besides its inherent reasonableness and equity, would
+extinguish the desire of promotion by translation, except in a few
+specified instances. Various reasons, sufficiently obvious and
+notorious, rendered the two archbishoprics, and the bishoprics of
+London, Durham, and Winchester, more costly to the occupants than
+the other dioceses; and these were, therefore, left in possession
+of larger revenues than the rest, proportionate to their wider
+duties or heavier charges. But all the others were to be nearly
+equal, none exceeding &pound;5500, and none falling below
+&pound;4500; while the five richer sees were also the only ones to
+which a prelate could be translated from another diocese. It
+followed, almost as a matter of course, that the practice of
+allowing a bishop to hold any other preferment was to cease with
+the cessation of the cause that had led to such an abuse.</p>
+<p>Another part of the bill provided for the suppression of such
+canonries or prebends as might fairly be considered superfluous.
+Four were considered sufficient for the proper performance of the
+duties of each cathedral; and the extinction (after the lives of
+the present holders) of the rest was designed to form a large fund,
+to be at the disposal of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners,[<a href=
+"#note-243">243</a>] and to be applied by them chiefly to meet the
+wants of the more populous parishes in different large towns, for
+which it had hitherto been difficult to make any
+provision,[<a href="#note-244">244</a>] by contributing to the
+erection of additional churches, by increasing the incomes of the
+incumbents in cases where it was insufficient, or in any other way
+which the practical experience of the members of the commission
+might suggest. One very important reform of a different kind was
+also provided for in the abolition of pluralities, the bill
+prohibiting the holding of two livings by the same person except
+they were within ten miles of each other. The measure was objected
+to by Sir Robert Inglis, who had represented Oxford as the peculiar
+champion of Protestant and Church principles ever since 1829, and
+by a party which shared his views, as one calculated to be "fatal
+to the best interests of the Church." They looked on the property
+of the Church and everything connected with it as invested with so
+peculiar a character, that they not only contested the right of
+Parliament to take any step to diminish its revenues or to change
+the employment of them, but they even "disputed its right to
+deprive one class of the clergy of any portion of their revenues
+for the purpose of distributing it among another." But the
+distinction thus made between Church property and that of any other
+public body seems one which can hardly be supported. The purposes
+for which ecclesiastical chapters or officials have been endowed
+with possessions and revenues are undoubtedly of a more sacred
+character than the duties imposed on lay corporations; but that
+consideration cannot be regarded as affecting the tenure of those
+possessions, or as inconsistent with the doctrine that they are
+national property, bestowed by the nation on the Church for the
+service and advantage of the people; deeply interested not only in
+the maintenance of an Established Church, but in that Church being
+in the highest possible degree efficient for its holy objects.
+Being so bestowed and appropriated, that property must, on every
+principle of the constitution, be subject to the control of the
+national Parliament. And surely that control could never be more
+legitimately exerted than in carrying out the recommendations of a
+commission which numbered among its members several of the prelates
+of the Church, whose profession and position were a guarantee for
+their anxiety to preserve all the rights of the Church which
+contributed to its credit or efficiency; while their matured
+experience enabled them better than any other men to judge how to
+reconcile the maintenance of its dignity with the extension of its
+usefulness.</p>
+<p>Notes:</p>
+<p><a name="note-226" id="note-226">
+<!-- Note Anchor 226 --></a>[Footnote 226: The second resolution
+affirmed that "this House looks forward to a progressive
+improvement in the character of the slave population, such as may
+prepare them for a participation in those civil rights and
+privileges which are enjoyed by other classes of his Majesty's
+subjects." (Stapleton's "Life of Canning," iii., 98, where also
+large extracts from the minister's speech are given.)]</p>
+<p><a name="note-227" id="note-227">
+<!-- Note Anchor 227 --></a>[Footnote 227: Trinidad, St. Lucia, and
+Demerara were the only British islands which had not separate
+Legislatures.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-228" id="note-228">
+<!-- Note Anchor 228 --></a>[Footnote 228: Miss Martineau. "History
+of the Thirty Years' Peace," book iv., c. viii.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-229" id="note-229">
+<!-- Note Anchor 229 --></a>[Footnote 229: Alison, "History of
+Europe," 2d series, c. xxxi., sec. 74.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-230" id="note-230">
+<!-- Note Anchor 230 --></a>[Footnote 230: In the debate on the
+Registration Bill, in 1836, Lord John Russell stated that two
+hundred and twenty eight unions had already been formed in England
+and Wales, and that it might be calculated that when the whole
+country was divided into unions the entire number would amount to
+something more than eight hundred.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-231" id="note-231">
+<!-- Note Anchor 231 --></a>[Footnote 231: See Lord Althorp's
+speech, of parts of which an abstract is given in the
+text.&mdash;<i>Parliamentary Debates</i>, xxii., April 17.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-232" id="note-232">
+<!-- Note Anchor 232 --></a>[Footnote 232: Lord Althorp made the
+following frightful statement of the crimes committed in the
+province of Leinster alone in the last three months of 1832 and the
+first three of 1833: 207 murders, 271 cases of arson. The assaults
+attended with grievous personal injury were above 1000; burglaries
+and robberies, above 3000.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-233" id="note-233">
+<!-- Note Anchor 233 --></a>[Footnote 233: It was often asserted
+that fourteen-fifteenths of the land in Ireland belonged to
+Protestants, but this estimate was, probably, an exaggeration.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-234" id="note-234">
+<!-- Note Anchor 234 --></a>[Footnote 234: "Memoirs of Sir Robert
+Peel," ii., 3, 19.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-235" id="note-235">
+<!-- Note Anchor 235 --></a>[Footnote 235: "Memoirs of Sir Robert
+Peel," pp. 31, 32.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-236" id="note-236">
+<!-- Note Anchor 236 --></a>[Footnote 236: "One important question
+I found practically, and perhaps unavoidably, decided before my
+arrival, namely, the dissolution of the existing Parliament. Every
+one seemed to have taken it for granted that the Parliament must be
+dissolved, and preparations had accordingly been made almost
+universally for the coming contest."&mdash;<i>Peel's Memoirs</i>,
+ii., 43.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-237" id="note-237">
+<!-- Note Anchor 237 --></a>[Footnote 237: "Middle Ages," ii., 31
+<i>seq</i>. See also Stubbs, "Constitutional History," i., 82-92
+<i>et seq.</i>]</p>
+<p><a name="note-238" id="note-238">
+<!-- Note Anchor 238 --></a>[Footnote 238: See Hallam's
+"Constitutional History," ii., 155.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-239" id="note-239">
+<!-- Note Anchor 239 --></a>[Footnote 239: This was a matter of no
+small importance. The number of boroughs included in the bill was
+183, having a population of about two millions. Their annual income
+was stated by Lord John Russell to be as nearly as possible
+&pound;2000 a year for each, being &pound;367,000; but their annual
+expenditure exceeded that amount by &pound;10,000, being
+&pound;377,000; "besides which there was a debt of &pound;2,000,000
+owing by these bodies."]</p>
+<p><a name="note-240" id="note-240">
+<!-- Note Anchor 240 --></a>[Footnote 240: See Hallam, "Middle
+Ages," ii., 205-207.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-241" id="note-241">
+<!-- Note Anchor 241 --></a>[Footnote 241: "Life of Pitt," ii.,
+131. Lord Stanhope imagines that the plan was relinquished in
+consequence of discouraging comments by the Archbishop (Dr.
+Moore).]</p>
+<p><a name="note-242" id="note-242">
+<!-- Note Anchor 242 --></a>[Footnote 242: These objections were
+founded on the following calculations, or something similar to
+them. The tithe was the tenth of the produce. In letting estates it
+was estimated that a farm ought to produce three rents; in other
+words, that a farm let at &pound;1 an acre ought to produce yearly
+&pound;3 an acre. One-tenth of three pounds, or 6s., therefore, was
+what the clergyman was entitled to claim. Out of this, however, he
+had to defray the cost of collection, which might, perhaps, be one
+shilling, leaving him five shillings. But the average of
+compositions over the whole kingdom was under 2s. 9d., or
+eleven-twentieths of what he was entitled to; and if augmented by
+ten per cent., it would not exceed three shillings.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-243" id="note-243">
+<!-- Note Anchor 243 --></a>[Footnote 243: The fund so created was
+expected to amount to &pound;130,000 a year.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-244" id="note-244">
+<!-- Note Anchor 244 --></a>[Footnote 244: As instances of the want
+of church-room in such towns, Lord John cited the dioceses of
+London, Chester, York, Lichfield, and Coventry, containing a
+population of 2,590,000 persons, with church accommodation for only
+276,000, or one-ninth of the population; the Commissioners, from
+whose report he was quoting, reckoning that church-room ought to be
+provided for one-third.]</p>
+<hr />
+<a name="CH11" id="CH11"><!-- CH11 --></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XI.</h2>
+<p class="blockquote">Death of William IV., and Accession of Queen
+Victoria.&mdash;Rise of the Chartists.&mdash;Resignation of Lord
+Melbourne in 1839, and his Resumption of Office.&mdash;Marriage of
+the Queen, and Consequent Arrangements.&mdash;The Precedence of the
+Prince, etc.&mdash;Post-office Reform.&mdash;War in
+Afghanistan.&mdash;Discontent in Jamaica.&mdash;Insurrection in
+Canada.&mdash;New Constitution for Canada and other
+Colonies.&mdash;Case of Stockdale and Hansard.</p>
+<p>The reforms mentioned in the preceding chapter were the last
+measures of the reign of William IV. In the summer of the next
+year, 1837, he died, and was succeeded in his British, though not
+in his Hanoverian, dominions by our present gracious sovereign, who
+had only just arrived at the age which entitled her to exercise the
+full authority of the crown. The change was calculated to
+strengthen the crown, by enlisting the chivalrous feelings of all
+that was best in the nation in the support of a youthful Queen, and
+in a lesser degree it for a time strengthened the ministry also;
+but, with respect to the latter, the feeling did not last long. For
+the next three years the summers were very unfavorable to the
+farmer; the harvests were bad; the inevitable accompaniment of a
+rise in prices had caused severe and general distress, and distress
+had produced clamorous discontent, and in some districts formidable
+riots. It had been greatly aggravated in the manufacturing counties
+by the operations of the trades-unions, which had gradually put
+forth pretensions to regulate the wages and other conditions of
+work, and had enforced them with such tyrannical violence, not
+flinching from the foulest crimes, that in many instances they had
+driven the masters to close their factories rather than submit to
+their mandates; and in others had compelled the workmen themselves
+to discontinue their labors, thus spreading destitution among
+thousands whose earnings, if they had been allowed to consult their
+own wishes, would have been amply sufficient for the support of
+their families;[<a href="#note-245">245</a>] and the evil had grown
+to such a height, that in 1838 a committee was appointed by the
+House of Commons to investigate the whole subject of trade
+combinations. But the turbulent spirit excited by this distress did
+not now confine itself to single outbreaks of violence, but, under
+the guidance of some demagogues of a more methodical turn of mind
+than usual, developed itself in a systematic organization having
+for its object what they called "the people's charter," which aimed
+at a total revolution of the existing parliamentary system, with
+the avowed design that, when adopted, it should eventually lead to
+an entire reconstruction of the government. The Chartists, as they
+called themselves, had advocates even in Parliament, who presented
+their petitions to the House of Commons, and tried, though
+unsuccessfully, to give them importance by the appointment of a
+committee to investigate the character of the reforms which they
+demanded. They were not, however, contented with peaceful modes of
+pressing their demands, but, in the course of the summer of 1839,
+broke out in formidable riots in different parts of the country. At
+Birmingham they set fire to different parts of the town, carrying
+on their work of pillage and destruction to such a pitch that the
+Duke of Wellington compared the condition of the town to one taken
+by storm in regular warfare; and at Newport, in Monmouthshire, they
+even planned and carried out an attack on the troops quartered in
+the district. But this violence led for a time to the suppression
+of the movement, the leaders in the Newport riots being convicted
+of high-treason; and, though the government forbore to put the
+extreme severities of the law in force against them, those who
+remained unconvicted had been taught by their example the danger
+which they incurred by such proceedings; and some years elapsed
+before a series of revolutionary troubles on the Continent again
+gave a momentary encouragement to those in this country who
+sympathized with the revolutionists, and prompted them to another
+attempt to force their views upon the government and the
+people.</p>
+<p>It had nearly, however, been another ministry on whom the task
+of quelling these riots had fallen. Though, as has been already
+said, Lord Melbourne's cabinet derived a momentary strength from
+the accession of a young Queen, the support it thus acquired did
+not last; and in May, 1839, having been defeated on a measure of
+colonial policy, which will be mentioned <a href=
+"#govcarried">hereafter</a>, the cabinet resigned. The Queen
+intrusted the task of forming a new administration to Sir Robert
+Peel, who undertook it with a reasonable confidence that he should
+be able to hold his ground better than formerly, now that the
+retirement of his predecessors was their own act, and admitted by
+them to have been caused by a consciousness of the divisions among
+their supporters and their own consequent weakness. He had the
+greater reason for such confidence, since two of the colleagues of
+Lord Grey who had refused his offers in 1834, Lord Stanley and Sir
+James Graham, were now willing to unite with him; and he had almost
+completed his arrangements, when he was stopped by an unexpected,
+though not altogether unprecedented, impediment. It will be
+recollected that, in 1812, some of the arrangements for the
+formation of a new administration on the death of Mr. Perceval were
+impeded by a doubt which was felt in some quarters whether the new
+ministers would be allowed to remove one or two officers of the
+household, to whom the Regent was generally understood to be
+greatly attached, but who were hostile to the party which hoped to
+come into power, though it was afterward known that these officers
+had felt themselves bound to retire as soon as the arrangements in
+contemplation should be completed.[<a href="#note-246">246</a>] Sir
+Robert Peel was now met by a difficulty of the same kind, but one
+which the retiring ministers had the address to convert into a real
+obstacle. The Queen, who had warm affections, but who could not
+possibly have yet acquired any great knowledge of business, had
+become attached to the ladies whom Lord Melbourne had appointed to
+the chief places in her household. It had never occurred to her to
+regard their offices in a political light; and, consequently, when
+she found that Sir Robert considered it indispensable that some
+changes should be made in those appointments, she at once refused
+her consent, terming his proposal one "contrary to usage and
+repugnant to her feelings." Sir Robert, however, felt bound to
+adhere to his request for the removal of some of the ladies in
+question; for, in fact, they were the wives and sisters of his
+predecessors, and a continuance of their daily intercourse with the
+Queen might reasonably be expected to have some influence over her
+Majesty's judgment of the measures which he might feel it his duty
+to propose. Such a difficulty could not have arisen under a male
+sovereign; but Lord Melbourne himself had departed from the
+ordinary practice when he surrounded his royal mistress with ladies
+so closely identified with his cabinet. It is very possible that he
+had originally made the appointments without any such design, from
+the careless indifference which was his most marked characteristic;
+but he cannot be so easily acquitted when, in reply to the Queen's
+application to him for advice on the subject, he, being joined in
+his assertion by Lord John Russell, assured her that Sir Robert
+Peel's demand was unjustifiable and unprecedented. Supported by the
+positive dictum of the ministers on whose judgment she had hitherto
+been bound to rely, the Queen naturally adhered to her decision of
+refusing to permit the removal of the ladies in question, and the
+result was that Sir Robert Peel declined to take office under
+circumstances of difficulty beyond those to which every new
+minister must of necessity be exposed, and Lord Melbourne and his
+colleagues resumed their posts. The transaction was, of course,
+canvassed in both Houses of Parliament. Sir Robert Peel and the
+Duke of Wellington, who was the spokesman of the party in the House
+of Lords, defended their refusal to undertake the government on any
+other condition than that for which they had stipulated, on the
+ground that the authority to make such changes in the household as
+they had proposed was indispensable, as a proof of their possession
+of her Majesty's confidence; while Lord Melbourne, with a strange
+exaggeration, defended the advice which he had given her Majesty by
+the assertion that to have complied with Sir Robert Peel's proposal
+would have been "inconsistent with her personal honor." Other
+arguments on the same side were based on the alleged cruelty of
+separating her Majesty "from the society of her earliest friends,
+her old and constant companions;" an argument which was disposed of
+by Lord Brougham's remark, that till she had become Queen (not yet
+two years before) she had had no acquaintance with them
+whatever.[<a href="#note-247">247</a>]</p>
+<p>But it is needless to dwell at any length on the case, in which
+all subsequent historians and political critics, however generally
+prepossessed in favor of the Liberal ministers, have given up their
+position as untenable. Her Majesty herself kept strictly on the
+path of the constitution in guiding herself by the counsels of
+those who, till their successors were appointed, were still her
+responsible advisers. But the course which they recommended was
+absolutely irreconcilable with one fundamental principle of the
+constitution&mdash;the universal responsibility of the ministers.
+In denying the right of the incoming ministers to remodel the
+household (or any other body of offices) in whatever degree they
+might consider requisite, they were clearly limiting the
+ministerial authority. To limit the ministerial authority is to
+limit the ministerial responsibility; to limit the ministerial
+responsibility is to impose some portion of responsibility (that
+portion from which it relieves the minister) on the sovereign
+himself, a dangerous consequence from which the constitution most
+carefully protects him. In fact, that the advice Lord Melbourne
+gave was indefensible was tacitly confessed by himself, when, on
+the recurrence of the same emergency two years later, he was
+compelled to recommend a different course;[<a href=
+"#note-248">248</a>] and the ladies whom Sir Robert had considered
+it necessary to remove anticipated their dismissal by voluntary
+resignation. It may be added that, at the close of this same year,
+Lord Melbourne himself insisted on nominating the private secretary
+to the Prince whom the Queen was about to marry, though no one
+could pretend that offices in his household were as important as
+those in that of the sovereign; and though, if there was any post
+in which the Prince might have been supposed to have a right to an
+unfettered choice, that might have been supposed to have been the
+office of his private secretary.[<a href="#note-249">249</a>]</p>
+<p>Her Majesty's marriage with Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg, her
+first cousin&mdash;one tending as greatly to the happiness of
+herself and the advantage of the nation as any royal marriage
+recorded in history&mdash;took place in the beginning of 1840; and
+in the preparatory arrangements&mdash;matters of far greater
+consequence to the Queen's feelings than any appointments in the
+household&mdash;the ministry, by singular mismanagement, contrived
+to force the consideration of other constitutional questions on
+Parliament in such a way that the conclusions which were adopted,
+however inevitable, could hardly fail to be mortifying and
+vexatious to her Majesty, in whose cup of happiness at such a
+moment special care ought rather to have been taken to prevent the
+admixture of any such alloy. In the matter of the annuity to be
+settled on the young Prince, the Opposition must, indeed, share the
+blame with the minister. If it was unpardonable carelessness in the
+latter to omit the usual practice of previously consulting the
+leaders of the Opposition on the amount of the grant to be
+proposed, it was not the less impolitic and unworthy of such men as
+the Duke and Sir Robert Peel to show their disapproval of the
+inattention by a curtailment of the grant. The sum proposed,
+&pound;50,000 a year, was fairly justified by the fact of its being
+the same which twenty-four years before had been settled on the
+Prince's uncle, Leopold, on his marriage with the Princess
+Charlotte. Indeed, if there were to be any difference, the
+circumstances might have been regarded as warranting an increase
+rather than a diminution of it. Money was certainly more plentiful
+in 1840 than in 1816, and the husband of an actual Queen occupied,
+beyond all question, a higher position than the husband of the
+heiress-presumptive, who might never become Queen, and who, in
+fact, never did. We cannot think, therefore, that the reduction of
+&pound;20,000, which Sir Robert Peel proposed and carried, was
+reasonable or becoming, but regard it as neither called for by the
+circumstances of the kingdom, nor as befitting its liberality, nor
+as in harmony with its practice.</p>
+<p>But on the two other questions&mdash;one immediately affecting
+the constitution, and the other not absolutely unconnected with
+it&mdash;no defence of the minister seems available. At the opening
+of Parliament in 1840, her Majesty commenced her speech by the
+announcement of her intended marriage, describing the bridegroom
+simply as "the Prince of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha," the same
+expression which she had used in addressing the Privy Council a few
+weeks before. That description of him had at once struck her uncle,
+Leopold&mdash;who, since the death of his English wife, the
+Princess Charlotte, had become King of Belgium&mdash;as so
+imperfect and insufficient, that, on reading her address to the
+Privy Council, he at once wrote to her to point out that it would
+have been desirable to mention the fact of the Prince being a
+Protestant,[<a href="#note-250">250</a>] and that the omission
+would inevitably cause discontent. But, in spite of this warning,
+Lord Melbourne refused to advise the Queen to insert a statement of
+the Prince's religion in her speech, though it was by no means
+superfluous on such an occasion, since, if he were a Roman
+Catholic, a marriage with him would have incurred a forfeiture of
+the crown. The Duke of Wellington, on the other hand, regarded it
+as a positive duty to require that the fact of the Prince being a
+Protestant should be mentioned, so as to show the care of
+Parliament to prevent any constitutional precautions from being
+overlooked, such statement having, indeed, been usually made on
+similar occasions. When he, therefore, moved an amendment to insert
+the word "Protestant" in the description of the Prince, Lord
+Melbourne did not venture to divide the House against it; but still
+his management gave an ungracious appearance to the transaction, as
+if there had been in any quarter an unwillingness to recognize the
+fact of the Prince's Protestantism till the recognition was forced
+on the government by the action of the Parliament.</p>
+<p>The third question, as affecting the relative ranks and
+positions of the different members of the royal family, cannot be
+said to have been wholly unconnected with the provisions of the
+constitution; and the mismanagement of the minister was, perhaps,
+even more sure to attract notice in this case than in the other,
+since to introduce into a bill a clause which had no connection
+whatever with its title had something of the appearance of a
+deliberate slight to the two Houses. A bill to naturalize the
+Prince was, of course, indispensable. But into it the ministers,
+without any notice, had introduced a clause enabling him "during
+his life to take precedence in rank after her Majesty in Parliament
+and elsewhere as her Majesty might think fit and proper, any law,
+statute, or custom to the contrary notwithstanding." It was
+admitted that no such precedence had been given to Prince George of
+Denmark, nor to Prince Leopold. And there were obvious difficulties
+in the way of conferring such a life-long precedence, because, as
+Lord Brougham had pointed out, it was possible that the Queen might
+die without issue, in which case the King of Hanover would become
+King of England also, and his son the Prince of Wales; and it would
+have been an inconceivable anomaly that a foreign naturalized
+prince should take precedence of the Prince of Wales, whose special
+rank and importance was recognized in many acts of Parliament. This
+objection was so clearly insuperable, that Lord Melbourne consented
+to alter the clause so as to give the Prince precedence only "after
+the heir-apparent." But even this concession failed to satisfy the
+objectors, the King of Hanover, among others, positively refusing
+to waive his precedence over any foreign prince. And eventually the
+minister withdrew the clause altogether, and the bill, as it was
+passed, was confined to the naturalization of the Prince. Lord
+Melbourne had thus contrived to make the Queen and Prince appear as
+if they were desirous to induce the two Houses by a sort of trick
+to confer on the Prince a precedence and dignity to which he was
+not entitled, and to render the refusal of Parliament to be so
+cajoled a fresh cause of mortification to the royal pair. The
+course that was eventually adopted is understood to have been
+suggested by the Duke of Wellington&mdash;to withdraw the affair
+altogether from the cognizance of Parliament, and to leave it to
+the Queen to confer on the Prince whatever precedence she might
+choose, as it was certainly within her right to do. And so, a few
+days after the bill had passed, she did by letters-patent give him
+precedence next to herself "on all occasions and in all meetings,
+except when otherwise provided by act of Parliament," as, seventeen
+years later, she, in the same way, with the cordial approval of the
+whole nation, conferred on him the title of Prince Consort. And
+apart from its convenience, as avoiding all unseemly discussions,
+this would seem to have been the most natural and proper mode of
+settling such a matter. The Queen is the fountain of honor in this
+kingdom, and at her own court she can certainly confer on any of
+her own subjects whatever precedence she may think fit, while it
+may be doubted whether any act of a British Parliament could give
+precedence at a foreign court. It was, probably, not in his
+character of Duke of Cumberland, but as an independent sovereign,
+that the King of Hanover maintained his claim to superior
+precedence; and it was plain that the most illustrious subject
+could not possibly at any court be allowed to rank above a king.
+With reference to its possible effect on the subsequent relations
+of Peel and his followers with the court, it was, perhaps, well
+that a few months later they had the opportunity of proving that no
+personal objection to the Prince himself had influenced their
+course in these transactions, by giving a cordial assent to the
+ministerial proposal of conferring the Regency on him in the event
+of the Queen giving an heir to the throne, and dying while he was
+still a minor. The principle was the same as that which had guided
+the arrangements for a Regency ten years before; but it was not
+inconceivable that Parliament might have hesitated to intrust so
+large an authority to so very young a man, and him a comparative
+stranger, such as the Prince still was, had the leaders of the
+Opposition given the slightest countenance to such an
+objection.</p>
+<p>Lord Melbourne's ministry was hardly strengthened by the
+circumstances under which it resumed office. Yet the close of the
+same year witnessed a reform of which it is hardly too much to say
+that no single measure of this century has contributed more to the
+comfort of the whole mass of the people, with which it has also
+combined solid commercial benefits. Hitherto the Post-office had
+been managed in a singular manner, and the profit derived from it
+had been treated as something distinct from the ordinary revenue of
+the kingdom. In the reign of Charles II. it had been given to the
+Duke of York, and the grant was regarded as conferring on him such
+extensive rights, that when, some years afterward, an enterprising
+citizen set up a penny post for the delivery of letters in the City
+and its precincts, the Duke complained of the scheme as an
+infraction of his monopoly, and the courts of law decided in his
+favor. That grant ceased, as a matter of course, on the Duke's
+accession to the throne; and in the reign of Queen Anne a portion
+of the Post-office proceeds was appropriated, with the general
+consent of a grateful country, to reward the great achievements of
+the Duke of Malborough, a perpetual charge on it of &pound;5000 a
+year being annexed to the dukedom. In those days the postage of a
+letter was twopence for short distances, and threepence for any
+distance beyond eighty miles.[<a href="#note-251">251</a>] But
+those charges had been gradually increased; about the middle of the
+century the lowest charge was fixed at fourpence, rising in
+proportion to the distance, till the conveyance of a single letter
+from one extremity of the kingdom to the other cost eighteen-pence.
+Such a rate could not fail to be very profitable; and by the
+beginning of the present reign the yearly profit exceeded a million
+and a half of money. The heaviness of the charge, however, had
+latterly attracted attention, and had been the cause of many
+complaints, as being a great discouragement, and, in the case of
+the poorer classes, a complete obstacle to communication. However,
+neither the ministers nor the Parliament had succeeded in devising
+any remedy, since a system affording so large a return was not a
+thing lightly to tamper with, when those who complained suddenly
+found a practical leader in Mr. Rowland Hill, who published a
+pamphlet on the subject, in which he affirmed the cost of the
+conveyance of each letter even for such a distance as from London
+to Edinburgh to be infinitely less than a farthing; and that,
+consequently, all the rest of the postage was a tax for the
+purposes of revenue. When this fact was once established, it needed
+no argument to prove that to increase the tax paid by each
+recipient of a letter in proportion to the distance at which he
+lived from the writer was an indefensible unfairness; and, after
+much investigation and discussion, Mr. Hill succeeded in converting
+the ministers to his view. Accordingly, the Budget for 1839,
+introduced by Mr. Spring Rice, then Chancellor of the Exchequer,
+contained a clause which reduced the postage for every letter
+weighing less than an ounce to a uniform charge of a penny, to be
+prepaid by means of a stamp to be affixed to each letter by the
+sender. It was not without plainly-expressed reluctance that the
+scheme was consented to by the Opposition; nor can their hesitation
+be considered as unreasonable, in the very unsatisfactory condition
+of the finances of the kingdom at the time. The balance-sheet of
+the preceding year showed a considerable deficiency. There was a
+large unfunded debt; and even Mr. Hill's most sanguine calculations
+admitted a probable loss to the Post-office of &pound;1,200,000 for
+the first year or two; though he expressed his confidence that
+eventually the correspondence of the kingdom would be found to
+increase so largely as to make up for the greater part, if not the
+whole, of the deficiency. His anticipations were far outran by the
+reality.</p>
+<p>In 1839 the Postmaster-general estimated the number of letters
+sent yearly by the post at less than twenty-five millions. They are
+now upward of a thousand millions, a number the conveyance of which
+(with the addition of newspapers, whose circulation had also been
+greatly augmented by a recent reduction of the tax to a penny)
+would have severely taxed the whole carrying power of the kingdom
+before the introduction of railroads. Nor have the benefits of the
+new system been confined to ourselves. Foreign nations have
+followed our example, though not quite in the same degree, till an
+international postage is at length established throughout the whole
+of the civilized world. And it has not been only the happiness of
+private individuals that has been augmented by this facility of
+communication. In its gradual development it has largely promoted
+the extension of trade of every kind, and, by facilitating a
+commercial intercourse between nations, it cannot but contribute to
+the maintenance of friendship and peace.</p>
+<p>The full advantages of this reform could not be seen at first;
+but, even had it been appreciated as fully as we appreciate it now,
+no approval of it could have counterbalanced the general
+dissatisfaction with which the ministry was regarded. At home the
+finances were falling into great disorder, the expenditure of the
+year greatly exceeding the income; while the feeling that their
+Irish policy was dictated by a wish to purchase at any price the
+support of O'Connell, was still more injurious to them, for he was
+already beginning to renew agitation in Ireland, inaugurating a new
+association, which, though its purposes were faintly veiled for a
+time under the title of the Precursor Association, was understood
+to point at a repeal of the Union; while the ministers, though they
+denounced such a measure as ruinous to every part of the kingdom,
+seemed willing to give it practical encouragement by a bill which
+they introduced, which bore the name of a Registration Act for
+Ireland, but which was not confined to that object. On the
+contrary, it contained a provision for lowering the qualification
+for the franchise by one-half; so that it was, in fact, a new
+Reform Bill for Ireland,[<a href="#note-252">252</a>] calculated
+greatly to increase his influence by the number of voters of the
+poorer classes whom it would create. The bill was defeated, but the
+odium of having proposed it remained.</p>
+<a name="afghan" id="afghan"></a>
+<p>But, besides these home difficulties, there were troubles
+abroad, both in the East and in the West. In the East, the
+complications inseparable from a dominion like that of ours in
+India, where constant expansion seemed to have become a law of its
+existence, had involved us in a war with a new enemy, the warlike
+Afghan nation; in the West, both Jamaica and Canada were in a state
+threatening insurrection. Indeed, the troubles in Jamaica had been
+the immediate cause of that resignation of the ministry in 1839
+which has already been mentioned. Measures adopted in the English
+Parliament with reference to the termination of that apprenticeship
+system which, as we have seen, formed a part of the bill for the
+abolition of slavery, and another for the regulation of the prisons
+in the island, had given such offence to the colonial Assembly,
+never very manageable, that the members passed a resolution that
+their legislative rights had been violated, and that they would
+abstain from all exercise of their legislative functions, except
+such as might be necessary "to preserve inviolate the faith of the
+island with the public creditor, until" (by the rescinding of the
+resolutions, etc., of which they complained) "they should be left
+to the free exercise of their inherent rights as British subjects."
+And this resolution was seconded by an insulting protest, in which
+they drew an offensive comparison between the state of crime in the
+island and that which prevailed in Great Britain, taunting the
+British Parliament with the murders and acts of incendiarism which
+terrified Ireland night and day, with the murders of Burke and Hare
+in Scotland, with the law of divorce and <i>crim. con.</i> trials
+in England, and "a Poor-law which has taken millions from the
+necessities of the destitute to add to the luxuries of the
+wealthy." The Governor dissolved the Assembly, but that which
+succeeded re-adopted the resolutions of its predecessor, and the
+ministers, in consequence, brought in a bill "to suspend the
+existing constitution of the island for a limited number of years,
+and to provide that during that interval its legislative functions
+should not be exercised by a Governor, a Council, and a House of
+Assembly, but should reside in the Governor and Council alone." The
+emergency was too great and undeniable, the remedy proposed was
+also too unprecedented in its stringency, to be dealt with without
+the gravest deliberation; and the House of Commons accordingly gave
+the matter the patient consideration which became both it and
+themselves. They allowed the island to appear by counsel against
+the bill, and listened for many hours to an elaborate defence of
+the conduct of the Assembly, which if it failed to change the
+intention of the ministers, convinced Sir Robert Peel and his party
+that their measure was doubtful in its justification and impolitic
+in its severity. He pointed out that "the bill was neither more nor
+less than one for the establishment of a complete
+despotism&mdash;one which would establish the most unqualified,
+unchecked, unmitigated power that was ever yet applied to the
+government of any community, in place of that liberal system which
+had prevailed for upward of one hundred and fifty years." And,
+though he did not for a moment question the power of Parliament to
+pass such a measure, he greatly doubted the policy of such an
+exertion of it. A somewhat similar measure affecting Canada they
+had been compelled to enact in the preceding year, and he feared
+lest "it might seem to be coming to be a practice of Parliament to
+suspend a constitution every session." And he quoted a speech of
+Canning, delivered fifteen years before, in which that eloquent
+statesman, a man by no means inclined to a timorous policy, had
+declared that "no feeling of wounded pride, no motive of
+questionable expediency, nothing short of real and demonstrable
+necessity, should ever induce him to moot the awful question of the
+transcendental power of Parliament over every dependency of the
+British crown. That transcendental power was an ordinance of
+empire, which ought to be kept back within the penetralia of the
+constitution. It exists, but it should be veiled. It should not be
+produced on trifling occasions, or in cases of petty refractoriness
+or temporary misconduct."</p>
+<p>And Sir Robert, "looking at all the papers before the House,
+could not say that there was here any vindication for bringing
+forward this transcendental power." He asked whether "they had ever
+treated with so much severity a conquered colony amid the first
+heat of animosity after the contest." And he traced the history of
+our government of the island back to the time of Charles II.,
+pointing out (as Burke had formerly argued with respect to our
+Colonies in North America) that "Jamaica owed its colonization by
+British subjects to the conquest that was made of it by the arms of
+Cromwell; that its first English population was composed of those
+who, disgusted with the excesses of the civil wars, there found a
+refuge," and who had carried with them that attachment to liberty
+which, as early as 1678, had led them successfully to repel the
+attacks made on the privileges of their House of Assembly by the
+ministers of Charles II. He warned the House, also, that if this
+measure were passed, "a sympathy for the people of Jamaica would be
+excited throughout the other West Indian possessions of the crown."
+And, while fully admitting that the conduct of the Assembly had
+been "foolish and unjustifiable," he still recommended that it
+should be treated in a conciliatory spirit, which as yet had not
+been shown toward it.</p>
+<a name="govcarried" id="govcarried"></a>
+<p>The government carried their proposal by a majority of no more
+than five in a very full house, a success which they regarded as a
+defeat, and, as has been already mentioned, resigned. But as the
+state of the question and of the island did not admit of delay, on
+their resumption of their offices they introduced a fresh measure,
+which the Conservatives again curtailed of its most severe clauses,
+and which, in the form in which it was eventually passed, gave the
+Assembly time to reconsider its conduct, and, without the
+humiliation of confessing itself guilty, to give a practical
+recantation of their offensive resolutions, by resuming its work of
+legislation, any farther delay of which would on many subjects be
+very mischievous to the island itself. The distinct assertion by
+both parties of the power of the Parliament to inflict even the
+severest penalty enabled the Houses to take this conciliatory
+course without loss of dignity; while the stern disapproval of the
+conduct of the Assembly which the Conservative leader had
+expressed, even when pleading for a milder treatment of it,
+convinced the colonists that any protracted contumacy would be
+dangerous, and would deprive them for the future of all title to
+even the modified protection which on this occasion had saved
+them.</p>
+<p>In the discussion of these transactions, Peel, as we have seen,
+had alluded to the affairs of Canada, which had been of a still
+more serious complexion; since there the discontent of the
+colonists in the Lower Province had developed into armed
+insurrection. We have seen that, from the first moment after the
+country had passed into our possession, there had been almost
+constant dissensions between the old French colonists and the
+English immigrants who crossed over both from England and from the
+colonies on the southern side of the St. Lawrence in the early part
+of the reign of George III. The desire of terminating these
+divisions, which had their root in a difference of religion as well
+as of race, the French settlers being Roman Catholics, had been one
+of the chief motives which had led Pitt in 1791 to divide the
+country into two provinces.[<a href="#note-253">253</a>] And for
+many years the scheme was fairly successful; but, toward the end of
+the reign of George IV., the political excitement caused by the
+agitation in England of the question of Catholic Emancipation, and
+subsequently of Reform, spread across the Atlantic to the Canadas;
+and the French portion of the colonists, who almost monopolized the
+representation in Lower Canada, began to urge the adoption of
+changes utterly inconsistent with the existing constitution of the
+colony. In the hope of compelling the compliance of the home
+government with their demands, in 1832 and the following years they
+refused to vote the necessary supplies; and, gaining courage, as it
+were, from the contemplation of their own violence, and under the
+guidance of a leader of French extraction, a M. Papineau, who
+scarcely concealed his hope of effecting the complete severance of
+the Lower Province from the British dominion, they proceeded to put
+forth farther demands, which they regarded as plausible from the
+apparent resemblance of the changes which they required to the
+system of the English constitution, but which, to use the words in
+which Sir Robert Peel described them, would have established "a
+French republic." The most important of them were that the Upper or
+Legislative Council should, like the Assembly, be rendered
+elective, instead of, as had hitherto been the case, being
+nominated by the crown. And another asked that the Executive
+Council should be made responsible to the Assembly, in the same
+manner as in England the ministers of the crown were responsible to
+Parliament. As it was at once shown that the ministry at home had
+no intention of granting these demands, Papineau collected a band
+of malcontents in arms, with whom he took possession of one or two
+small towns, and ventured even to measure his strength with the
+Commander-in-chief of the province, Sir John Colborne, one of the
+most distinguished of Wellington's comrades and pupils. His force
+was utterly routed, and he himself fled across the frontier to New
+York. A similar outbreak, excited in the Upper Province by a
+newspaper editor, was crushed with equal ease and
+rapidity.[<a href="#note-254">254</a>] And the next year, 1838,
+Lord John Russell brought forward a bill to suspend the
+constitution of the colony, and to confer on a new Governor, who
+was at once to proceed thither, very ample powers for remodelling
+the government of the province, subject, of course, to the sanction
+of the home government. In the previous year he had succeeded in
+carrying some resolutions announcing the determination of
+Parliament not to concede the demands of the Assembly of the Lower
+Province, which have been already mentioned. And the reasons which
+he gave for this course are worth preserving, as expressing the
+view recognized by Parliament of the relations properly existing
+between the mother country and a colony. It was on a proper
+understanding of them that he based his refusal to make the
+Executive Council in Canada responsible to the Assembly. He held
+such a step to be "entirely incompatible with those relations.
+Those relations require that his Majesty should be represented, not
+by a person removable by the House of Assembly, but by a Governor
+sent out by the King, responsible to the King, and responsible to
+the Parliament of Great Britain. This is the necessary constitution
+of a colony; and if we have not these relations existing between
+the mother country and the colony, we shall soon have an end of
+these relations altogether." And he pointed out the practical
+difficulties which might reasonably be apprehended if such a change
+as was asked were conceded. "The person sent out by the King as
+Governor, and those ministers in whom the Assembly confided, might
+differ in opinion, and there would be at once a collision between
+the measures of the King and the conduct of the representatives of
+the colony."</p>
+<p>The plan of sending out a new Governor free from any previous
+association with either of the parties, or any of the recent
+transactions in the colony, was, probably, the wisest that could
+have been adopted. Unfortunately, it was in some degree marred by
+the choice of the statesman sent out, Lord Durham, a man of
+unquestioned ability, but of an extraordinarily self-willed and
+overbearing temper. He drew up a most able report of the state of
+the provinces, combined with recommendations of the course to be
+pursued toward them in future, so judicious that subsequent
+ministers, though widely differing from his views of general
+politics, saw no better plan than that which he had suggested; but,
+unhappily, the measures which he himself adopted, especially with
+respect to the treatment of those who had been leaders in the late
+rebellion, were such manifest violations of law, that the
+government at home had no alternative but that of disallowing some
+of them, and carrying a bill of indemnity for others. He took such
+offence at their treatment of him, though it was quite inevitable,
+that he at once resigned his appointment and returned home. But the
+next year the Queen sent down a message to the Houses recommending
+a union of the two provinces (a measure which had been the most
+important, and the very foundation, of his suggestions), and Lord
+John Russell introduced a bill which, as he described its object,
+he hoped would "lay the foundation of a permanent settlement of the
+affairs of the entire colony." The main feature of the government
+policy was the formation of "a legislative union of the two
+provinces on the principles of a free and representative
+government," and the establishment of such a system of local
+government as amounted to a practical recognition of the principle
+so earnestly repudiated, as we have seen, by Lord John Russell a
+year or two before. It was not, perhaps, fully carried out at
+first. Lord Sydenham, who had succeeded Lord Durham, reported to
+the home government, as the result of a tour which he had taken
+through a great part of the country, that in the whole of the Upper
+Province, and among the British settlers of the Lower Province, "an
+excellent spirit prevailed, and that he had found everywhere a
+determination to forget past differences, and to unite in an
+endeavor to obtain under the union those practical measures for the
+improvement of the country which had been too long neglected in the
+struggle for party and personal objects." But of the French
+Canadians he could not give so favorable a report. Efforts were
+still made by some of the old Papineau party to mislead the people;
+but he was satisfied they would not again be able to induce the
+peasantry to support any attempt at disturbance. It was natural
+that that party should still feel some soreness at the utter
+failure of their recent attempts and the disappointment of their
+hopes; and affairs took the longer time in being brought into
+perfect order and harmony through a strange mortality which took
+place among the first Governors-general. Lord Sydenham died the
+next year of lockjaw, brought on by a fall from his horse; Sir
+Charles Bagot was forced to retire in a state of hopeless bad
+health after an administration equally brief; two years later, Sir
+Charles Metcalfe, who succeeded him, returned home only to die; and
+it was not till a fourth Governor, Lord Elgin, succeeded to the
+government that it could be said that the new system, though
+established five years before, had a fair trial.</p>
+<p>Fortunately, he was a man admirably qualified by largeness of
+statesman-like views and a most conciliatory disposition for such a
+post at such a time; and he strictly carried out the scheme which
+was implied by the bill of Lord John Russell, and to a certain
+extent inaugurated by Lord Sydenham, selecting his advisers from
+the party which had the confidence of the Legislative Assembly, and
+generally directing his policy in harmony with their counsels; so
+that under his government the working of the colonial constitution
+was a nearly faithful reproduction of the parliamentary
+constitution at home. Such a policy was in reality only a
+development of the principle laid down by Pitt half a century
+before, and warmly approved by his great rival, that "the only
+method of retaining distant colonies with advantage is to enable
+them to govern themselves."[<a href="#note-255">255</a>] And since
+that day similar constitutions have been established in our other
+distant dependencies as they have become ripe for them&mdash;in New
+Zealand, the Cape, and the Australian colonies&mdash;almost the
+only powers reserved to the home government in those colonies in
+which such constitutions have been established being that of
+appointing the governors; that of ratifying or, if necessary,
+disallowing measures adopted by the colonial government; and, in
+cases of necessity, that of prescribing measures for the adoption
+of the local Legislatures, and even of compelling such adoption, in
+the event of any persevering opposition. The act of 1850, which
+established a constitution in Victoria, went even farther in the
+privileges it conferred on the colonists, inasmuch as it gave power
+to the Legislative Council to alter some of its provisions, and
+even to remodel the Legislative Council and Assembly. It may be
+doubted whether this last concession did not go too far, since in
+more than one important instance the government of that great
+colony has availed itself of it so liberally as to render it
+necessary to pass a fresh act of Parliament to enable her Majesty
+to give her royal assent to some of the changes which the Assembly
+had enacted.[<a href="#note-256">256</a>] Indeed, it cannot be said
+that the system has worked in every part or on every occasion quite
+as well as might have been hoped; nor can it be denied that the
+colonies have occasionally claimed a power of independent action in
+opposition to the home Parliament in a way to try severely the
+patience of the home government. After the British Parliament had
+adopted the policy and system of free-trade, the Canadian Assembly
+adhered to the doctrine of protection so obstinately that it
+actually established a tariff of import duties injurious to the
+commerce of the mother country, and apparently intended as a
+condemnation of its principles. But its contumacy showed how wholly
+different was the spirit of the British government from that which
+had prevailed in the last century; for though the home government
+had unquestionably the right of disallowing the offensive tariff,
+it forbore to exercise it; and, probably, by this striking proof
+that it considered a complete recognition of the principle of local
+self-government more important than any trifling financial or
+commercial advantage, contributed greatly to implant in Canada and
+all the colonies that confidence in the affectionate moderation of
+the home government which must be the strongest, if not the only
+indissoluble, bond of union.</p>
+<p>On the whole, it is hardly too much to say that no more
+statesman-like, and (if sentiment may be allowed a share in
+influencing the conduct of governments) no more amiable spirit
+animates any act of our modern legislation than is displayed in
+these arrangements for the management of our colonies. They are a
+practical exemplification of the idea embodied in the expression,
+"the mother country." A hundred years ago, Burke sought to impress
+on the existing ministers and Parliament the conviction that, "so
+long as our Colonies kept the idea of their civil rights associated
+with our government, they would cling and grapple to us, and no
+force under heaven would be of power to tear them from their
+allegiance." In the case of which he was speaking his warning, as
+we have seen, fell on deaf ears; but the policy of the present
+reign is a willing and full adoption of them, on a far larger scale
+than even his farseeing vision could then contemplate. Within the
+century which has elapsed since his time the enterprise of Britain
+has sent forth her sons to people another hemisphere; and they, her
+children still, cling to the parent state with filial affection,
+because they feel that, though parted from her by thousands of
+miles and more than one ocean, they are still indissolubly united
+to her by their participation in all the blessings of her
+constitution, her generous toleration, her equal laws, her
+universal freedom.</p>
+<p>On one transaction of these years the leaders of the Opposition
+were found acting in close agreement with the ministers. We have
+seen how, in the early part of the reign of George III., the House
+of Commons threw the sheriffs of London into prison, on account of
+their performance of what they conceived to be their duty as
+magistrates; and in 1840 it subjected the same officials to the
+same treatment on a question of the same character&mdash;the extent
+of the privilege of the House of Commons to overrule the authority
+of the courts of law. The question was in appearance complicated by
+the institution of several suits at law, and by the fact that the
+House was not consistent in its conduct, but allowed its servants
+to plead to the first action, and refused the same permission in
+the second, when the result of the first trial had proved adverse
+to them. The case was this: some inspectors of prisons has
+presented a report to Parliament, in which they alleged that they
+had found in Newgate a book of disgusting and obscene character,
+published by a London publisher named Stockdale. The House of
+Commons had ordered the report to be printed and sold by Messrs.
+Hansard, the Parliamentary publishers, and Stockdale brought an
+action against Messrs. Hansard for libel. Chief-justice Denman
+charged the jury that "the fact of the House of Commons having
+directed Messrs. Hansard to publish their reports was no
+justification to them for publishing a Parliamentary report
+containing a libel;" and Stockdale obtained damages, which were
+duly paid. Stockdale, encouraged by this success, when, in spite of
+the result of the late trial, Hansard continued to sell the report,
+brought a fresh action; but now the House forbade the publishers to
+plead to it; and, as they obeyed the prohibition, and forbore to
+plead, the case eventually came before the Sheriff's Court; fresh
+damages were given, and, in obedience to the writ of the Queen's
+Bench, the sheriffs seized Hansard's goods, and sold them to
+satisfy the judgment. Lord John Russell, as leader of the House,
+moved to bring to the Bar of the House all the parties concerned in
+the action&mdash;the plaintiff, his attorney, the sheriffs, and the
+under-sheriffs. He was opposed by nearly all the legal members of
+the House except the crown lawyers, Sir Edward Sugden especially
+warning the House that "a resolution of the House was of no avail
+in a court of justice;" while others taunted the House with want of
+courage in not proceeding against the judges themselves, rather
+than against their officers, which in this case the sheriffs
+were.</p>
+<p>There could be no doubt of the importance of the question, since
+it was no less, as the Attorney-general, Sir J. Campbell, put it,
+than a question whether Parliament or the courts of law had the
+superiority; and now Sir Robert Peel, as leader of the Opposition,
+came to the support of Lord John Russell, declaring his opinion to
+be, first, that "the House possessed every privilege necessary for
+the proper and effectual discharge of its functions;" secondly,
+that "the publication of evidence which had led the House to adopt
+any course was frequently essential to justify that course to the
+nation;" and thirdly, that "to judge of the extent of their
+privileges, and to vindicate them by their own laws, belonged to
+the House alone." And he pressed strongly on the House that it was
+"the duty of the House to fight the battle to the last," though he
+confessed that "it was with pain that he had come to the
+determination of entering into a contest with the courts of law."
+On one point the judges agreed with the House of Commons. The House
+committed the sheriffs; but, when they sued out their <i>habeas
+corpus</i>, the judges decided that the return of the
+Sergeant-at-arms that they were committed by the House for breach
+of privilege was a sufficient return. Stockdale brought fresh
+actions. But meantime the case was arousing a strong excitement in
+the country.[<a href="#note-257">257</a>] The singular hardship of
+the position of the sheriffs excited general sympathy: if they
+obeyed the House of Commons, which prohibited them from paying over
+to Stockdale the damages which they had received for him, the Court
+of Queen's Bench would be bound to attach them for disobedience to
+its order. If they obeyed the Queen's Bench, the House would
+imprison them for breach of privilege. And the national feeling is
+always in favor of the strictly defined authority of the courts of
+law, rather than of the somewhat indefinite claims of Parliament to
+interpret, and even to make, privilege. Another consideration,
+probably, weighed a little with the champions of the
+House&mdash;that their power of imprisonment ended with the
+session. As matters went on, it was found that even the Attorney
+and Solicitor-general differed as to the course to be pursued; and
+eventually Lord John Russell consented to adopt the advice which
+had been given by a former Attorney-general, Sir F. Pollock, and to
+bring in a bill to legalize all similar proceedings of Parliament
+in future, by enacting that a certificate that the publication of
+any document had been ordered by either House should be a
+sufficient defence against any action. The introduction of such a
+bill was in some degree an acknowledgment of defeat; but it can
+hardly be denied to have been not only a judicious step, but the
+only one practicable, if the contest between Parliament and the
+courts of law were not to be everlasting; and it met with general
+approval. If it was a compromise, it was one that satisfied both
+parties and both ends. It upheld the authority of the courts of
+law, and at the same time it practically asserted the
+reasonableness of the claim advanced by the House of Commons, by
+giving it for the future the power which it had claimed. Nor were
+people in this day inclined to be jealous of the privileges of
+Parliament, so long as they were accurately defined. They felt that
+it was for the advantage and dignity of the nation that its powers
+and privileges should be large; what they regarded with distrust
+was, a claim of power of which no one knew the precise bounds, and
+which might, therefore, be expanded as the occasion served.</p>
+<p>Notes:</p>
+<p><a name="note-245" id="note-245">
+<!-- Note Anchor 245 --></a>[Footnote 245: Fifty-two mills and
+30,000 persons were thrown out of employment for ten weeks at
+Ashton in 1830 by the turning out of 3000 "coarse spinners," who
+could clear at the time from 28s. to 31s. per week. The following
+passage is extracted from an oath said to have been administered by
+the combined spinners in Scotland in 1823: "I, A B, do voluntarily
+swear, in the awful presence of God Almighty, and before these
+witnesses, that I will execute with zeal and alacrity, as far as in
+me lies, every task or injunction which the majority of my brethren
+shall impose upon me in furtherance of our common welfare, as the
+chastisement of <i>knobs</i>, the assassination of oppressive and
+tyrannical masters, or the demolition of shops that shall be deemed
+incorrigible."&mdash;<i>Annual Register</i>, 1838, pp.
+204-207.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-246" id="note-246">
+<!-- Note Anchor 246 --></a>[Footnote 246: See <a href=
+"#endeavors">page 221</a>.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-247" id="note-247">
+<!-- Note Anchor 247 --></a>[Footnote 247: The question was
+examined with great minuteness by Lord Brougham a fortnight after
+the ministerial explanation. See "Parliamentary Debates," 3d
+series, xlvii., 1164.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-248" id="note-248">
+<!-- Note Anchor 248 --></a>[Footnote 248: It is stated on good
+authority that Lord Melbourne, in private conversation, justified
+or explained the line he had taken by his consideration for his
+friends, scores of whom would have had their hopes blighted by his
+retirement.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-249" id="note-249">
+<!-- Note Anchor 249 --></a>[Footnote 249: See "Life of the Prince
+Consort," i., 55.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-250" id="note-250">
+<!-- Note Anchor 250 --></a>[Footnote 250: "Life of the Prince
+Consort," i., 57.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-251" id="note-251">
+<!-- Note Anchor 251 --></a>[Footnote 251: Macaulay's "History of
+England," i., 386.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-252" id="note-252">
+<!-- Note Anchor 252 --></a>[Footnote 252: This is the name which
+the Liberal historian of the time, Miss Martineau, gives it. "The
+so-called Registration Bill was, in fact, an unannounced new Reform
+Bill for Ireland."&mdash;<i>History of the Peace</i>, book v., c.
+vi.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-253" id="note-253">
+<!-- Note Anchor 253 --></a>[Footnote 253: See <i>ante</i>,
+<a href="#canadaconst">p. 127</a>.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-254" id="note-254">
+<!-- Note Anchor 254 --></a>[Footnote 254: In one instance the
+rebels were aided by a party of citizens of the United States, who,
+without any sanction from their own government, seized an island on
+the St. Lawrence belonging to us, and attacked some of the Canadian
+villages. And this led to the discussion of a question of
+international combined with constitutional law, which Lord Campbell
+thus describes: "'Whether, if the subjects or citizens of a foreign
+state with which we are at peace, without commission or authority
+from their own or any other government, invade the English
+territory in a hostile manner, and levy war against the Queen in
+her realm, we are entitled to treat them as traitors?' The Canadian
+courts held that we could not, as they had never acknowledged even
+a temporary allegiance to our sovereign. And of this opinion was
+Sir William Follett. But, after reading all that is to be found on
+the subject, I come to the conclusion that they owed allegiance
+when, as private individuals, they voluntarily crossed the English
+frontier; that it was no defence for them to say that they then had
+arms in their hands and intended to murder the Queen's
+subjects."&mdash;<i>Life of Lord Campbell</i>, ii.,119. It
+certainly would have been no <i>defence</i>; but would it not have
+taken their conduct from under the definition of <i>treason</i>,
+and made it an act of <i>piracy</i>?]</p>
+<p><a name="note-255" id="note-255">
+<!-- Note Anchor 255 --></a>[Footnote 255: See Fox's words, quoted
+by Lord Stanhope.&mdash;<i>Life of Pitt</i>, ii., 90.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-256" id="note-256">
+<!-- Note Anchor 256 --></a>[Footnote 256: A couple of years after
+the period which is the boundary of the present work, this Canadian
+constitution of 1841 was superseded by a measure uniting Canada,
+Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick in one federal government, with, as
+the act recites, "a constitution similar in principle to that of
+the United Kingdom." The act farther provided for the admission of
+other dependencies of the crown in North America, Newfoundland,
+Prince Edward Island, British Columbia, and Rupert's Land into the
+union, and established as the constitution of the whole one
+scarcely differing from that of 1841, with the exception that both
+the Houses of the Legislature&mdash;called in the act the Senate
+and the House of Commons&mdash;were to be representative bodies,
+and that powers were conferred on them so absolutely free and
+independent, that it was thought necessary to add a clause
+providing that their "privileges, immunities, and powers were never
+to exceed those at the passing of the act held, enjoyed, and
+exercised by the Commons House of Parliament of the United Kingdom
+of Great Britain and Ireland, and by the members thereof."]</p>
+<p><a name="note-257" id="note-257">
+<!-- Note Anchor 257 --></a>[Footnote 257: Lord Campbell, in his
+autobiography, puts the transaction, in the phase at which it had
+now arrived, in a very serious light: "Next came a proceeding which
+placed me in a most difficult position; and the public never knew
+the danger which then existed of a convulsion unexampled in our
+history. The sheriffs sued out a writ of <i>habeas corpus</i>,
+directed to the Sergeant-at-arms, commanding him to produce before
+the Court of Queen's Bench the sheriffs of Middlesex, alleged to be
+illegally in custody, with the cause of their detention. Wilde, the
+Solicitor-general, was strong for refusing to make any return to
+the writ, and for setting the Court of Queen's Bench at defiance.
+Had I concurred in this opinion it would certainty have been acted
+on. The consequences would have been that the Sergeant-at-arms,
+even with the mace in his hand, would have been sent to Newgate by
+the Court of Queen's Bench. The House must have retaliated by
+committing the judges. The crown would then have had to determine
+on which side the army should be employed, and for a time we must
+have lived under a military government" (ii., 129). The noble and
+learned autobiographer does not explain why it should have been
+indispensable to employ the army on either side.]</p>
+<hr />
+<a name="CH12" id="CH12"><!-- CH12 --></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XII.</h2>
+<p class="blockquote">Sir Robert Peel becomes
+Prime-minister.&mdash;Commercial
+Reforms.&mdash;Free-trade.&mdash;Religious
+Toleration.&mdash;Maynooth.&mdash;The Queen's
+University.&mdash;Post-office Regulations.&mdash;The Opening of
+Letters.&mdash;Naturalization of Aliens.&mdash;Recall of Lord
+Ellenborough.&mdash;Reversal of the Vote on the Sugar
+Duties.&mdash;Refusal of the Crown to Sanction a Bill.&mdash;The
+Question of Increase in the Number of Spiritual Peers.&mdash;Repeal
+of the Corn-laws.&mdash;Revolution in France, and Agitation on the
+Continent.&mdash;Death of Sir Robert Peel.&mdash;Indifference of
+the Country to Reform.&mdash;Repeal of the Navigation
+Laws.&mdash;Resolutions in Favor of Free-trade.&mdash;The Great
+Exhibition of 1851.</p>
+<p>The transactions mentioned in the last chapter were among the
+last events of Lord Melbourne's ministry. He had for some time been
+aware of his impending defeat in the House of Commons, and, greatly
+to his credit, had endeavored to make the return to office easier
+to his successors by the friendly counsels he had given to the
+Queen on the subject.[<a href="#note-258">258</a>] A dissolution of
+Parliament in the summer of 1841 only weakened his party, and in
+September he resigned, and was succeeded by Sir Robert Peel, who,
+comparatively short as was his tenure of office,[<a href=
+"#note-259">259</a>] found it long enough to establish for himself
+a reputation as the greatest financier of Europe since the days of
+Pitt. It may be worth remarking that, in the "Memoirs of the Prince
+Consort," it is mentioned that in the course of his administration
+Peel found reason to change his judgment on the question of which
+House of Parliament it was the more desirable for the
+Prime-minister to be a member. Canning had more than once asserted
+his conviction that the public business would be more
+satisfactorily conducted when the Prime-minister was a commoner,
+founding his opinion chiefly on the paramount importance of
+financial questions, the discussion of which is almost confined to
+the House of Commons, and conceiving it to be supported by the
+history of the administration of Pitt, from whom, indeed, he had
+imbibed the idea; and in former years Peel had more than once
+expressed his concurrence with that view of the subject. But, from
+papers which were intrusted to him for the execution of his great
+work, Sir Theodore Martin learned that Peel had subsequently found
+reason to come to the opposite conclusion, not from any change in
+his view of the relative importance of the different departments of
+administration, but solely because "the amount of work imposed upon
+the first minister in the House of Commons, in addition to what he
+had to go through elsewhere, was too great for any human strength.
+In the House of Lords the Prime-minister would escape the necessity
+for being in a position to vindicate all the details of
+administration, and to answer the multiplicity of questions on all
+sorts of subjects, the putting of which has almost degenerated into
+a vice. He had, therefore, come to the conclusion that it was there
+he ought to be."[<a href="#note-260">260</a>] And, indeed, the
+subjects which demanded the care of the minister, and attracted the
+attention of Parliament, were constantly increasing in number,
+variety, and importance to the very end of his administration. Not
+only were the financial difficulties of the country, the depressed
+state of agriculture and commerce (the result of a succession of
+bad harvests), sufficient causes for grave anxiety, but the
+terrible war, of which <a href="#afghan">mention has already been
+made</a>, which we had now been carrying on for nearly three years
+in Afghanistan, and which, before the end of this very year, was
+about to be signalized by a disaster such as had never before
+befallen a British army, threatened to kindle the flames of war in
+Europe also, from the share which the intrigues of Russia had had
+in fomenting the quarrel; and the same danger was more than once in
+the course of the next five years imminent, from the irritation
+with which France regarded us, and which, commencing in Syria,
+while Lord Melbourne was still at the helm, lost no opportunity of
+displaying itself, whether in transactions in the remote Pacific
+Ocean or the old battle-field of the two nations, the Spanish
+peninsula; and finally, these embarrassing perplexities were
+crowned by the appalling visitation of famine, which, at the end of
+the fourth year of the administration, fell upon Ireland with a
+severity surpassing any similar event in modern history.</p>
+<p>With all these multiform difficulties the new minister grappled
+with unflinching courage, and with conspicuous success. Peace was
+preserved abroad, and financial prosperity was restored at home.
+Into the details of his measures devised for this last-mentioned
+object, though the leading features of his administration, and
+those on which his fame chiefly rests, it would be beside the
+purpose of the present work to enter. It is sufficient to say here
+that, in the spirit of Pitt's great financial reform of 1787, he
+revised the whole of the import duties of our commercial tariff,
+especially reducing the duties on raw material;[<a href=
+"#note-261">261</a>] making up the deficiency so caused by an
+income tax, which he described as a temporary imposition, since he
+doubted not that the great increase of lawful trade, which would be
+the consequence of the reduction of duties, would soon enable the
+revenue to dispense with a tax to the objections of which he was
+not blind. In recommending this great change to the House, he laid
+down as the soundest maxim of financial legislation, in which "all
+were now agreed, the principle that we should buy in the cheapest
+market and sell in the dearest," a doctrine which, when more fully
+carried out, as it was sure to be, led almost inevitably to the
+great measure for which his administration is most celebrated, the
+repeal of the Corn-laws. There could be no doubt that, in the most
+modified application of it, it struck at the root of the principle
+of protection, which had hitherto been the fundamental principle of
+our finance, and made a farther extension of it inevitable.</p>
+<p>And, as he had been one of the leading members of the ministry
+which carried Catholic Emancipation, so he now proceeded on the
+same path of religious toleration; and, in the session of 1844,
+successfully recommended to the House of Commons a bill which had
+already been passed by the Lords, repealing a number of penal acts
+affecting the Roman Catholics, which, though they had long been
+practically obsolete, still encumbered, and it may be said
+disgraced, the statute book, and were, so to say, a standing
+degradation of and insult to the Roman Catholic body. One of them,
+passed in the reign of William and Mary, still forbade any Roman
+Catholic to come within ten miles of London, to have either sword
+or pistol in his house, or to possess a horse worth more than five
+pounds. Another, enacted under Elizabeth, still made every Roman
+Catholic who omitted to take certain oaths guilty of high-treason,
+though no attempt to administer those oaths had been made since the
+Revolution. Another, of the time of Charles I., deprived any Roman
+Catholic who should send his son to a foreign school of all
+protection of the law; he could neither sue nor defend an action.
+It may fairly be said that the credit of Parliament and of the
+nation was concerned in the abrogation of laws so ridiculously
+oppressive, and not the less obnoxious for being practically
+invalid. And in the same spirit another measure was framed and
+carried by the Lord Chancellor, whose object was the confirmation
+of religious endowments belonging to different sects of Protestant
+Dissenters, and their protection from vexatious and unjust
+litigation, by making a continued possession of any kind of
+endowment or property for twenty years a valid title.</p>
+<p>These enactments may be regarded as indispensable supplements to
+the repeal of the Test Act and Catholic Emancipation. They were the
+coping-stone of the great edifice of religious toleration, of which
+the former acts had laid the foundation. And the next year Peel
+carried out still farther the same principle, by a measure which
+could not fail to be regarded as an especial boon in Ireland, since
+the great majority of the population of that kingdom were of the
+Roman Catholic persuasion. It has been seen that when the troubled
+state into which the Continent was thrown by the French Revolution
+threw hinderances in the way of the Irish students designed for the
+Roman Catholic priesthood going to one of the great Continental
+colleges, such as St. Omer or Salamanca, for their education, Pitt
+established for them a college at Maynooth, for the endowment of
+which Parliament was annually asked for a grant of about
+&pound;9000. The sum had long been felt to be altogether inadequate
+to the requirements of the foundation. As early as the year 1807,
+Lord Liverpool, then Home-secretary, had contemplated a large
+increase of the grant, though the weakness of the government, then
+presided over by the Duke of Portland, prevented him from carrying
+out that and other measures which he had conceived in a kindred
+spirit. Moreover, the grant was rarely proposed without giving rise
+to a warm debate raised by a party whose too tender consciences
+forbade them to sanction any measure appearing to foster a religion
+from which they dissented. And to remedy the two evils (the one
+arising from the want of a sufficient provision, the other from the
+spirit of religious controversy, for which the House of Commons was
+certainly very ill-calculated), Peel, in 1845, proposed to treble
+the grant, so as to put the college on a more satisfactory footing,
+by providing sufficient incomes for the professors, and a revenue
+adequate to the respectable maintenance of an increased number of
+pupils; and also to place the charge for the future on the
+Consolidated Fund, by which step its yearly discussion in
+Parliament would be altogether avoided. The measure was vigorously
+resisted, partly on the religious ground already mentioned, and
+partly by an argument, urged with some plausibility, that the
+design with which the college had originally been founded had not
+been realized; that, in fact, it had not proved a benefit to the
+country, but rather the reverse, by tempting into the service of
+the Roman Catholic Church a humbler and poorer class of students
+than could devote themselves to it when the preliminary education
+involved the expense of a protracted residence in a foreign
+country. But the obvious advantages of the change prevailed over
+these considerations, and the bill was carried by large
+majorities.[<a href="#note-262">262</a>]</p>
+<p>And now that the long cessation of controversy on the
+subject&mdash;which, indeed, has been not the least beneficial
+fruit of this bill of 1845&mdash;permits a candid consideration of
+it in all its bearings, it will probably be thought that Parliament
+had not often come to a wiser decision, one more dictated by
+judicious liberality of sentiment, and more imperatively required
+on every ground of statesman-like policy. If the countervailing
+objections and advantages be calmly weighed, it may almost be said
+that there was no alternative between enlarging the endowment and
+putting it on a new footing, or suppressing the college altogether.
+In its existing condition it was notoriously inadequate to fulfil
+the design of its founder; and any establishment visibly inadequate
+to its design tends to bring the design itself into some degree of
+contempt. Yet even if it should be granted that there might have
+been no fair ground of complaint if the college had never been
+founded, to close it after its benefits, however scanty, had been
+enjoyed for half a century, could not fail to have been regarded as
+an unpardonable injustice and injury. The other alternative,
+therefore, was practically the only one that remained; and in
+embracing it Peel was but carrying out the original principle on
+which the college was founded. It had been intended to be
+efficient; through lack of means it had proved inefficient. The
+obvious and just remedy was to supply such increased means as to
+create or bestow the efficiency originally aimed at. And it was a
+felicitous idea to place the charge for the future on such a
+footing as to combine with such an increase an avoidance of the
+irritation which its yearly discussion had never failed to
+excite.</p>
+<p>And at the same time, to carry still farther the principle of
+religious toleration, or rather of religious equality, he induced
+the Parliament to found a new university, consisting of three
+colleges, one in each of the three provinces of Ulster, Munster and
+Connaught (Leinster, as having Trinity College and Maynooth, being
+regarded as already sufficiently provided with university
+education), which should be open to students of every religious
+denomination, and at which, while every kind of secular education,
+both literary and scientific, should be given, the stirring up of
+religious controversy and animosity should be guarded against, by
+the absence of any theological professorships. He did not, indeed,
+design that the still greater benefits of religious education
+should be withheld from the pupils, but he proposed to provide for
+that object by confiding their religious education to the care of
+the clergy of each persuasion, some of whom in each town which was
+the seat of a college&mdash;Belfast, Cork, and Galway&mdash;might
+be trusted for willingness to superintend it. It was hoped that one
+fruit of this scheme, and that by no means its least valuable
+result, would be that the association of pupils of various creeds
+in their studies and amusements from an early age would lead them
+to maintain, in their more mature years, the harmony of which the
+foundation had thus been laid in their youth; and that thus the
+religious animosities which were the principal obstacle to the
+prosperity of the country would be softened, and in time
+extinguished. And this object has been achieved to a great extent,
+though the disfavor with which the Roman Catholic Church regards
+any educational system which is not under the superintendence of
+its priesthood has prevented the scheme from attaining the full
+development which was hoped for. The number of students of each of
+the principal sects&mdash;the Church of Ireland, the Roman
+Catholics, and the Presbyterians&mdash;steadily increases.[<a href=
+"#note-263">263</a>] Members of each religious body are among the
+professors in each college, and all accounts represent the most
+perfect harmony and cordiality as existing throughout the whole
+body.</p>
+<p>Yet, important as was the principle contained in these measures,
+none of them, perhaps, caused such excitement at the moment as an
+exercise by the government of what was, in point of fact, one of
+its most ancient, as well as most essential, powers: the occasional
+opening of letters which passed through the post, in compliance
+with a warrant of the Secretary of State. England had at all times
+been the refuge of those unquiet spirits who, in pursuit of their
+schemes of rebellion and revolution, had incurred the displeasure
+of their own governments, and had too easily found accomplices
+here. And in the course of the summer some notorious offenders of
+this class found a member of the House of Commons to present a
+petition, in which they complained that some letters which they had
+posted had been stopped and opened by the officers of the
+Post-office. The member who presented the petition appears to have
+fancied it an unprecedented and wholly unlawful exercise of
+authority; but Sir James Graham, the Home-secretary, not only at
+once avowed that the statement was true, and that he had issued his
+warrant for the opening of the letters mentioned, but also showed
+that the power to issue such an order was reserved to the Secretary
+of State in all the statutes which regulated the proceedings of the
+Post-office. The clause in the act which conferred the power had
+been originally framed by Lord Somers, a statesman certainly as
+little open as any of his time to the suspicion of desiring to
+encroach on the rightful liberty of the subject; and it had been
+exercised from time to time in every reign since the Revolution. It
+was a power intrusted to the Secretaries of State for the public
+safety, and exercised by them on their own responsibility. The
+practice and its justification were assailed in both Houses of
+Parliament by members of the extreme Liberal party; but, though no
+distinct motion on the subject was made, the general feeling of
+both Houses was plainly evinced, that it was a power which might at
+times be highly useful for the prevention of crime, or for the
+hinderance of conspiracies which might be dangerous to the general
+welfare and tranquillity, and that the constitutional
+responsibility attaching to every minister for every official act
+was a sufficient security against its being improperly
+used.[<a href="#note-264">264</a>]</p>
+<p>And it will, probably, be generally admitted that this was the
+statesman-like view of the subject. There is no doubt that the
+practice in question does infringe the great constitutional right
+of every individual in these kingdoms to absolute freedom of
+communication with his friends. But the most important and the most
+cherished constitutional rights must possess something of
+elasticity. It must be necessary at times to go back to the
+original object for which those rights have been conferred and
+secured. That original object is the safety and welfare of the
+whole body corporate&mdash;of the entire nation. And if that safety
+and welfare at times require the sacrifice, a wise ruler will not
+hesitate to demand it of the people, or to impose it on them for
+their own good. So another principle of the constitution is the
+absolute freedom of action for all the subjects of the sovereign;
+yet that principle is infringed by more than one statute: Factory
+Acts, which limit the hours of even voluntary labor; Education
+Acts, which compel the parent to a certain line of conduct toward
+his children; each in their way substitute another rule for that
+entire freedom of action which, as has been said before, is the
+fundamental principle of the constitution; but they make the
+substitution on the reasonable ground that the course of action
+which they compel is for the benefit, not only of the individual
+constrained, but of the whole community of which he is a member,
+and for whose welfare all laws and constitutions exist.</p>
+<p>One of the grounds of complaint against the exercise of this
+power, which had been alleged by some of the opponents of the
+government, had been that Sir James Graham's conduct had been
+dictated by an unworthy subservience to some of the despotic
+sovereigns of the Continent. The fact was indignantly denied in the
+House of Lords by the Duke of Wellington; and in the course of the
+session a remarkable proof was afforded how little influence such
+motives had on the decisions of our government, when they
+acquiesced in the passing of a bill which was a virtual repeal of
+the Alien Act, which had existed for more than half a century, and
+of which more than one Continental sovereign would certainly have
+desired the retention. Of late, indeed, it had been so modified,
+that practically it had become little more than a dead letter; and
+now, in 1844, without being formally repealed, it was virtually
+abrogated by an act which enabled all foreigners to obtain letters
+of naturalization, which conferred on them every right of British
+subjects, except those of becoming members of Parliament,[<a href=
+"#note-265">265</a>] or of the Privy Council.</p>
+<p>Generally speaking, few governments had enjoyed more of the
+confidence of the nation than Peel's did in 1844; yet in this year
+it was exposed to two remarkable mortifications. The charter of the
+East India Company, as framed by Pitt in subsequent events, which
+has led to the entire extinction of the political power of the
+Company, makes anything beyond this brief mention of the
+transaction superfluous at the present time.</p>
+<p>The other mortification of the ministry to which allusion has
+been made fell upon it at home in the Parliamentary discussion of
+the Prime-minister's financial measures, on which his judgment was
+usually regarded as pre-eminent, and on which a large majority of
+the House was generally disposed implicitly to follow his guidance.
+Sir Robert was not, indeed, himself Chancellor of the Exchequer,
+that office being filled by Mr. Goulburn, but it was certain that
+the Budget was inspired by a deference to the Prime-minister's
+views. And, among the arrangements which it proposed, one consisted
+of a relaxation of the sugar-duties, which was regarded with dread
+by those interested in the West Indies, as a farther step in the
+direction of free-trade, and as depriving them of the modified
+protection which they were as yet enjoying. To preserve that
+protection to them, Mr. Miles, the member for Bristol, proposed an
+amendment which, after an animated debate, was carried by a
+majority of twenty. Three months before, on the Factory Bill and
+the question whether the hours of labor should be limited to ten or
+to twelve, the minister had also found himself defeated, though by
+a much smaller majority; but in that case the defeat had been the
+less pronounced from the inconsistency of the votes on the
+different limits.[<a href="#note-266">266</a>] And he extricated
+himself from that difficulty by abandoning the bill altogether, and
+introducing a new one, not without angry resistance on the part of
+Lord John Russell and other members of the Opposition. They
+denounced such a manoeuvre as alike unconstitutional and
+unparliamentary; while he, on the contrary, insisted that the House
+had always jealously retained the right of reconsidering its own
+decisions. In that instance, however, the introduction of a new
+bill might have been regarded as the simplest mode of harmonizing
+the variety of views which had been represented by the discussion
+of and votes on the ministerial proposal and the amendments; but no
+such expedient was practicable in this case, that of the
+sugar-duties. A defeat on an important clause in the Budget by a
+majority of twenty was a far more serious matter; it was such a
+blow as had generally been reckoned sufficient to require a
+resignation of a ministry. But on this occasion Peel did not feel
+himself called on to take that step; nor was he inclined to
+dissolve Parliament, which some regarded as his only legitimate
+alternative, though he had little doubt that, if he did so, he
+should be supported by the confidence of the country. After careful
+reflection, the course on which he eventually decided was to adhere
+to the principle of a relaxation of duties, but to consent to a
+moderate variation from his original proposal as to the amount. And
+in pursuit of this plan, on the next discussion of the Budget, he
+proposed an amendment to that effect, making the adoption of it by
+the House a test of its confidence in the administration. Lord John
+Russell opposed the amendment with great vehemence, pronouncing the
+acceptance of it, if it should be accepted, and the House should
+thus consent "to retract its previous vote, a lamentable proof of
+subserviency, which would disgrace it with the country." What Sir
+Robert now asked was, substantially, that they should now declare
+that to be expedient which they had declared to be inexpedient only
+three nights ago; and Lord Palmerston insisted that the proper
+course to be taken by the government was to resign; while Mr.
+Labouchere, who had also been a member of Lord Melbourne's
+cabinet,[<a href="#note-267">267</a>] though he admitted that there
+might be "circumstances under which a minister might without
+impropriety ask the House to reconsider a vote," denied that the
+present was such a case, and especially denounced the importation
+of the question of confidence or no confidence in the ministry into
+the discussion as "dangerous and unconstitutional." Another section
+of the Opposition agreed in taking the same line; Mr. Disraeli
+(then beginning to lay the foundations of his reputation and
+influence) strongly denouncing the conduct of the minister, as
+degrading both to his own supporters and still more to the whole
+House, and recommending him to say frankly to both, "We have gauged
+your independence, and you may have a semblance of parliamentary
+freedom as far as this point, but the moment you go farther, you
+must either submit to public disgrace, or we must submit to private
+life." The end of the discussion was, that the minister prevailed
+by a majority a trifle larger than that which had defeated him
+before. This is not the place to discuss the difference between one
+principle of taxation and another; but the question whether a
+minister when defeated is justified in asking either House of
+Parliament to reconsider its vote, seems one that could only have
+been raised in a House under the influence of unusual excitement of
+some kind. The charge that such a request was unconstitutional only
+serves to show how loosely the words "constitution" and
+"unconstitutional" are often used even by those from whom precision
+of language might most be expected; for Sir Robert Peel's proposal
+that the House should retract its vote was not unprecedented, the
+very same demand having been made in 1833 by Lord Althorp, then
+Chancellor of the Exchequer of Lord Grey's ministry, of which those
+very men were members who were now loudest in denouncing the
+conduct of the present government. And on that occasion it is worth
+remarking that, though Lord Althorp's demand was resisted in one or
+two quarters, he was vigorously supported by Sir Robert Peel, on
+the ground that, though to rescind one night a vote passed on a
+former one might be not altogether free from objection, it would be
+a far greater evil that questions of importance should be held to
+be in all cases finally decided by a single vote, passed, it might
+be, in a thin House, or in obedience to some sudden impulse.</p>
+<p>And this seems to be the view of the case commended not only by
+constitutional and parliamentary practice, but by common-sense. It
+would be strange, indeed, when the questions submitted to the
+British Parliament and the decisions of that Parliament on them are
+so often of paramount importance to the whole world, if the
+Parliament should be the only body in the world denied the right of
+revising its own judgments, the only one whose first resolution is
+so irrevocable that even itself may not change or modify it. To
+rescind a recent vote is, no doubt, as Sir Robert Peel said, a step
+not wholly free from objection. It should be an exceptional act, as
+one which, if often repeated, would give an appearance of
+capricious fickleness and instability to the opinions of
+Parliament, calculated to impair that respect for it which the
+whole state and nation are deeply concerned in upholding; but to
+refuse, under any circumstances, to confess a change of judgment,
+would lay the Parliament open to an imputation at least equally
+dangerous to that respect&mdash;that of an obstinacy which refuses
+to confess the possibility of being mistaken, or to hear reason. It
+would not be well, therefore, that the abrogation of a previous
+vote should become an ordinary practice; but it would be equally
+undesirable that any fixed or unchangeable rule should be
+interposed to prevent a second discussion of an important question,
+with the possibility of its leading to a reversal of the opinion
+first expressed.</p>
+<p>In the same year (1844) the ministers felt compelled to raise a
+constitutional point of singular refinement, which had the effect
+of arresting the progress of a bill, in which one part of the
+kingdom took a lively interest, which a division in its favor
+proved to be fully shared by the House of Lords.[<a href=
+"#note-268">268</a>] It has been already mentioned that in the last
+year of the preceding reign a bill had passed for creating, when
+opportunity offered by the sees affected becoming vacant, two new
+bishoprics at Ripon and Manchester, the incomes of which were to be
+provided by the union of some of the smaller existing bishoprics,
+Gloucester with Bristol, St. Asaph with Bangor. But the Welsh
+regarded with great disapproval any reduction of the number of
+bishoprics in the principality, and Lord Powis now brought in a
+bill to repeal so much of the act as provided for the union of two
+Welsh sees, urging not only their great extent, which he stated at
+3000 square miles of very mountainous country, but the fact that
+the population of North Wales was steadily and largely increasing.
+The bill, as has been intimated, was favorably received by the
+Lords, who passed the second reading by a majority of twelve; but,
+before it could be read a third time, the Duke of Wellington, as
+leader of the ministry in that House, announced that the bill was
+one which touched the prerogative of the crown, and therefore could
+not be proceeded with without the consent of her Majesty, which he
+was not authorized to express.</p>
+<p>As the matter was explained by the Chancellor, Lord Lyndhurst,
+the manner in which the bill touched the royal prerogative was
+this: as, during the vacancy of any see, its temporalities belonged
+to the crown, any alterations in a see affected the direct
+pecuniary interests of the crown, and he, as Speaker of the House,
+doubted whether he should be justified in putting a question which
+so touched the royal prerogative without the sovereign's consent. A
+committee which was appointed to investigate the case fully
+confirmed the view thus taken by the ministers, and the bill was
+dropped.</p>
+<p>It was, however, an exercise of the royal prerogative which was
+received by the House in general with great dissatisfaction.
+Certainly, since the Civil List and royal income had been placed on
+their present footing, it was only by a very forced construction
+that the pecuniary interests of the sovereign could be said to be
+affected. And it seemed a very insufficient plea for evoking the
+exercise of a power which, as it was said, had certainly never been
+exerted before since the accession of the Hanoverian dynasty. Nor
+was it made more acceptable by the explanation of Lord Brougham,
+who on this occasion came to the support of the minister, that the
+refusal of the crown's consent at this stage was "a warning, as it
+were, a polite and courteous communication between the sovereign,
+as guardian of the privileges of the crown, and the two Houses of
+Parliament, that if they passed a certain bill it would not receive
+the royal assent;" for, though the right to refuse the royal assent
+to any bill was incontestable, it had not been exercised since the
+time of William III., and to put it in force for the protection of
+an imaginary interest of the crown itself would have been so
+unpopular an exercise of it that no administration could have
+ventured to advise it.</p>
+<p>One of the arguments which the Duke of Wellington brought
+forward in the discussion, and which, probably, contributed to
+induce him thus to strangle Lord Powis's bill, has had an influence
+on subsequent legislation. He urged that its adoption&mdash;since
+the resolution to establish bishoprics at Manchester and Ripon was
+one which every one desired to carry out&mdash;would increase the
+number of bishops, "and thus make an organic change in the
+constitution of the House of Lords." It is not very clear how the
+addition of a single spiritual peer could have that effect. But the
+Duke had dwelt upon the same argument before in the debate on the
+proposed union of the sees affected, urging that there was such a
+jealousy of the Church in many quarters, and especially in some of
+the large towns, that it would be very undesirable to pass any
+measure the effect of which would be to increase the number of
+Episcopal peers. Even if there was any general reluctance at that
+time to see such an increase (a fact which was by no means
+ascertained), it may be doubted whether it was founded on any
+sufficient reason. It is not easy to see why, when there is no
+limit to the augmentation of the number of lay peers, it should be
+judged impolitic or unjust to make even so small an addition to the
+number of spiritual peers. At the Restoration the spiritual peers
+were, probably, more than a fifth of the entire House. From the
+great number of subsequent creations of lay peers they were now
+less than a sixteenth, so that there could be no ground for
+apprehending that a slight re-enforcement of the Episcopal bench
+would disturb the balance, or give the Church an undue
+preponderating weight in the decisions of the House. The
+difficulty, however, such as it appeared to the Duke then, has had
+such weight with subsequent administrations, that a new principle
+has been established of creating bishoprics which shall not at
+first confer seats in the Upper House till their holders become
+entitled to them by seniority. As they are peers from the moment of
+their consecration, it may be doubted whether this creation of
+peers, without seats in Parliament, does not deserve the name of
+"an organic change in the constitution," far more than the addition
+of one or two ecclesiastical peers to the Episcopal bench; and also
+whether it has not established a dangerous principle and precedent;
+the disconnection of bishoprics from seats in Parliament, in even a
+single instance, seeming to furnish an argument in favor of the
+exclusion of the whole order, a measure which, if unjust and
+injurious to the Church, would be at least equally injurious to
+Parliament itself, and to the whole state.</p>
+<p>But all questions of this kind were presently lost sight of in
+the excitement produced by the measure which more than any other
+has stamped Sir Robert Peel's administration with a lasting
+character, the repeal of the Corn-laws. Many statesmen, even of
+those who were most in favor of free-trade in other articles of
+commerce, made an exception in the case of corn, partly from a
+feeling of the necessity of encouraging agriculture, and partly
+from a conviction of the danger of in any way contributing to
+create or increase a dependence on foreign countries for the food
+of the people. Both Whigs and Tories were generally thus agreed on
+the necessity of maintaining the principle of protection; the
+dispute between the two parties being whether it were best achieved
+by a fixed duty on imported corn, or by what was commonly known as
+a sliding scale: a scale, that is, which varied inversely with the
+price of the grain itself, rising as the price in the home market
+fell, and falling as it rose. In the manufacturing districts a
+different feeling had prevailed for some years. In the first years
+of the present reign severe distress in Manchester and others of
+the chief manufacturing towns had led to the formation of an
+association whose chief object was sufficiently indicated by its
+title of the Anti-Corn-law League. At first Mr. Villiers, the
+member for Wolverhampton, was its principal spokesman in the House
+of Commons, but at subsequent elections two manufacturers of great
+eloquence obtained seats, and year after year urged the entire
+repeal of all duties on corn with great earnestness, though for
+some time their arguments made but little impression on the House.
+Their motions were rejected in 1842 by a majority of 300; in 1843
+by one exceeding 250; in 1844 by above 200; and in 1845 by one of
+more than 130 in a much smaller House. But this last division had
+scarcely been taken when an unprecedented calamity&mdash;the almost
+entire failure of the potato crop, which was attacked in nearly
+every part of both islands by a new disease, the cause of which is
+not to this day fully ascertained&mdash;suddenly changed the aspect
+of the subject. To the English farmer and laborer it was a severe
+loss; to the Irish farmer it was ruin; to the Irish peasant famine.
+The grain harvest, too, was generally deficient. And it was evident
+that rigorous measures, promptly taken, were indispensable, if a
+large portion of the peasantry in the southern and western
+provinces of Ireland were not to be left to perish of actual
+starvation. In the face of so terrible an emergency Peel acted with
+great decision. On his own responsibility he authorized the
+purchase of a large supply of Indian corn from the United States,
+hoping, among other indirect effects of such a step, to accustom
+the Irish to the use of other kinds of food besides the root on
+which hitherto they had too exclusively relied.[<a href=
+"#note-269">269</a>] And he laid before his colleagues in the
+cabinet a proposal to suspend the existing Corn-law "for a limited
+period," a measure which all saw must lead to its eventual repeal.
+It would be superfluous now to recapitulate the discussions which
+took place, the various alternative proposals which were suggested,
+or the dissensions in the cabinet to which his proposal gave birth;
+the resignation of the ministry, and its subsequent resumption of
+office, when Lord Stanley and Lord John Russell had found it
+impossible to form an administration. It is sufficient to say that,
+as soon as Parliament met, Sir Robert brought forward a bill to
+reduce the duty on corn to four shillings, a price only half of the
+lowest fixed duty that had ever been proposed before, that
+reduction, too, being a stepping-stone to the abolition of all
+duties, at the end of three years, beyond a shilling a quarter,
+which was to be retained, in order to acquire an accurate knowledge
+of the quantity of grain imported. The diminution, however, of this
+duty was not the whole object of his new measure. It included other
+arrangements which would serve as a compensation to the
+agriculturists, by relieving them from some of the peculiar burdens
+to which the land was subjected; and it contained, farther, a
+reduction or abolition of import duties hitherto levied on many
+other articles, especially on such as "formed the clothing of the
+country," on the fair ground that if the removal of protection from
+the agriculturist were "a sacrifice for the common good," the
+commercial and manufacturing interests might justly be required to
+make a similar sacrifice for the same patriotic object.</p>
+<p>Though opposed in both Houses with unusual bitterness, the
+ministry carried their measure, which, indeed, in all probability,
+even if the destruction of the potato crop had not come to
+accelerate the movement, could not have been long delayed, the
+continual and rapid increase of the population adding yearly
+strength to the arguments of those who denounced the imposition of
+any tax which had the effect of increasing the price of the
+people's food. But, however inevitable it may have been, we are not
+the less compelled to regard it as indirectly bringing about a
+great constitutional change, or rather as consummating that which
+had been commenced by the Reform Bill. Till the year 1832 the
+territorial aristocracy had exerted a predominating influence in
+the government of the state. The Reform Bill, which deprived the
+wealthier land-owners of the greater part of their power at
+elections, struck the first blow at that influence. The abolition
+of the Corn-laws inflicted on it a still more decisive wound, by
+its extinction of the doctrine that there was any such peculiar
+sacredness about the land and its produce as entitled them to
+protection beyond that enjoyed by other kinds of property. Placing
+in that respect the commercial and manufacturing interest on a
+level with the landed interest, it made us, in a farther and a
+somewhat different sense from that in which Napoleon had used the
+phrase, a nation of shopkeepers.[<a href="#note-270">270</a>]</p>
+<p>The repeal of the Corn-laws had another result: it divided the
+Conservative party, and, as a necessary consequence, led to the
+downfall of the ministry. The same session which witnessed its
+success in carrying that repeal witnessed also its defeat on a
+coercion bill, which they regarded as indispensable for the
+"protection of life in Ireland," where actual murders had reached
+the appalling amount of nearly three hundred in two years. The
+ministry at once resigned, and Lord John Russell had no difficulty
+in forming an administration, now that the question of the
+Corn-laws was finally settled. It was, however, no bed of roses to
+which the new ministry succeeded; the famine in Ireland exceeded
+the worst anticipations; and, though prodigious efforts were made
+by the government and Parliament to relieve it, though large sums
+were placed at the disposal of the Lord-lieutenant, aided by
+contributions from private sources in England to an enormous
+amount; though the small remnant of the import duty on corn which
+had been left on it by the measure of the preceding year was taken
+off, and the navigation laws suspended, in order that no obstacle
+interposed to the acquisition of food from every available quarter,
+it was estimated that more than half a million of people perished
+through actual famine or the diseases which scarcity brought in its
+train.[<a href="#note-271">271</a>] A severe monetary crisis was
+one not unnatural result of this distress, so severe that the Funds
+fell to a price below any that had been quoted for many years, and
+the reserve in the Bank of England to an amount lower than it had
+been at any period since 1828. And these difficulties had hardly
+been surmounted when a new revolution in France overturned the
+dynasty of Louis Philippe and established a republic. The
+revolutionary contagion spread to Italy, where, indeed, the
+movement had begun. The Pope&mdash;Pius IX.&mdash;who had but
+lately succeeded to the tiara, was forced to flee from Rome in the
+disguise of a foreign courier, after his Prime-minister had been
+murdered by the mob. Germany was scarcely less disturbed. The
+administration of Metternich, who had governed Austria with
+authority little less than absolute for nearly forty years, was
+overthrown in a tumult in which he himself escaped with difficulty
+from the violence of the populace; dangerous riots took place at
+Munich, at Berlin, and at the capitals of most of the smaller
+principalities, and for some time everything seemed to portend the
+outbreak of a general war, likely to be the more formidable as
+being a war of the revolutionary and republican against the
+monarchical principle. Happily, that danger was averted. The only
+war which broke out between different nations was a brief contest
+in the north of Italy, which the superior numbers of the Austrian
+armies and the skill of Marshal Radetsky, a veteran who had learned
+the art of war under Suvarof nearly sixty years before, decided in
+favor of Austria, and which in the spring of 1849 was terminated by
+a peace on less unfavorable terms to Sardinia than she could well
+have expected. And in the same season tranquillity was
+re-established even at Rome, which, from the peculiar character of
+the Papal power, contained special elements of provocation and
+danger.</p>
+<p>But, though peace was thus generally maintained, these various
+events had produced a ferment of spirits which required some time
+to calm down, and so greatly embarrassed the government, that in
+the spring of 1852 Lord John Russell's administration was
+dissolved, and a new ministry was formed by Lord Derby[<a href=
+"#note-272">272</a>]. But the causes which had overthrown his
+predecessor remained to weaken him; so that for some time it seemed
+impossible to form a ministry which afforded any promise of
+stability. Such a rapid succession of changes as ensued had had no
+parallel since the first years of George III. Between February,
+1852, and February, 1855, the country had no fewer than four
+different Prime-ministers, a fact which was at once both the proof
+and the parent of weakness in every administration. Lord John
+Russell had attempted to procure a factitious support in the
+country by stimulating a fresh demand for parliamentary reform. A
+year or two before, he had provoked the dissatisfaction of the
+"Advanced Liberals," as they called themselves, by insisting on the
+finality of the Reform Bill of 1832, and by advising his followers
+"to rest and be thankful" for what had been then obtained. But now
+he began to advance an opinion that that act required "some
+amendments to carry into more complete effect the principles on
+which it was founded." He inserted an intimation of that doctrine
+in the Queen's speech; and endeavored to give effect to it by
+bringing in a bill to lower the franchise, having, it seems,
+persuaded himself that a five-pound franchise would create a more
+Conservative class of voters.[<a href="#note-273">273</a>] He had
+scarcely introduced it when the fall of his ministry led to its
+abandonment; but, though it was coldly received by the House of
+Commons, the idea was taken up by the other political parties, who
+can hardly be acquitted of having used the question merely as an
+instrument of party warfare, trying, with an unstatesmanlike
+indifference to the danger of re-awakening the old frenzy on the
+subject, to rouse the nation to take an interest in it; but trying
+in vain. The nation was no longer in the same temper as it had
+displayed twenty years before. The Reform Bill of 1832 had been
+demanded and carried with a frantic vehemence of enthusiasm such as
+could only have been excited by real defects and grievances. But
+those grievances had been removed and redressed. And the bulk of
+the people could take no interest in schemes whose sole end seemed
+to be either to satisfy the theories of some political doctrinaires
+or to embarrass an adversary; till at last, as Reform Bill after
+Reform Bill was framed, brought in, and defeated, or dropped, it
+became plain, "as the Prince Consort noted in a private memorandum
+at the end of 1859, that what the country wanted, in fact, was not
+reform, but a bill to stop the question of Reform."[<a href=
+"#note-274">274</a>] And, at last, the prevalence of this feeling
+Lord John Russell could not conceal even from himself, but
+confessed to Lord Palmerston, then Prime-minister, who had always
+silently discouraged the movement, that "the apathy of the country
+was undeniable; nor was it a transient humor. It seemed rather a
+confirmed habit of mind. Four Reform Bills had been introduced of
+late years by four different governments, and for not one of them
+had there been the least enthusiasm. The conclusion to which he had
+come was, that the advisers of the crown of all parties having
+offered to the country various measures of reform, and the country
+having shown itself indifferent to them all, the best course which
+could now be taken was to wait till the country should show a
+manifest desire for an amendment of the representation."[<a href=
+"#note-275">275</a>]</p>
+<p>There was, however, in these years one subject in which the
+country did take a real interest; that was the development and
+extension of the principles of free-trade. On that the national
+view had become so decided that in 1848 the Parliament even
+abolished the navigation laws, which had subsisted so long, the
+first act on the subject dating from the reign of Richard II., that
+the adherence to the principle contained in them of confining both
+the export and the import trade of the kingdom, with but few
+exceptions, to British shipping, seemed almost an essential article
+of the constitution. It was the dearer, too, to the national
+prejudices, from the sense universally entertained of the paramount
+importance of maintaining the pre-eminence of our navy, and from
+the belief that the commercial marine was a nursery for the royal
+fleets, with which they could not dispense. But latterly the laws
+had become unpopular even with some of those who had formerly been
+supposed to derive the greatest benefit from them. Many of our
+colonies had complained of their operation, and several of the
+ablest of our colonial governors had recommended their repeal. They
+had been found, too, to present frequent and considerable
+difficulties in our commercial negotiations with other countries,
+and many naval officers of large experience and sound judgment
+expressed a decided belief that they were of no practical use to
+the naval service. The result of a long and able debate was that
+the laws were repealed, with the exception of that portion of them
+which preserved the monopoly of the coasting trade to our own
+seamen and vessels, that exception being chiefly dictated by
+considerations connected with the prevention of smuggling.</p>
+<p>The ground on which the ministers relied in proposing this
+repeal of laws so ancient was that, when protection had been
+removed from every other trade, those concerned in these different
+trades had an irresistible claim for its removal from the shipping.
+And on general principles, both of commerce and statesmanship, the
+claim was, as they urged, irresistible, unless some object of
+greater importance still than uniformity of
+legislation&mdash;namely, the national safety, bound up as it
+unquestionably was in the perpetual pre-eminence of the national
+navy&mdash;required an exception to be made. But for the
+maintenance of our maritime supremacy it was, as Burke had preached
+three-quarters of a century before, better to trust to the spirit
+of the people, to their attachment to their government, and to
+their innate aptitude for seamanship, which they seem to have
+inherited from the hardy rovers of the dark ages, and which no
+other nation shares with them in an equal degree. And if that may
+safely be trusted, as undoubtedly it may, to maintain the supremacy
+of our warlike fleets, the preponderance of argument seemed greatly
+on the side of those who contended that our commercial fleets
+needed no such protection; to which it may be added that exceptions
+to a general rule and principle are in themselves so questionable,
+that the burden of proof seems to lie upon those who would
+establish or maintain them. But the advocates of free-trade were
+not content even with this triumph, though it might have been
+thought a crowning one, and in the course of the next year they
+succeeded in carrying a resolution which (though Lord Derby and the
+opponents of the act of 1846 were now in office) was not resisted
+even by the ministry, being, in fact, the result of a compromise
+between the different parties; and which asserted that "the
+improved condition of the country, and especially of the
+industrious classes, was mainly the result of recent legislation,
+which had established the principle of unrestricted competition,
+... and that it was the opinion of the House that this policy,
+firmly maintained and prudently extended, would, without inflicting
+injury on any important interest, best enable the industry of the
+country to bear its own burdens, and would thereby most surely
+promote the welfare and contentment of the people." Such a
+resolution was, in fact, the adoption of free-trade as the
+permanent ruling principle of all future commercial legislation.
+And even before the adoption of this resolution, the feeling in
+favor of free-trade had been greatly strengthened by the Great
+Exhibition, which not only delighted the world for six months with
+a spectacle of such varied and surpassing beauty as even its
+original projector, the Prince Consort, had not pictured to
+himself, but which had also the farther and more important effect
+of instructing the British workman in every branch of manufacture,
+by bringing before his eyes the workmanship of other nations; and,
+as we may well believe (though such a result is not so easily
+tested), of improving the mutual good-will between rival nations,
+from the respect for each which the experience of their skill and
+usefulness could not fail to excite.</p>
+<p>Notes:</p>
+<p><a name="note-258" id="note-258">
+<!-- Note Anchor 258 --></a>[Footnote 258: On the 20th of February,
+1840, Baron Stockmar writes: "Melbourne told me that he had already
+expressed his opinion to the Prince that the Court ought to take
+advantage of the present movement to treat all parties, especially
+the Tories, in the spirit of a general amnesty." To the Queen his
+language was the same: "You should now hold out the olive-branch a
+little."&mdash;<i>Life of the Prince Consort</i>, i., 83.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-259" id="note-259">
+<!-- Note Anchor 259 --></a>[Footnote 259: He became Prime-minister
+in September, 1841, and retired in June, 1846&mdash;four years and
+three-quarters afterward.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-260" id="note-260">
+<!-- Note Anchor 260 --></a>[Footnote 260: "Life of the Prince
+Consort," i., 266. It may be remarked that, in spite of the opinion
+thus expressed by Sir Robert Peel, of those who, since his
+retirement in 1846, have held the same office, the majority have
+been members of the House of Commons. The peers who have since been
+Prime-ministers have been Lord Aberdeen and Lord Derby; the members
+of the House of Commons have been Lord John Russell, Lord
+Palmerston, Mr. Disraeli, and Mr. Gladstone; though it may be
+thought that in his second ministry Mr. Disraeli showed his
+concurrence in Sir Robert Peel's latest view, by becoming a peer in
+the third year of his administration.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-261" id="note-261">
+<!-- Note Anchor 261 --></a>[Footnote 261: Lord Stanhope tells us
+"the remedial resolutions moved by Pitt in the House of Commons, as
+abolishing the old duties and substituting new ones in a simpler
+form, amounted in number to no less than 2537."&mdash;<i>Life of
+Pitt</i>, i., 330. Peel, in his speech, March 21, 1842, states that
+he reduces or takes off altogether (wherever the duty is trifling,
+but is practicable) the duty on 750 articles of import.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-262" id="note-262">
+<!-- Note Anchor 262 --></a>[Footnote 262: In the Commons by 307 to
+184; in the Lords by 226 to 69.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-263" id="note-263">
+<!-- Note Anchor 263 --></a>[Footnote 263: The following statements
+of the members of colleges and of the three denominations for 1879,
+1874, and 1869 appear in the last <i>Queen's University
+Calendar</i>:</p>
+<pre>
+                         1879. 1874. 1869.
+Church of Ireland ....... 201   189   211
+Roman Catholics   ....... 223   188   161
+Presbyterians  .......... 388   249   227
+Other denominations......  88    87    83
+                           --    --    --
+                          900   713   682]
+</pre>
+<p><a name="note-264" id="note-264">
+<!-- Note Anchor 264 --></a>[Footnote 264: In the course of the
+session, in order to tranquillize the public mind on the subject,
+secret committees were appointed by both Houses of Parliament to
+investigate the subject, from whose inquiries it appeared that,
+since the days when the government was endangered by the plots of
+the Jacobites, the power had been very sparingly used. The most
+conspicuous instance of its employment had been in the case of
+Bishop Atterbury, several of whose letters had been opened, and
+were produced in Parliament to justify the bill of "pains and
+penalties" which was passed against him. The power had been
+confined to Great Britain till the latter part of the last century,
+when it was judged desirable to extend it also to the
+Lord-lieutenant of Ireland. But, since the Peace of Amiens, the
+number of letters opened in a year had not, on an average, exceeded
+eight; nor was there the least ground for suspecting that a single
+one had been opened except on such information as fully warranted
+suspicion.</p>
+<p>The practice, however, was not confined to our own government.
+In the second volume of the "Life of Bishop Wilberforce" a page is
+given of his diary, dated July 18, 1854, which records a
+conversation in which the Duke of Newcastle and Lord John Russell
+took part, and in which it is mentioned that the French government,
+under the administration of M. Guizot, opened letters, and that the
+practice was not confined to monarchical or absolute governments,
+for "the American government opens most freely all letters." And,
+with reference to this particular case, the Duke of Newcastle said
+that "Sir James Graham really opened Mazzini's letters on
+information which led to a belief that a great act of violence and
+bloodshed might be prevented by it."&mdash;<i>Life of Bishop
+Wilberforce</i>, ii., 247.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-265" id="note-265">
+<!-- Note Anchor 265 --></a>[Footnote 265: A subsequent act, passed
+since the date at which the present history closes, has repealed
+even this exception. By the 33d Victoria, c. 14 ("Law Reports," p.
+169), it is enacted that "an alien, to whom a certificate of
+naturalization is granted, shall in the United Kingdom be entitled
+to all political and other rights, powers, and privileges, and be
+subject to all obligations to which a natural born British subject
+is entitled as subject in the United Kingdom," etc.; and at the
+general election of 1880 the Baron de Ferrieres, a Belgian
+nobleman, who had been naturalized in 1867, was elected M.P. for
+Cheltenham.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-266" id="note-266">
+<!-- Note Anchor 266 --></a>[Footnote 266: In one instance&mdash;on
+the question whether twelve should be the number of hours, as
+proposed by the Government&mdash;the majority against that number
+was 186 to 183. But immediately afterward a majority of 188 to 184
+decided against Lord Ashley's alternative proposal of ten
+hours.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-267" id="note-267">
+<!-- Note Anchor 267 --></a>[Footnote 267: As President of the
+Board of Trade. He afterward was raised to the Peerage as Lord
+Taunton.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-268" id="note-268">
+<!-- Note Anchor 268 --></a>[Footnote 268: The second reading was
+carried in the House of Lords by 49 to 37.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-269" id="note-269">
+<!-- Note Anchor 269 --></a>[Footnote 269: See "Peel's Memoirs,"
+ii., 173.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-270" id="note-270">
+<!-- Note Anchor 270 --></a>[Footnote 270: It has been observed
+that till the Corn-laws were repealed there had been no instance
+whatever of any person who had been engaged in trade becoming a
+cabinet minister. Since that time there have been several, some of
+whom only relinquished their share in houses of business on
+receiving their appointments, and some who are generally understood
+to have continued to participate in the profits of trade while
+members of an administration.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-271" id="note-271">
+<!-- Note Anchor 271 --></a>[Footnote 271: Alison, quoting the
+General Report of the Census Commissioners, estimates the deaths
+caused by famine and the diseases engendered by it at the appalling
+number of 590,000, and states the sums advanced under different
+acts of Parliament to meet the emergency at
+&pound;7,132,268.&mdash;<i>History of Europe</i>, vii., 274, 276,
+2d series.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-272" id="note-272">
+<!-- Note Anchor 272 --></a>[Footnote 272: The same statesman who
+has previously been mentioned as Lord Stanley, and whom the death
+of his father had recently raised to the House of Peers.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-273" id="note-273">
+<!-- Note Anchor 273 --></a>[Footnote 273: In 1853 he said to Lord
+Clarendon, speaking of a new bill which he was pressing on Lord
+Aberdeen, then Prime-minister, "I am for making it as Conservative
+as possible, and that by a large extension of the suffrage. The
+Radicals are the ten-pound holders. The five-pound holders will be
+Conservative, as they are more easily acted upon."&mdash;<i>Life of
+the Prince Consort</i>, ii., 503. It was the same idea that
+inspired some of the details of the Reform Bill subsequently passed
+by Lord Derby's third ministry.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-274" id="note-274">
+<!-- Note Anchor 274 --></a>[Footnote 274: "Life of the Prince
+Consort," iv., 395.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-275" id="note-275">
+<!-- Note Anchor 275 --></a>[Footnote 275: "Life of the Prince
+Consort," v., 56.]</p>
+<hr />
+<a name="CH13" id="CH13"><!-- CH13 --></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER XIII.</h2>
+<p class="blockquote">Dismissal of Lord Palmerston.&mdash;Theory of
+the Relation between the Sovereign and the
+Cabinet.&mdash;Correspondence of the Sovereign with French
+Princes.&mdash;Russian War.&mdash;Abolition of the Tax on
+Newspapers.&mdash;Life Peerages.&mdash;Resignation of two
+Bishops.&mdash;Indian Mutiny.&mdash;Abolition of the Sovereign
+Power of the Company.&mdash;Visit of the Prince of Wales to
+India.&mdash;Conspiracy Bill.&mdash;Rise of the
+Volunteers.&mdash;National Fortifications.&mdash;The Lords Reject
+the Measure for the Repeal of the Paper-duties.&mdash;Lord
+Palmerston's Resolutions.&mdash;Character of the Changes during the
+last Century.</p>
+<p>The frequency of ministerial changes at this time has already
+been mentioned, and the first of them took place at the beginning
+of 1852, under circumstances which throw some light on a question
+which has never been exactly defined&mdash;the duty of the
+different members of a cabinet to one another, to the
+Prime-minister, and to the sovereign.</p>
+<p>Queen Victoria had a high idea of her duties and
+responsibilities. From any legal responsibility she was aware that
+she was exempt; but she did not the less consider that a moral
+responsibility rested on her not to be content to give her royal
+sanction as a mere matter of form to every scheme or measure which
+might be submitted to her, but to examine every case for herself,
+to form her own opinion, and, if it differed from that of her
+ministers, to lay her objections and views fairly before them,
+though prepared, as the constitution required, to act on their
+decision rather than on her own, if, in spite of her arguments,
+they adhered to their judgment. And in carrying out this notion of
+her duty she was singularly aided by the Prince, her husband, a man
+of perfectly upright character, of great general ability, and who,
+from the first moment of his married life, regulated his views of
+every question, domestic and foreign, by its bearing on English
+interests and English feelings, to which he early acclimatized
+himself with a remarkable readiness of appreciation.</p>
+<p>In the administration of Lord John Russell, Lord Palmerston was
+Foreign Secretary, and during its latter years foreign affairs
+occupied more of the attention of the country than matters of
+domestic policy.</p>
+<p>The revolution of 1848, which overthrew the Orleans dynasty, had
+produced in France a state of affairs but little removed from
+anarchy, which was scarcely mitigated by the election of Prince
+Louis Napoleon to the Presidency of the new republic for four
+years, so constant was the opposition which the Republican party in
+the Assembly offered to every part of his policy. They even carried
+their opposition so far as to form a deliberate plan for the
+impeachment of his minister and himself, and for his arrest and
+imprisonment at Vincennes. But he was well-informed of all these
+dangers, and on the morning of the 2d of December, 1851 (the day,
+as was commonly believed, having been selected by him as being the
+anniversary of his uncle's great victory of Austerlitz), he
+anticipated them by the arrest of all the leading malcontents in
+their beds; which he followed up by an appeal to the people to
+adopt a new constitution which he set before them, the chief
+article of which was the appointment of a President for ten
+years.</p>
+<p>No one could avoid seeing that what was aimed at was the
+re-establishment of the Empire in his own person. And so arbitrary
+a deed, as was inevitable, produced great excitement in England and
+anxious deliberations in the cabinet. Their decision, in strict
+uniformity with the principle that rules our conduct toward foreign
+nations, was to instruct our ambassador in Paris, Lord Normanby, to
+avoid any act or word which could wear the appearance of an act of
+interference of any kind in the internal affairs of France. But, on
+Lord Normanby reporting these instructions to the French Foreign
+Secretary, M. Guizot, he learned, to his surprise and perplexity,
+that Lord Palmerston had interfered already by expressing to the
+French ambassador in London, M. de Walewski, his warm approval of
+the President's conduct;[<a href="#note-276">276</a>] and Lord
+Normanby, greatly annoyed at being directed to hold one language in
+Paris, while the head of his department was taking a widely
+different tone in Downing Street&mdash;a complication which
+inevitably "subjected him to misrepresentation and
+suspicion"&mdash;naturally complained to the Prime-minister of
+being placed in so embarrassing a situation.</p>
+<p>Both the Queen and the Prime-minister had for some time been
+discontented at the independent manner in which Lord Palmerston
+apparently considered himself entitled to transact the business of
+his department, carrying it so far as even to claim a right to send
+out despatches without giving them any intimation of either their
+contents or their objects. And the Queen, in consequence, above a
+year before,[<a href="#note-277">277</a>] had drawn up a
+memorandum, in which she expressed with great distinctness her
+desire to have every step which the Foreign Secretary might
+recommend to be taken laid clearly before her, with sufficient time
+for consideration, "that she might know distinctly to what she had
+given her royal sanction;" and "to be kept informed of what passed
+between him and the Foreign Ministers before important decisions
+are taken," etc., etc. And, after such an intimation of her wish,
+she not unnaturally felt great annoyance at learning that in a
+transaction so important as this coup d'etat (to give it the name
+by which from the first it was described in every country) Lord
+Palmerston had taken upon himself to hold language to the French
+Ambassador "in complete contradiction to the line of strict
+neutrality and passiveness which she had expressed her desire to
+see followed with regard to the late convulsions at Paris, and
+which was approved by the cabinet."[<a href="#note-278">278</a>]
+The Prime-minister seems to have taken the same view of the act,
+and remonstrated with Lord Palmerston, who treated the matter very
+lightly, and justified his right to hold such a conversation, which
+he characterized as "unofficial," in such a tone and on such
+grounds that Lord John considered he left him no alternative "but
+to advise the Queen to place the Foreign Office in other
+hands."</p>
+<p>A careful and generally impartial political critic has recently
+expressed an opinion "that Lord Palmerston made good his
+case;"[<a href="#note-279">279</a>] but his argument on the
+transaction seems to overlook the most material point in it. Lord
+Palmerston's own defence of his conduct was, that "his conversation
+with Walewski was of an unofficial description; that he had said
+nothing to him which would in any degree or way fetter the action
+of the government; and that, if it was to be held that a Secretary
+of State could never express any opinion to a foreign minister on
+passing events except as the organ of a previously consulted
+cabinet, there would be an end of that easy and familiar
+intercourse which tends essentially to promote good understanding
+between ministers and government;" and he even added, as a personal
+justification of himself as against the Prime-minister, that three
+days afterward Lord John Russell himself, Lord Lansdowne (the
+President of the Council), and Sir Charles Wood (the Chancellor of
+the Exchequer) had all discussed the transaction with M. de
+Walewski at a dinner-party, "and their opinions were, if anything,
+rather more strongly favorable than his had been."</p>
+<p>This personal aspect of the case it is impossible to discuss,
+since there are no means of knowing whether the ministers mentioned
+would have admitted the correctness of this report of their
+language. If it were confessed to be accurate, it would only show
+them to have been guilty of equal impropriety, and to a great
+extent justify him as against the Prime-minister, whose
+condemnation of his language, if he were conscious that he had held
+the same himself, would be inexplicable. But it certainly does not
+justify him in respect of her Majesty or the cabinet collectively,
+since the Queen's complaint was, not that he held unofficial
+conversations as a private individual, and not as "the organ of a
+previously consulted cabinet," but that the tenor of the
+conversation which he had held was in direct contradiction to the
+tone which the cabinet had decided should be taken on the subject;
+that his language was calculated to draw the government into a
+course of action which it had been deliberately resolved to avoid.
+And, in spite of the deference due to Lord Palmerston's great
+experience, it is hard to see how a conversation between our
+Foreign Secretary and the French Ambassador on an action, the
+result of which is as yet undecided, can be wholly unofficial, in
+the sense of having no influence on the conduct of affairs, or, as
+he expressed it, "in no degree or way fettering the action of the
+government."</p>
+<p>The result was, as has been mentioned before, that the
+Prime-minister recommended the removal of Lord Palmerston from his
+office, and that he was removed accordingly. And this conclusion of
+the case seems to show that the statement of the position of the
+Prime-minister in the cabinet is rather understated by Mr.
+Gladstone in one of his essays,[<a href="#note-280">280</a>] where
+he says: "The head of the British government is not a Grand Vizier.
+He has no powers, properly so called, over his colleagues; on the
+rare occasions when a cabinet determines its course by the votes of
+its members, his vote only counts as one of theirs." He admits at
+the same time that "they are appointed and dismissed by the
+sovereign on his advice." And surely to have the right of giving
+this advice is to have the greatest possible power over his
+colleagues; not power, perhaps, to change their opinions (though it
+possibly at times has had power to prevent the expression of them),
+but power to compass their immediate removal from the
+administration, as was exercised in this instance, and as had been
+exercised by Pitt with regard to Lord Thurlow. That a difference of
+opinion, even on an important subject, is not always regarded as a
+sufficient cause for such a dismissal; that a Prime-minister,
+especially if conscious of his strength, occasionally consents to
+retain colleagues who differ from him on some one subject, the same
+work to which we are partly indebted for our knowledge of the
+details of this affair&mdash;the "Life of the Prince
+Consort"&mdash;furnishes two remarkable instances in which the
+Prime-minister, then Lord Palmerston himself, submitted to be
+overruled. We read there that on one occasion, when "Count Persigny
+sought the active intervention of England by the way of 'moral
+support' to a demand" which France proposed to address to Austria,
+"Lord Palmerston and Lord John Russell (then Foreign Secretary)
+were disposed to accede; but a different view was taken both by her
+Majesty and by the cabinet, and Count Persigny's request was
+accordingly declined."[<a href="#note-281">281</a>] On this
+occasion, it is true, he was yielding to an overwhelming majority
+of his colleagues (her Majesty's approval must, of course, have
+been expressed subsequently to their decision). But in another
+instance we find the same Prime-minister consenting to the
+introduction of a bill by one of his colleagues, Mr. Gladstone,
+then Chancellor of the Exchequer, of which he disapproved so highly
+that, after it had been passed by a very slender majority of the
+House of Commons,[<a href="#note-282">282</a>] he expressed to the
+Queen a hope that the closeness of the division "might encourage
+the House of Lords to throw out the bill when it should come to
+their House, and that he was bound in duty to say that, if they
+should do so, they would perform a good public service;" and after
+they had rejected it by a majority of eighty-nine, he pronounced
+that "they had done a right and useful thing," reporting to her
+Majesty, as a corroboration of this opinion, and as a proof that it
+was largely shared by the public out-of-doors, that "the people in
+the gallery of the House of Lords are said to have joined in the
+cheers which broke out when the numbers of the division were
+announced."[<a href="#note-283">283</a>] And on a third occasion
+also he bore with the same colleague's opposition to a measure
+which he and all the rest of the cabinet justly thought of vital
+importance to the best interests of the country, the fortification
+of our great seaports, allowing him to object for a time in
+private, and even to threaten public opposition to it the next
+year, since he felt assured that his opposition, if carried out,
+which he doubted, would be wholly ineffectual.[<a href=
+"#note-284">284</a>]</p>
+<p>The personal interest in politics which this laudable habit of
+judging of everything for herself naturally engendered in the
+Queen's mind led, however, to the adoption by her Majesty, in more
+than one instance, of a course at variance not only with all
+historical precedent, but, with deference be it said, with
+constitutional principle, sanctioned though it was by more than one
+ministry. When the First Napoleon, after his elevation to the head
+of the French government as First Consul, proposed, by an autograph
+letter to George III., to treat with that sovereign for the
+conclusion of peace between the two nations, Pitt, to whom his
+Majesty communicated the letter, had no difficulty in deciding that
+it would be unseasonable for the King "to depart from the forms
+long established in Europe for transacting business with foreign
+states,"[<a href="#note-285">285</a>] and, under his guidance, the
+cabinet instructed Lord Grenville, as Foreign Secretary, to address
+the reply to the First Consul's letter to the French Foreign
+Secretary, M. de Talleyrand.</p>
+<p>But this reign has witnessed several departures from the old and
+convenient rule. Its violation was not begun by her Majesty, but by
+the Emperor Nicholas of Russia in the year preceding the Crimean
+war. He wrote to the Queen herself to discuss some of the points in
+dispute, and she answered his letter with her own hand.[<a href=
+"#note-286">286</a>] The outbreak of war which soon ensued
+prevented any continuation of that correspondence; but the close
+alliance which that war for a time produced between England and
+France, strengthened as it was by an interchange of visits between
+the royal and imperial families, which led to the establishment of
+a strong mutual friendliness and regard, led also to an occasional
+interchange of letters on some of the gravest questions affecting
+the policy of the two nations. The correspondence was sanctioned by
+successive English cabinets, every letter which the Queen either
+received from, or sent to, any foreign prince on political affairs
+being invariably communicated by her either to the Prime-minister
+or to the Foreign Secretary; and they, in one instance, even
+suggesting to her Majesty to write to Louis Napoleon[<a href=
+"#note-287">287</a>] with an object so delicate as that of
+influencing the language with which he was about to open his
+Chambers.</p>
+<p>But we must think the line recommended by Pitt to George III.
+both more constitutional and more safe. A letter from one sovereign
+to another on political subjects cannot be divested of the
+character of a state-paper, and for every state-paper some one must
+be responsible. The sovereign cannot be, but for every one of his
+actions the ministers are. And it follows, therefore, that they are
+thus made responsible for documents of which they have not been the
+original authors; of which, were it not for the courtesy of the
+sovereign, they might by possibility be wholly ignorant; and with
+parts of which, even with the knowledge which that courtesy has
+afforded them, they may not fully coincide, since they could hardly
+venture to subject a composition of their royal mistress to a
+vigorous criticism. Such a correspondence, therefore, places them
+so far in a false position, and it runs the risk of placing the
+sovereign himself in one equally false and unpleasant, since, if
+the opinions expressed or the advice given fail of their effect,
+the adviser is so far lowered in the eyes of his correspondent and
+of the world.</p>
+<p>As has been incidentally mentioned, in the spring of 1854 war
+broke out with Russia, nominally on account of the Sultan's refusal
+to concede some of the Czar's demands concerning the condition of
+the Greek Church in Palestine, but more really because, believing
+the Turkish empire to be in the last stage of decay, he hoped by
+hastening its destruction to obtain the lion's share of its spoils.
+And for the first time for two centuries an English and French army
+stood together in a field of battle as allies. In the field our
+armies were invariably victorious, inflicting severe defeats on the
+enemy at Alma and Inkerman, and wresting from them the mighty
+fortress of Sebastopol, in the Crimea, which hitherto they had
+believed to be absolutely impregnable. Our fleet was, if possible,
+still more triumphant, destroying Bomarsund and Sweaborg, in the
+Baltic, without the Russian ships daring to fire a single gun in
+their defence, while their Black Sea fleet was even sunk by its own
+admiral, as the only expedient to save it from capture. And in the
+spring of 1856 the war was terminated by a treaty of peace, in
+which, for the first time since the days of Peter the Great, Russia
+was compelled to submit to a cession of territory. But (it may
+almost be said) to the credit of the nation these successes,
+glorious and substantial as they were, made at the time scarcely so
+great an impression on the people as the hardships which, in the
+first winter of the war, our troops suffered from the defective
+organization of our commissariat. Want of shelter and want of food
+proved more destructive than the Russian cannon; presently our
+gallant soldiers were reported to be perishing by hundreds for lack
+of common necessaries; and the news awakened so clamorous a
+discontent throughout the whole of the United Kingdom as led to
+another change of ministry, and Lord Aberdeen was succeeded by Lord
+Palmerston. While a war on so large a scale was being waged there
+was but little time to spare for the work of the legislator, though
+it is not foreign to our subject to relate that in 1855 the last of
+those taxes which the political economists denounced as taxes on
+knowledge, the tax on newspapers, was abolished. Originally it had
+been fourpence; in 1836 Mr. Spring Rice, Chancellor of the
+Exchequer in Lord Melbourne's ministry, had reduced it to a penny;
+and now, with a very general acquiescence, it was abolished
+altogether.</p>
+<p>The entire abolition of a tax is not properly to be called a
+financial measure, that epithet belonging rather to those which aim
+at an augmentation of revenue by an increase in the number of
+contributors to a tax, while lessening the amount paid by each. But
+the abandonment of the tax in question should rather be regarded as
+a sacrifice of revenue for the instruction of the people in
+political knowledge; a price paid to enable and induce the poorer
+classes to take a well-instructed interest in the affairs of the
+state and the general condition of the country. And, viewed in this
+light, the abolition of this tax must be allowed to have been a
+political measure of great importance, and to have contributed
+greatly to the end which was aimed at. Till 1836 a daily paper,
+costing sevenpence, was the luxury of the few; and the sale even of
+those which had the largest circulation was necessarily limited.
+But the removal of the tax at once gave birth to a host of penny
+newspapers, conducted for the most part with great ability, and
+soon attaining a circulation which reached down to all but the very
+poorest class; so that the working-man has now an opportunity of
+seeing the most important questions of the day discussed from every
+point of view, and of thus acquiring information and forming a
+judgment on them which the subsequent extension of the franchise
+makes it more than ever desirable that he should be able to form
+for himself. Every movement in that direction renders it the more
+necessary to raise the intelligence of the great mass of the people
+to a level which may enable them to make a safe and salutary use of
+the power placed in their hands. And no mode of implanting a
+wholesome political feeling in the masses can equal candid
+political discussion: discussion one ruling principle of which
+shall be to teach that the greatest differences of opinion may be
+honestly entertained; that, with scarcely an exception, the leading
+men of each party, those who have any title to the name of
+statesman, are animated with an honest, patriotic desire to promote
+the best interests of the nation; and that the elucidation of truth
+is not aided by unreasoning invective and the undeserved imputation
+of base motives.</p>
+<p>One of the last topics discussed by Mr. Hallam was the
+introduction of a bill to limit for the future the prerogative of
+the crown in a field in which its exercise had previously been
+unrestrained, the creation of peers;[<a href="#note-288">288</a>]
+and among the last which we shall have to examine was one of an
+exactly opposite character, though relating to the same subject,
+the creation of a life peerage. In the winter of 1855 Sir James
+Parke, one of the Barons of the Exchequer, was created Lord
+Wenslydale, by letters-patent which conferred the title limiting it
+also to the new peer's own life. The professed object of the
+measure was to strengthen the judicial power of the House of Lords.
+But it was not denied that the limitation of the peerage conferred
+on him for his own life (a limitation which made no practical
+difference to Sir James himself, since he had no children) was
+intended to raise the question whether the crown could or could not
+create a life peerage with a seat in the House of Lords. A creation
+so limited was so novel, or at all events so long disused a
+proceeding, that it inevitably provoked examination and discussion.
+And, as it was found that the lawyers in general regarded it as
+indefensible, at the beginning of the session of 1856 Lord
+Lyndhurst brought the matter before the House of Lords by a motion
+for the appointment of a committee of privileges to investigate and
+report upon it. There were two aspects of the case which naturally
+came to be considered in the debates on it which ensued: the
+advantages or disadvantages, in other words, the political
+expediency, of such a form of letters-patent, and their legal or
+constitutional propriety. It was, of course, with the latter alone
+that the committee of privileges had to deal. And this part of the
+question was examined with great legal and antiquarian learning,
+though, as was almost inevitable, it was argued as a party
+question, except, indeed, by the lawyers. They, with the exception
+of the Chancellor, Lord Cranworth, who had advised the measure,
+were unanimous in their condemnation of it; the Whig peers, Lord
+Brougham and Lord Campbell, then Chief-justice, being as positive
+in their denial of the right so to exercise the prerogative as
+those on the Opposition side of the House, Lord Lyndhurst or Lord
+St. Leonards.[<a href="#note-289">289</a>]</p>
+<p>The arguments against the measure were chiefly these: The
+objectors drew a distinction between what was legal according to
+the strict letter of the law, and what was constitutional;
+contending that there might be exercises of the prerogative which
+could not be affirmed to be illegal, but which no one would deny to
+be altogether inconsistent with the principles and practice of the
+constitution, since a great part of the constitution rested on
+unwritten law, on long-continued usage, <i>Lex et consuetudo
+Parliamenti</i>. And they affirmed that this measure was so opposed
+to that usage, that "no instance had occurred within a period of
+four hundred years in which a commoner had been raised to a seat in
+the House of Lords by a patent of peerage containing only an estate
+for life;"[<a href="#note-290">290</a>] one most essential, if not
+the most essential character of the peerage being that it was an
+hereditary dignity, and one which combined with its rank an
+hereditary seat in the House of Lords. That one or two instances of
+life peerages were to be found in the annals of the Plantagenet
+kings was not denied, though none exactly similar in
+character.[<a href="#note-291">291</a>] But Lord Lyndhurst argued
+that precedents which had occurred "at a time when the constitution
+of the country was neither understood nor fully formed" were
+entitled to but little respect; and Lord Derby, limiting the age of
+valid precedents a little more strictly, "said frankly that he had
+no respect for any precedent affecting the prerogatives of the
+crown that dated farther back than the year 1688." And since that
+time, or indeed since the time of Henry VIII., it was certain that
+no life peerage had ever been granted, except by Charles II., James
+II., and George I. and II., to some of their mistresses, instances
+wholly beside the present case, since, of course, none of those
+ladies could claim seats in the House of Lords. Indeed, it was
+believed that both Mr. Pitt, at the time of the Union, and Lord
+Grey, in 1832, had considered the question, and had both decided
+against the propriety of advising a creation of life peerages.</p>
+<p>In defence of the measure Lord Granville refused to admit the
+distinction between what was legal and what was constitutional; if
+a measure were both legal, that is, warranted by the letter of the
+law, and also expedient, these two concurrent qualities, he
+contended, made it constitutional. He denied, also, that any legal
+prerogatives of the crown could be held to have lapsed through
+disuse; <i>nullum tempus occurrit Regi</i>; and he challenged any
+peer to assert that the sovereign had lost the right of refusing
+his royal assent to a measure passed by the two Houses, merely
+because no sovereign since William III. had so exercised his royal
+prerogative. And against the authority of Mr. Pitt and Lord Grey he
+quoted that of Lord John Russell, who, in 1851, had offered a life
+peerage to an eminent judge, who, though he had declined the offer,
+had been influenced in his refusal by no doubt of the right of the
+crown to make it.</p>
+<p>On the expediency of the measure its opponents had urged that it
+would effect a remodelling of the House of Peers, a total change of
+its constitution, by the introduction of a second and distinct
+class of peerages; and Lord Campbell, with a not unbecoming
+jealousy for what he regarded as the interests of his brother
+lawyers, argued that it would "henceforth prevent any lawyer,
+however eminent he might have been as an advocate, whatever
+services he might have rendered to the state in the House of
+Commons, whatever fame or fortune he might have acquired, from
+aspiring to an hereditary peerage, or to becoming the founder of a
+family, since, to make a distinction between the Chancellor and the
+Chief-justice, between one Chancellor or Chief-justice and another,
+when coming into the Upper House, as to the tenure of their honors,
+would be intolerable; all must be under the same rule, 'no son of
+theirs succeeding.'" And Lord Lyndhurst closed his argument by
+drawing a comparison between the House of Lords and the French
+Senate: "It was but a few weeks since he had read an official
+comment in the <i>Moniteur</i>, coming from the highest source, on
+the inefficiency, the want of patriotism, energy, and the
+backwardness to fulfil the high destinies to which they were
+called, that characterized that illustrious body, the Senate of
+France. He had no disposition to cut down our tribunal to that life
+interest on which the Senate of France is based, as he believed the
+hereditary character of the House of Lords to be one from which
+great and important advantages are derived.... The hereditary
+principle," he added, "is intwined in every part of our
+constitution; we in this House enjoy our hereditary rights in
+common with the crown; we mutually support and assist each other,
+and we form a barrier and defence to protect both those branches of
+the constitution against any by whom they may be assailed."</p>
+<p>As Lord Granville had made the expediency of any measure the
+quality which, combined with legality, was sufficient to establish
+its constitutional character, he naturally labored this point with
+especial diligence. He dwelt upon the great importance of
+strengthening the judicial element in the House, since it was the
+great ultimate court of appeal. He produced a letter of the great
+Chancellor, Lord Eldon, which quoted instances in which various
+administrations had found difficulties in the way of introducing
+eminent lawyers into the House, because their want of adequate
+fortune to support the rank had disinclined them to encumber their
+descendants with an hereditary peerage. He showed also that that
+difficulty had made so great an impression on their own Chairman of
+Committees, Lord Redesdale, that on one occasion he had intimated a
+feeling in favor of allowing "the Law, in the same way as the
+Church, to be, to a certain extent, represented in the House by the
+holders of certain offices, who should be admitted to that House as
+Peers of Parliament during the continuance of holding such office"
+(to which argument Earl Grey added another, that the instance of
+bishops, who were but life peers, proved that the holders of life
+peerages were not considered inferior to hereditary peers).</p>
+<p>He dwelt, too, on the evil consequence of the Lords "placing
+themselves before the country as seeking to limit the prerogative
+of the crown, when that prerogative was exercised with a view to
+remedy something that was weak, and to remove a certain imminent
+danger." What the danger was he certainly did not explain. But Lord
+Grey, in supporting him, took wider ground, and, applying the
+argument derived from Lord Eldon's letter to other professions,
+extolled the idea of instituting life peerages as one whose effect
+would be "more easily to open the doors of the House to men whom it
+was desirable should be admitted&mdash;to distinguished officers;
+to eminent writers; to members of the House of Commons, who in
+their different lines might have rendered good service to the
+state, but who, though possessing means amply sufficient to support
+their rank during their own life, yet, from having only a life
+income, or a numerous family to be provided for, might be unable to
+accept an hereditary peerage without injury to their family. In
+such instances," he contended, "it would be most desirable to grant
+peerages for life only. Such a proceeding would, he was convinced,
+by no means disincline others in different circumstances to accept
+hereditary titles, nor indispose the ministry to confer them. Nor
+did he see any reason for fearing that the practice of creating
+life peerages would be more likely to be abused for the purpose of
+increasing the power of the minister than the creation of
+hereditary peerages."</p>
+<p>The committee of privileges was appointed, and reported it as
+the opinion of the members that "neither the letters-patent by
+themselves, or with, the addition of the usual writ of summons,
+could entitle the grantee to sit and vote in Parliament." And the
+House, by a majority of ninety-two to fifty-seven, adopted their
+report. The ministers yielded to its judgment, and ennobled Lord
+Wenslydale by a new patent in the usual form, as Lord Derby had
+suggested. But Lord Derby desired to show that his objection had
+been founded on principle only; and, as he was willing to admit
+that, apart from the principle involved, "some advantages in
+certain cases, and under certain modifications, might arise from
+peerages for life," he proposed the appointment of a select
+committee "to consider the expediency of making provision for the
+more efficient discharge of the duties of the House as a court of
+appeal." The committee was appointed, and, after careful
+consideration, recommended the creation of two new offices, to be
+held by two law lords, as "Deputy Speakers of the House of Lords,"
+who should be judges of at least five years' standing, and should
+be enabled "by authority of Parliament to sit and vote in the
+House, and enjoy all the rights and privileges of a peer of
+Parliament under a patent conferring a peerage for life only, if
+the crown may have granted or shall grant the same to such persons
+in preference to an hereditary peerage, provided always that not
+more than four persons shall have seats in the House at one time as
+peers for life." Such an arrangement would have introduced a new
+practice, but not a new principle, since the annexation of a seat
+in the House of Lords to certain offices had existed from time
+immemorial in the case of the bishops. And the bill was carried in
+the House of Lords, but defeated in the Commons by a motion to
+refer it to a committee, which was adopted by a small majority, in
+a not very full House,[<a href="#note-292">292</a>] toward the end
+of the session.</p>
+<p>Those who look at the question apart from all preference of one
+minister or one party to another will, probably, be of opinion that
+the decision of the committee, that a life peerage thus created by
+the crown could not confer a seat in Parliament, was conformable to
+the most legitimate view of the constitution. It was, indeed,
+matter of history that in the Middle Ages the crown had exercised
+its prerogative in many ways which it had since abandoned. Boroughs
+had been enfranchised, and again disfranchised, apparently from no
+motive but pure caprice; writs of summons had been withheld from
+peers.[<a href="#note-293">293</a>] But no one would have justified
+the repetition of such acts now. And common-sense, as well as
+recognized usage, favored the doctrine that long disuse was a
+sufficient and lawful barrier against their revival. That the power
+of conferring life peerages with a seat in Parliament&mdash;of
+which, perhaps, the only undeniable instances were the cases of the
+brothers of Henry V., whose royal blood would in those days,
+probably, have been held to warrant an exception in their
+favor&mdash;had not been exercised for full four hundred years, was
+admitted; and the assumption that so long a disuse of a power was
+tantamount to a tacit renunciation of it, is quite compatible with
+a loyal and due zeal for the maintenance of other parts of the
+prerogative which have suffered no such abatement.</p>
+<p>If, however, we consider the expediency of the measure, or, in
+other words, the possible advantage that might ensue from the
+existence of a power to create life peerages with a seat in
+Parliament, opinions will probably be more divided. We have seen
+that Lord Derby allowed that there might be advantages in such an
+exercise of power under certain limitations; and the existing
+system does, undoubtedly, appear open to improvement in certain
+cases. At present the only mode of rewarding naval or military
+commanders who have performed brilliant and useful service, or a
+Speaker of the House of Commons, whose public career, though less
+showy and glorious, may at times have been scarcely less valuable,
+and has certainly been by far more irksome, is the grant of a
+peerage with a pension for lives. Without the peerage they cannot
+have the pension.[<a href="#note-294">294</a>] And, consequently,
+many most distinguished officers, whose conspicuous merits well
+deserved conspicuous honors, have gone unrewarded except by some
+promotion of knighthood, which carries with it no substantial
+benefit; while the descendants of some of those who have been
+ennobled have openly lamented that the only mode which could be
+found of honoring their fathers proves a punishment to their heirs,
+by encumbering them with an empty title, which they are unable
+adequately to support, and practically closing against them avenues
+to possible wealth and distinction which custom pronounces
+derogatory to their rank. So, not to mention the names of living
+worthies, no reward could be found for Sir W. Parker, that brave
+and skilful seaman who conducted a British fleet two hundred miles
+up a Chinese river, and crowned his exploits by the capture of a
+mighty city, which had never before beheld a European flag; nor for
+Inglis, who, when the safety of our Indian Empire hung upon his
+gallantry, successfully sustained a siege whose hardships and
+dangers are surpassed by none in ancient or modern history. Many
+will, probably, be of opinion that it is not for the honor of
+England that such services should want due recognition; and that
+for men like those life peerages with liberal pensions would be an
+appropriate recompense. It would, of course, be impossible to limit
+the number of them beforehand, but it would also be needless, since
+the nature of the services by which alone they could be deserved
+would act of itself as a sufficient limitation.</p>
+<p>One of the expedients which had been mentioned in this
+discussion had been the annexation of peerages to certain offices,
+to which it had been regarded as an unanswerable objection that
+this would be the creation of an absolutely unheard-of tenure, the
+peer thus created being able at pleasure to lay down his peerage,
+or even, it might be, being removable. But before the end of the
+session an emergency arose which induced Parliament to sanction the
+principle, novel though it was, that an official peerage, if a
+bishopric may be so called, might be laid down with the sanction of
+Parliament when the holder was no longer able to discharge its
+duties. Two of the most eminent members of the Episcopal bench, Dr.
+Blomfield, Bishop of London, and Dr. Maltby, Bishop of Durham, had
+become wholly incapable of discharging their duties, the one having
+been struck down by paralysis, and the other being almost blind.
+And they now proposed to the Prime-minister that he should make
+some arrangement by which they might be allowed to relinquish their
+offices, retaining a certain portion of the income of their sees as
+a retiring pension. There was no precedent for such an arrangement,
+but the necessity of the two cases was so manifest, the injury
+which the Church must suffer if the superintendence of two such
+important dioceses were to be neglected, was so palpable, and the
+conditions of the retiring pensions asked were so moderate and
+equitable, that Lord Palmerston had no hesitation in sanctioning
+the introduction of a bill to give effect to the arrangement
+proposed.</p>
+<p>It did not pass without vigorous resistance from more than one
+quarter. The Bishop of Exeter complained of it as incompatible with
+the great Church principle, that a bishop could only resign his
+office to the archbishop of his province; others opposed it as a
+violation of the common law, which forbids any bargain being made
+for the resignation of an office; while some, referring to the
+prohibition of simony (a word, perhaps, as much misunderstood and
+as often misapplied as any in the language), denounced the
+arrangement that the retiring prelates were to have pensions as
+simoniacal.[<a href="#note-295">295</a>] The most reasonable
+objection made to the proceeding was, that such exceptional
+legislation to meet an isolated case tended to establish a
+dangerous precedent, and that, as there were other men of great age
+on the bench, it would be better to effect the end now aimed at by
+a large general measure providing means for the retirement of all
+clergymen, those of inferior rank as well as bishops, whom age or
+infirmity might incapacitate. But the general feeling was against
+delay. The bill passed, and served in some degree as a model for
+that general measure which was soon afterward introduced, and
+which, as was suggested on this occasion, provided for an
+arrangement similar in principle being carried out whenever a
+priest holding any kind of ecclesiastical preferment should become
+disabled for the performance of its duties.</p>
+<p>There can be no doubt that such legislation was absolutely
+necessary in the interests of the Church, taking that expression to
+include, not the clergy alone, but the whole congregation of
+Churchmen. But it introduced a remarkable change into the system of
+ecclesiastical peerages, and, so far, into the constitution of the
+House of Lords. What was resigned by the two prelates was not the
+peerage (they had still the right to be styled "my lord"), but the
+seat in the House of Lords, which was a part, and which had
+hitherto been regarded as an inseparable part of it, or, at least
+(as it should, perhaps, rather be said, since the recent regulation
+that the junior bishop should not have a seat was a clear violation
+of that principle), which hitherto no one had been able to
+dissociate from the peerage after it had been once enjoyed.</p>
+<p>The treaties which terminated the war with Russia were not
+concluded till the spring of 1856; and it was well, indeed, that
+the country had no longer a foreign war on her hands, for a
+twelvemonth had scarcely elapsed when the very continuation of her
+existence as a great Eastern power was suddenly imperilled by what,
+regarded in one aspect, was a mutiny of her troops on a most
+extensive scale; in another, a civil war, waged by a combination of
+native princes, Hindoo as well as Mohammedan,[<a href=
+"#note-296">296</a>] for the total extinction of our power, and the
+expulsion of the British race from Bengal. As early as the first
+week of February several commanders of regiments and other
+authorities received warnings of the organization of a wide
+conspiracy against our power; and in the second week of May the
+troops at Meerut broke into open mutiny, set fire to the public
+buildings, murdered their officers, and even their wives and
+children, and then marched off to Delhi, where the garrison was
+prepared to receive them with open arms, and to imitate their
+atrocities. The contagion spread, and in a few weeks nearly all
+Bengal was in arms. In one or two instances the native chiefs stood
+by us, but the greater number joined the insurgents, some from the
+desire to throw off our yoke, but others, probably, from constraint
+and through fear. Whatever were their motives, before the end of
+June nearly all the principal cities and fortresses of Bengal, up
+to the very gates of Calcutta, were in the hands of the insurgents,
+the chief exception being at the great city of Lucknow, where,
+though the mutineers got possession of the city, a British garrison
+held the Residency, in the centre; and, maintaining themselves with
+heroic fortitude, unsurpassed in all the history of war, for nearly
+nine months, contributed more than any other body of men to the
+final suppression of the revolt. It would be beside our purpose
+here to dwell upon the great deeds by which in that terrible year
+our army, in all its branches, maintained its old renown; upon the
+recapture of Delhi; the deliverance of the incomparable defenders
+and preservers of Lucknow; the exploits of Lawrence, and Inglis,
+and Havelock, and Outram, and Peel, and Campbell; and, if we are
+forced to deny ourselves the proud gratification of dwelling on
+their combined heroism and wisdom, we may for the same reason be
+spared the pain of recounting the horrid cruelties wreaked in too
+many instances not only on the officers who fell into the rebels'
+hands, and on the civil magistrates, but on the helpless women and
+children. In the first excitement of fear and horror those
+cruelties were, no doubt, greatly exaggerated, but still enough
+remains proved to stamp the insurrection as one branding with the
+foulest disgrace the race which perpetrated and exulted in
+them.</p>
+<p>It was not till the last week of 1858 that the last sparks of
+rebellion were finally extinguished by the defeat in Oude of the
+last body of rebels who remained in arms, and the flight of the
+remnant of their force across the frontier of Nepaul; but, even
+before that day came, the ministry at home had been led to see the
+necessity of putting the government of the country for the future
+on a different footing. It could hardly be doubted that the prompt
+suppression of a revolt of so unprecedented a magnitude, and the
+proof given in the course of our operations that the British
+soldier still maintained the same superiority over the native
+trooper as in the days of Clive, had heightened our reputation and
+the belief of our power among the native tribes. But, speedily and
+decisively crushed though it had been, the revolt had given too
+terrible a proof of the inconstancy and treachery of the native
+tribes not to act as a warning to our statesmen; and the reflection
+that was thus forced upon them showed that a company of merchants,
+however distinguished by general courage and sagacity they had
+shown themselves, was no longer qualified to exercise imperial
+dominion over a territory which now extended over more than a
+million of square miles, and more than a hundred and fifty millions
+of native subjects.</p>
+<a name="firstweek" id="firstweek"></a>
+<p>Accordingly, in the first week of the session of 1858, Lord
+Palmerston, as Prime-minister, introduced a bill to transfer the
+government of British India from the East India Company to the
+crown. It was natural that the principle of such a measure should
+be opposed by the Directors of the Company, though it was supported
+by more than one person who had held high civil office in India;
+and equally natural that the arrangement of its details should call
+forth a minute and rigorous examination, and on many points a very
+determined opposition. We need not, however, say more about this
+bill, since circumstances prevented its being proceeded with; and
+the history of those which succeeded it is now only worth referring
+to as showing the extreme difficulty of the task of framing a
+government on new principles for a dependency of such vast
+magnitude and importance.[<a href="#note-297">297</a>]</p>
+<p>Lord Palmerston's bill was dropped, in consequence of the fall
+of his ministry, before the time came for its second reading; but
+the discussion on it had to some extent smoothed the way for that
+of his successor, Lord Derby. A great impression on the Parliament,
+and on the country in general, had been made by a very able speech
+of Sir G.C. Lewis, Chancellor of the Exchequer. He traced the whole
+history of the Indian government from the day of Plassy, and
+substantiated the right of the home government and Parliament to
+remodel it as they might judge best, by proving that ever since the
+passing of Pitt's first bill, in 1784, the Company had been
+constantly subject to Parliamentary control. He showed, too, most
+convincingly, that a petition which the Company had presented to
+the House of Commons, deprecating any change in the existing system
+which should tend to diminish the authority of the Directors, was
+based on one great fallacy&mdash;speaking, as it did, of the
+Company as one and indivisible, and unchanged in character,
+functions, and influence, down to the date of the last renewal of
+its charter, only five years previously; whereas the truth was,
+that in the one hundred years since Plassy the system had undergone
+as many changes as the English constitution between the Heptarchy
+and the reign of Queen Victoria.</p>
+<p>He had thus removed some of the obstacles out of the way of the
+measure of the new government, though Lord Derby would have
+preferred postponing it till tranquillity should have been restored
+to the country by the complete suppression of the revolt, had not
+the large majority[<a href="#note-298">298</a>] which had
+sanctioned the introduction of Lord Palmerston's bill, in his
+opinion, "placed the Company in such a situation that they could no
+longer command the same amount of public confidence and public
+support as they were entitled to receive previously to that vote of
+the House of Commons." It may be added that the first bill on the
+subject which was introduced by his government bore evident marks
+of the difficulties under which it was framed&mdash;difficulties
+existing from the unexpected suddenness of his accession to office;
+so that, after a not very short discussion, it was eventually
+withdrawn, and it was not till the end of June that the measure
+which was finally adopted was introduced.</p>
+<p>The leading enactments of the measure[<a href=
+"#note-299">299</a>] provided that for the future the government of
+India, described as having been hitherto vested in, or exercised
+by, the Company in trust for her Majesty, should be vested in her
+Majesty, and exercised in her name; that one of her Majesty's
+principal Secretaries of State should have and perform all such
+powers and duties relating to the government or revenues of India
+as had formerly belonged to the Court of Directors, as the Court of
+Proprietors of the Company; that a Council of the Governor-general
+should be established, consisting of fifteen members, seven of whom
+should be appointed by the Court of Directors, being persons who
+were, or had formerly been, Directors of the Company, and eight
+should be nominated by the crown. And as to both classes, it was
+provided that the majority should consist of persons who had served
+or resided in India for ten years at the least, and should not have
+left India more than ten years when appointed. They were to hold
+their offices during good behavior, to receive salaries, and to be
+entitled to retiring pensions, but to be incapable of sitting in
+Parliament. The appointment of Governor-general and Governor of
+each Presidency was to belong to the crown. The expenditure of the
+revenues of India, both in India and elsewhere, was to be subject
+to the control of the Secretary of State in Council; other clauses
+provided for the dividends of the Company, for the admission of
+persons into the civil service; and, with reference to existing
+establishments, one clause provided that "the Indian military and
+naval forces should remain under existing conditions of
+service."</p>
+<p>This last clause was strongly objected to by the Queen,[<a href=
+"#note-300">300</a>] as "inconsistent with her constitutional
+position as head of the army, which required that the
+Commander-in-chief should be put in communication with the new
+Secretary of State for India, in the same manner in which he is
+placed with regard to the troops at home or in the colonies toward
+the Secretary of State for War.... With regard to the whole army,
+whether English or Indian, there could, with due regard to the
+public interest, be only one head and one general command." She
+yielded her opinion, however, to the resolute objections of the
+Prime-minister, with whom on this point his predecessor,[<a href=
+"#note-301">301</a>] Lord Palmerston, agreed; but the result proved
+the superior soundness of her Majesty's view. It was not only a
+most anomalous arrangement, since the supreme control of all the
+warlike forces was one of the most inalienable prerogatives of the
+crown, but it had the strange fault of preserving the double
+government in the case in which, above all others, unity of system
+and unity of command were most indispensable. And, what weighed
+more than either consideration with the generally practical views
+of English statesmen, it was from the beginning found to work
+badly, creating, as it did, great and mischievous jealousies
+between the two divisions, the Royal and the Indian army. It was
+found that all the generals then in the highest commands in
+India&mdash;Lord Clyde (Sir Colin Campbell having been ennobled by
+that title), Sir Hugh Rose, and Sir William
+Mansfield&mdash;strongly disapproved of it, and recommended a
+change; and consequently, in the summer of 1860, Lord Palmerston,
+who in the mean while had returned to the Treasury, came round to
+the Queen's view of the subject, and a new act was passed which
+amalgamated the two armies into one Imperial army, taking its turn
+of duty throughout all parts of the British empire.[<a href=
+"#note-302">302</a>]</p>
+<p>A letter addressed by Lord Palmerston to the Queen in the autumn
+of 1857, which appears to have been his first statement to her
+Majesty of the opinion which he had formed of the necessity of
+abolishing the governing authority of the Company, states the
+principal arguments in favor of such a measure with great
+clearness, as arising from "the inconvenience and difficulty of
+administering the government of a vast country on the other side of
+the globe by means of two cabinets, the one responsible to the
+crown and Parliament, the other only responsible to the holders of
+Indian stock, meeting for a few hours three or four times a year,
+which had been shown by the events of the year to be no longer
+tolerable." His disapproval of parts of Lord Ellenborough's policy
+probably prevented him from alluding to his recall from India by
+the Directors, in direct defiance of the opinion of the
+government,[<a href="#note-303">303</a>] though that strange step
+can hardly have been absent from his mind. But, in fact, the case
+for taking the whole rule of so vast a dominion wholly into the
+hands of the Queen's government at home was so irresistible, that
+it did not require to be strengthened by reference to any
+individual instances of inconvenience. When the double government
+was originally established, the English in India were still but a
+small mercantile community, with very little territory beyond that
+in the immediate neighborhood of its three chief cities. Of the
+conduct of the affairs of such a body, still almost confined to
+commerce, the chief share might not unreasonably be left to the
+merchants themselves, subject to such supervision on the part of
+the government at home as was implied in the very name of the
+department invested with that supervision, the Board of Control,
+which, as Pitt explained the name, was meant to show that it was
+not to be, like the measure proposed by the Coalition Ministry, a
+board of political influence.[<a href="#note-304">304</a>] But the
+case was wholly altered when British India reached from Point de
+Galle to the Himalayas, and spread beyond the Ganges on the east,
+to beyond the Indus on the west; when the policy adopted in India
+often influenced our dealings with European states, and when the
+force required for the protection of those vast interests exceeded
+the numbers of the royal army. India, too, is a country the climate
+of which prevents our countrymen from emigrating to it as settlers,
+as they do to Canada or Australia, and where, consequently, the
+English residents are, and always must be, a mere handful in
+comparison with the millions of natives. In such a case their
+government must at all times rest mainly on opinion, on the belief
+in the pre-eminent power of the ruler; and it was obvious that that
+belief would be greatly fortified by the sovereign of Britain
+becoming that ruler.[<a href="#note-305">305</a>] The great rajahs
+cordially recognized the value of the transfer of power considered
+in this light, and felt their own dignity enhanced by becoming the
+vassals of the sovereign herself.</p>
+<p>Turning to French affairs, a brilliant French writer has
+remarked, that his countrymen are, of all peoples, the least suited
+to be conspirators, since none of them can ever keep a secret. But
+it was the ill-fortune of Louis Napoleon that he had provoked
+enmities, not only among his own countrymen, but among the
+republican fanatics of other nations also, who saw in his zeal for
+absolute authority the greatest obstacle to their designs, which
+aimed at the overthrow of every established government on the
+Continent, and shrunk from no crimes which they conceived to be
+calculated to promote their object. To free themselves from such an
+antagonist, the most wholesale murders seemed by no means too large
+a price. And in the middle of January, as the Emperor and Empress
+were going to the Opera, a prodigious explosion took place almost
+beneath the wheels of their carriage, from the effect of which they
+themselves had a most narrow escape, both being struck in the face
+by splinters, the aide-de-camp in their carriage also being
+severely wounded on the head; while their escort and attendants
+were struck down on all sides, ten being killed and above one
+hundred and fifty wounded.[<a href="#note-306">306</a>] It was soon
+found out that the authors of this atrocious crime were four
+Italians, of whom a man named Orsini was the chief, and that he,
+who had but recently escaped from a prison in Mantua, had fled from
+that town to England, and had there concocted all the details of
+his plot, and had procured the shells which had been his
+instruments.</p>
+<p>It was not unnatural that so atrocious a crime, causing such
+wide-spread destruction, should awaken great excitement in France,
+and in many quarters violent reclamations against England and her
+laws, which enabled foreign plotters to make her a starting-place
+for their nefarious schemes. Even in the French Chambers very
+bitter language was used on the subject by some of the most
+influential Deputies, for which our ministers were disposed to make
+allowance, Lord Clarendon, the Foreign Secretary, writing to the
+Prince Consort that "it was not to be expected that foreigners, who
+see that assassins go and come here as they please, and that
+conspiracies may be hatched in England with impunity, should think
+our laws and policy friendly to other countries, or appreciate the
+extreme difficulty of making any change in our system."[<a href=
+"#note-307">307</a>]</p>
+<p>But a different feeling was roused by a despatch of the French
+Secretary of State to the ambassador here, which seemed to impute
+to this country that it deliberately sheltered and countenanced men
+by whose writings "assassination was elevated into a doctrine
+openly preached, and carried into practice by reiterated attacks"
+upon the person of the French sovereign, and asked, in language
+which had rather an imperious tone, "Ought the English Legislature
+to contribute to the designs of men who were not mere fugitives,
+but assassins, and continue to shelter persons who place themselves
+beyond the pale of common right, and under the ban of humanity? Her
+Britannic Majesty's Government can assist us in averting a
+repetition of such guilty enterprises, by affording us a guarantee
+of security which no state can refuse to a neighboring state, and
+which we are justified in expecting from an ally. Fully relying,
+moreover, on the profound sagacity of the English Cabinet, we
+refrain from indicating in any way the measures which it may seem
+fit to take in order to comply with this wish. We confidently leave
+it to decide on the course which it shall deem best fitted to the
+end in view." Still, though the charge that our Legislature
+contributed to the designs of assassins was some departure from the
+measured language more usual in diplomatic communications between
+friendly powers, under the circumstances this remonstrance might
+have been borne with. Unluckily, it was not all, nor the worst,
+that we were called upon to bear. A few days afterward some
+addresses to the Emperor from different military corps were
+published in the <i>Moniteur</i>, which not only poured forth
+bitter reproaches against the whole English nation, but demanded to
+be led to an invasion of the country, "as an infamous haunt for the
+carrying out of infernal machinations." Political addresses seem to
+our ideas inconsistent with military discipline; but the army had
+been permitted, and even encouraged, to make them ever since the
+days of the Consulate, though such addresses never received the
+recognition of a publication in the official journal till they had
+been subjected to careful revision, and, if necessary, expurgation.
+On this occasion, however, that supervision had been carelessly
+performed, and the offensive passages were left standing, though,
+when the Emperor learned the indignation which they had excited
+even among his well-wishers in England, he instructed his
+ambassador to apologize for their retention and publication, as an
+act of inadvertence on the part of the officials whose duty it had
+been to revise such documents. So far all was well. And had the
+English ministers replied to the despatch of M. de Persigny in firm
+and temperate language, they would have escaped the difficulties
+which eventually overthrew them. There was no doubt that, according
+to diplomatic usage, a written despatch formally communicated to
+the Secretary of State required a written reply.</p>
+<p>Unfortunately, a written reply was not given. Lord Clarendon was
+too apprehensive of the mischief which might possibly arise from a
+protracted discussion, leading, perhaps, to an angry controversy;
+and under the influence of this feeling contented himself, when the
+despatch was presented, with giving the ambassador a verbal answer,
+that "no consideration on earth would induce Parliament to pass a
+measure for the extradition of foreign political refugees; that our
+asylum could not be infringed, and that we adhered to certain
+principles on that subject which were so old and so sacred that
+they could not be touched;"[<a href="#note-308">308</a>] adding,
+however, at the same time an assurance that the Attorney-general
+was already, at his request, examining our law of conspiracy, to
+see whether it was sufficiently comprehensive or stringent. The
+purport of this answer was all that could have been desired; but
+there was a very general impression that the omission to reply by a
+written despatch was a sacrifice of the national dignity, if not an
+unworthy submission to scarcely disguised menace; though at the
+same time there was also a feeling among both parties in Parliament
+that our laws with respect to the conduct of foreigners residing
+among us were, perhaps, susceptible of improvement. On the very
+first night of the session, in allusion to the attack on the French
+Emperor, Lord Derby had said that "he could wish to hear the
+opinion of the ministers whether the existing laws of this country
+were adequate to afford security for the lives of foreign princes
+against plots contrived in this country; and, if they were not,
+whether they might not be amended, so as to meet the case of such
+crimes as had recently been perpetrated, which were so heinous and
+revolting to every feeling of humanity." And even before that
+speech the ministers had applied themselves to frame a measure to
+amend the law, which in the second week of February the
+Prime-minister himself introduced to the House of Commons.</p>
+<p>It was read a first time, though not without some opposition;
+but before it arrived at the second reading, though only a week
+afterward, the feeling of the country, reflected in this instance
+by the House, had become so inflamed, that the measure was not
+discussed on its own merits, but on the point whether, since no
+other answer had been given to the French despatch, this must not
+be regarded as the ministerial answer, and therefore whether it
+were such an answer as it befitted England to send. Had it been
+examined on its own merits solely, it could hardly have provoked
+much adverse criticism. It was entitled, "A bill to amend the law
+with relation to the crime of conspiracy to commit murder," and it
+merely proposed to establish in England a law which had long
+existed in Ireland. Hitherto, as Lord Palmerston explained the
+matter, England had treated conspiracy to murder as a misdemeanor,
+punishable with fine and imprisonment. In Ireland it had long been
+a capital crime; and, though he did not propose to assimilate the
+English to the Irish statute in all its severity, he proposed to
+enact that conspiracy to murder should be a felony, punishable with
+penal servitude, by whomsoever the conspiracy might be concocted,
+or wherever the crime might be designed to be committed.</p>
+<p>The principle of such a law, supported as it was by the
+precedent of Ireland, could hardly be resisted. And Mr. Walpole,
+who had been Home-secretary in Lord Derby's ministry, avowed his
+determination to support the bill, "as being right in principle."
+But even he limited his promise of support by a condition "that the
+honor of England should be previously vindicated;" arguing that the
+French despatch bore the character of a demand, based upon
+allegations which were contrary to truth, and which, therefore, the
+ministers were bound to repudiate; and that to pass such a bill
+without putting on record a formal denial of those allegations
+would, in the general view of Europe, imply a confession that to
+them we had no answer to give. And it was this consideration which
+eventually determined the decision of the House, Mr. Disraeli, who
+closed the debate on his side, condemning the conduct of the
+ministers as "perplexed, timid, confused, wanting in dignity and
+self-respect. In not replying to the despatch, they had lost a
+great opportunity of asserting the principles of public law." The
+House, taking his view of their conduct, threw out the bill by a
+majority of nineteen;[<a href="#note-309">309</a>] and the ministry
+resigned, and was succeeded by one under the presidency of Lord
+Derby.</p>
+<p>Many of those who on this occasion combined to form the majority
+had denounced the bill, as an infringement of the principles of our
+constitution. It is, however, evident that, had it passed, it would
+not have deserved such a description. It would in no degree
+whatever have deprived a foreign resident of safety and the
+protection of English law, so long as he should obey that law; and
+that is all the indulgence that the constitution ever gave or ought
+to give. Foreigners had always been amenable to our courts of
+justice for any violation of the law. And Lord Palmerston's bill
+not only went no farther than removing a certain class of offences
+from the category of misdemeanors to that of felonies, but it also
+imposed no liability in that respect on foreigners which it did not
+at the same time impose on all the Queen's subjects. Indeed, the
+bill was so moderate, and the improvement it proposed so desirable,
+that, in a subsequent discussion in the House of Lords, Lord
+Campbell, the Chief-justice, expressed a hope that Lord Derby's
+government would take it up; though Lord Derby, in view of the
+existing feeling of the country on the subject, prudently forbore
+to act on that suggestion. But, as one of Orsini's most guilty
+accomplices, a man named Bernard, was still in London, he caused
+him to be indicted for murder, as having incurred that guilt as
+accessary to the death of some whom the explosion had killed. The
+excitement on the question had, however, not died away when the
+trial came on; and, though it will, probably, be generally admitted
+that the evidence was sufficiently clear, Bernard was
+acquitted.</p>
+<p>Lord Derby, however, did not long retain his office. Indeed, the
+Earl was so conscious that, on questions of general policy, the
+House of Commons was inclined to views differing from his own, that
+he would have preferred declining the task of forming a ministry,
+had he not conceived that, in the difficulty in which the Queen was
+placed by recent circumstances, he was bound by his duty to make
+the attempt, even if the result of it were merely to obtain a kind
+of respite for his sovereign and the country, which might give time
+for the present excitement of feeling to calm down. He was not
+deceived in his forebodings of his inability to maintain his
+position. In the course of the next spring he was twice defeated in
+the House of Commons&mdash;once by the House which he found in
+existence, and a second time in one which was the fruit of a
+general election. And in the summer of 1859 Lord Palmerston
+returned to office, with power increased by the junction of many of
+those who had helped to overthrow him in 1858, but who now combined
+with him to strike a similar blow at his Conservative
+successor.</p>
+<p>Yet, brief as was Lord Derby's tenure of power, it was made
+memorable by the commencement of a movement which cannot be
+regarded as devoid of constitutional importance, since, though
+originally it was only designed to supply a temporary
+re-enforcement to our ancient constitutional forces, the regular
+army and the militia, it has eventually created a force which, to
+the great honor of those who constitute it, has become a permanent
+addition to them. In the great war against Revolutionary France,
+when it was generally believed that those who held rule in Paris
+were contemplating an invasion of these islands, Pitt, as we have
+seen, had encouraged the formation of corps of volunteers, which
+continued to be of great use till the very end of the war, by
+performing, in conjunction with the militia, a great portion of the
+home duties which must otherwise have fallen on the line regiments,
+and thus disengaging the regular army for service on the Continent.
+There was now no such formidable enemy to be dreaded as the first
+Napoleon, but in every part of Europe affairs were in a state so
+unquiet that every kingdom seemed at times on the very brink of
+war; and since, if it should once break out, no one could feel
+confident that we should not be involved in it, or, if we should
+be, who would be our allies or our enemies, measures of precaution
+and self-defence seemed as needful now as they had been sixty years
+before. Our boldest statesmen were disquieted and anxious; and the
+nation at large, sharing their uneasiness, kindled with the feeling
+that it was a time to show that the present generation inherited
+the self-denying patriotism of their fathers. Leaders were not
+wanting again to prompt the formation of a volunteer force. The
+government at once saw the value of the scheme. Fortunately, the
+Secretary for War, Colonel Peel, happened to be an old soldier, a
+veteran who had learned the art of war under Wellington himself;
+and he, having great talents for organization, placed the force
+from its infancy on a sound footing. How thoroughly the movement
+harmonized with the martial spirit of the nation&mdash;to which,
+indeed, it owed its birth&mdash;is shown by the history of the
+force, which now, above twenty years after its original formation,
+maintains its full numbers and yearly improves its efficiency.
+Though there has not for many years been any apprehension of war,
+above one hundred and twenty thousand men still annually devote no
+small portion of their time to the acquisition of military
+discipline and science, and that so successfully, that, by the
+testimony of the most experienced judges, they have attained a
+degree of efficiency which, if the necessity for their services
+should ever arise, would render them valuable and worthy comrades
+to the more regularly trained army. Lord Derby retired from office
+while the force was still in its infancy; but Lord Palmerston was
+equally sensible of its value, and gave a farther proof of his
+appreciation of the vast importance of measures of national defence
+by the vigor with which he carried out the recommendations of a
+royal commission which had been appointed by the preceding ministry
+to investigate the condition of our national defences. Its report
+had pointed out the absolute necessity of an improved system of
+protection for our great dockyards and arsenals, which, from their
+position on the coast, were more liable to attack than inland
+fortresses would have been, had we had such. And, in accordance
+with that warning, in the summer of 1860, Lord Palmerston proposed
+the grant of a large sum of money for the fortification of our
+chief dockyards. It was opposed on a strange variety of grounds;
+some arguing that the proposed fortifications were superfluous,
+because our navy was the defence to which the nation was wont
+deservedly to trust; some that they were needless, because no other
+nation was in a condition to attack us; others that they were
+disgraceful, because it was un-English and mean to skulk behind
+stone walls, and because Lycurgus had refused to trust to stone
+walls for the safety of Sparta; and one member, the chief spokesman
+of a new and small party, commonly known as the "peace-at-any-price
+party," boldly denounced the members of the commission as a set of
+"lunatics" for framing such a report, and the ministers as guilty
+of "contemptible cowardice" for suggesting to the nation that there
+was any danger in being undefended. But the ministry prevailed by a
+large majority;[<a href="#note-310">310</a>] the money was voted,
+and the nation in general warmly approved of the measure. As Lord
+Palmerston subsequently expressed it, "the government, the
+Parliament, and the nation acted in harmonious concert"[<a href=
+"#note-311">311</a>] on the subject.</p>
+<p>One of the arguments against it which the objectors had brought
+forward was, that the ministry was not unanimous in the conviction
+of the necessity; and we learn from the "Life of the Prince
+Consort"[<a href="#note-312">312</a>] that Mr. Gladstone, the
+Chancellor of the Exchequer, was vehement in his resistance to it,
+threatening even to carry his opposition so far as to resign his
+office, if it were persevered in. And, as has been intimated on a
+previous page, this was not the only question on which in the
+course of this year the Prime-minister did in his heart differ from
+his Chancellor of the Exchequer, though he did not think it
+expedient to refuse his sanction to his proposals on a matter
+belonging to his own department, the Exchequer. The subject on
+which he secretly doubted his colleague's judgment was one of the
+proposals made in the Budget of the year. As has already been
+mentioned, the transaction throws a rather curious light on the
+occasional working of our ministerial system; and the fate of the
+measure in the two Houses of Parliament is also deserving of remark
+and recollection, as re-opening the question, which had not been
+agitated for nearly a century, as to the extent of the power of the
+House of Lords with respect to votes of money. In a <a href=
+"#horton">former chapter</a>[<a href="#note-313">313</a>] we have
+had occasion to mention the angry feeling on the part of the House
+of Commons which, in the year 1772, had been evoked by the act of
+the House of Lords, in making some amendments on a bill relating to
+the exportation of corn which had come up to them from the Commons.
+A somewhat similar act had, as we have also seen, revived the
+discussion a few years later, when the minister of the day had
+shown a more temperate feeling on the subject. On neither occasion,
+however, had the question of the privileges of the Lords been
+definitively settled; and no occasion had since arisen for any
+consideration of the subject. But the Budget of 1860 contained a
+clause which, in spite of the deserved reputation of the Chancellor
+of the Exchequer as a skilful financier, was not regarded with
+general favor. There was a large deficiency in the revenue for the
+year; but while, among his expedients for meeting it, Mr. Gladstone
+proposed an augmentation of the income-tax, he proposed also to
+repeal the excise duty on paper, which produced about a million and
+a quarter. It is now known that the Prime-minister himself highly
+disapproved of the sacrifice at such a time of so productive a
+tax.[<a href="#note-314">314</a>] And, if that had been suspected
+at the time, the House of Commons would certainly not have
+consented to it; even when the ministry was supposed to be
+unanimous in its approval of it, it was only carried by a majority
+of nine; and, when the bill embodying it came before the House of
+Lords, a Whig peer, who had himself been formerly Chancellor of the
+Exchequer in Lord Melbourne's administration, moved its rejection,
+and it was rejected by a majority of eighty-nine.</p>
+<p>The rejection of a measure relating to taxation caused great
+excitement among a large party in the House of Commons&mdash;so
+violent, indeed, that the only expedient that presented itself to
+the Prime-minister, if he would prevent the proposal of some step
+of an extreme and mischievous character, was to take the matter
+into his own hands. Had he been able to act entirely on his own
+judgment, it may, perhaps, be thought that, with his sentiments on
+the inexpediency of the measure which had been rejected, he would
+have preferred a silent acquiescence in the vote of the Lords; but
+he would have been quite unable to induce the majority of his own
+supporters, and even some of his own colleagues, to adopt so
+moderate a course; and accordingly he moved the appointment of a
+committee to examine and report on the practice of Parliament in
+regard to bills for imposing or repealing taxes. And when it had
+made its report, which was purely of an historical character,
+setting forth the precedents bearing on the subject, he proposed
+three resolutions, asserting "that the right of granting aids and
+supplies to the crown is in the Commons alone, as an essential part
+of their constitution, etc.; that, although the Lords had exercised
+the power of rejecting bills of several descriptions relating to
+taxation by negativing the whole, yet the exercise of that power by
+them had not been frequent, and was justly regarded by the Commons
+with peculiar jealousy, as affecting their rights, etc.; and that,
+to guard for the future against an undue exercise of that power by
+the Lords, and to secure to the Commons their rightful control over
+taxation and supply, the Commons had it in their power so to impose
+and remit taxes, and to frame bills of supply, that their right,
+etc., might be maintained inviolate."</p>
+<p>In the debate which ensued his chief opponents came from his own
+party, and even his own colleague, the Chancellor of the Exchequer,
+displayed a fundamental difference of feeling from his on the
+subject, a difference which was expressed by one of the most
+eloquent supporters of the resolutions, Mr. Horsman, M.P. for
+Stroud, saying that "Lord Palmerston wished to make the
+independence of the House of Lords a reality, while Mr. Gladstone
+seemed to desire that it should be a fiction." Lord Palmerston,
+indeed, showed the feeling thus attributed to him in a
+statesman-like declaration that, if "this nation had enjoyed a
+greater amount of civil, political, social, and religious liberty
+than, as he believed, any other people in the world, that result
+had been accomplished, not by vesting in either of the three
+estates, the Crown, the Lords, or the Commons, exclusive or
+overruling power over the others, but by maintaining for each its
+own separate and independent authority, and also by the three
+powers combining together to bear and forbear, endeavoring by
+harmonious concert with each other to avoid those conflicts and
+clashings which must have arisen if independent authority and
+independent action had been exerted by each or by all." He entered
+into the history of the question, explaining that, though "each
+branch of the Legislature retained its respective power of
+rejecting any measure, the Commons had claimed from time immemorial
+particular privileges in regard to particular measures, and
+especially the exclusive right of determining matters connected
+with the taxation of the people. They claimed for themselves, and
+denied to the Lords, the right of originating, altering, or
+amending such measures; but, as long ago as 1671, the
+Attorney-general, in a memorable conference between the two Houses,
+had admitted that the Lords, though they could not originate or
+amend, had, nevertheless, power to reject money-bills;" and this
+admission he regarded as consistent with common-sense, for "it was
+well known that, though the Commons contended for the right of
+originating measures for the grant of supply, and of framing bills
+with that object, according to their belief of what was best for
+the public interest, yet such bills could not pass into law without
+the assent of the Lords; and it was clear that an authority whose
+assent was necessary to give a proposal the force of law, must, by
+the very nature of things, be at liberty to dissent and refuse its
+sanction."</p>
+<p>The committee had enumerated a large number of precedents (above
+thirty) in which, since that conference, the Lords had rejected
+such bills; but the cases were not in general exactly similar to
+that now under consideration, since the bills which they had
+rejected had commonly, if not in every case, been for the
+imposition and not for the repeal of a tax; and in most cases some
+question of national policy had been involved which had influenced
+their vote. But the view which Lord Palmerston pressed on the House
+was that the present was "a case in which party feelings ought to
+be cast aside. It was one in which higher and larger interests than
+those of party were concerned, and in which the course that the
+House now took would be a precedent to guide future Parliaments."
+He pointed out, moreover, that the smallness of the majority in the
+House of Commons had been to the Lords "some encouragement to take
+this particular step," and that "he was himself led to think that
+they had taken it, not from any intention to step out of their
+province, and to depart from the line of constitutional right which
+the history of the country has assigned them, but from motives of
+policy dependent on the circumstances of the moment; and therefore
+he thought it would be wise if the Commons forbore to enter into a
+conflict with the Lords on a ground which might really not exist,
+but satisfied themselves with a declaration of what were their own
+constitutional powers and privileges. It was of the utmost
+importance in a constitution like ours, where there are different
+branches, independent of each other, each with powers of its own,
+and where cordial and harmonious action is necessary, that care
+should be taken to avoid the commencement of an unnecessary
+quarrel, and the party that acted otherwise would incur a grave
+responsibility."</p>
+<p>Mr. Gladstone, however, though he ended by expressing his
+concurrence in the resolution proposed by his chief, used very
+different language respecting the vote of the House of Lords,
+characterizing it as "a gigantic innovation, the most gigantic and
+the most dangerous that had been attempted in our time," since "the
+origination of a bill for the imposition of a tax, or the amendment
+of a money-bill, was a slight thing compared with the claim to
+prevent the repeal of a tax;" and, dealing with assertions which he
+had heard, that in this instance "the House of Commons had been
+very foolish and the House of Lords very wise," he asked whether
+that really described the constitution under which we live. The
+House of Commons could not be infallible in matters of finance more
+than in other matters. It might make errors, but he demanded to
+know whether those errors in finance were or were not liable to
+correction by the House of Lords. If they were, "what became of the
+privileges of the Commons?" On the other hand, Mr. Disraeli, as
+leader of the Opposition or Conservative party, supported the
+resolutions, and applauded the speech of the Prime-minister, as "a
+wise, calm, and ample declaration of a cabinet that had carefully
+and deliberately considered this important subject. It had
+acknowledged that the conduct of the Lords was justified by law and
+precedent, and sanctioned by policy," and he maintained that it
+showed that "the charge made by the Chancellor of the Exchequer was
+utterly untenable, and had no foundation." And Mr. Horsman, taking
+a large general view of the legitimate working of the parliamentary
+constitution, argued that, while it was an undoubted rule that "all
+taxes should originate with the Commons, as that elective and more
+immediately responsible assembly that is constantly referred back
+to the constituencies, the reviewing power of a permanent and
+independent chamber was no less essential;" and that, considering
+that "the Reform Bill of 1832 had given a preponderance of powers
+to the Commons, and that the tendency of any farther Reform Act
+must be in the same direction, so far from narrowing the field of
+action for the peers, the wiser alternative might be to adopt a
+generous construction of their powers, with a view to preserving
+the equilibrium that is held to be essential to the safety and
+well-working of the constitution. The House of Commons," he
+concluded, "is perpetually assuming fresh powers and establishing
+new precedents. Virtually all bills now originate with the Commons;
+but this is not the consequence of any aggressive spirit in them,
+but is the necessary and inevitable result of the historic working
+of the constitution; and so this act of the Lords was but the
+natural working of the constitution to meet a definite emergency."
+The resolutions were passed, the first and third without a
+division; the second, to which an amendment had been proposed,
+designed to limit the force of the precedents alleged as justifying
+the act of the Lords, by a majority of nearly four
+hundred.[<a href="#note-315">315</a>] In their form and language
+the resolutions cannot be said to have greatly affected the power
+claimed by the Lords, and exercised by them in this instance. The
+first two were simply declaratory of acknowledged principles or
+facts, and the third intimated no desire to guard against anything
+but an undue exertion by the Lords of the right which they were
+admitted to possess. But it can hardly be doubted that the
+intention even of Lord Palmerston, dictated by the strong feeling
+which he perceived to prevail in the House of Commons on the
+subject, was to deter the Lords from any future exercise of their
+powers of review and rejection of measures relating to taxation,
+when, perhaps, the Commons might be under less prudent guidance;
+nor that the effect of the resolutions will correspond with the
+design rather than with the language of the mover, and will prevent
+the Lords, unless under the pressure of some overpowering
+necessity, from again interfering to control the Commons in such
+matters. At the same time it seems superfluous to point out that
+one claim advanced by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who was
+apparently carried beyond his usual discretion by his parental
+fondness for the rejected bill, is utterly unreconcileable with the
+maintenance of any constitution at all that can deserve the name.
+When there are three bodies so concerned in the legislation that
+the united consent of all is indispensable to give validity to any
+act, to claim for any one of them so paramount an authority that,
+even if it should adopt a manifestly mischievous course, neither of
+the others should have the right to control or check or correct the
+error, would be to make that body the irresponsible master of the
+whole government and nation; to invest it with that "overruling
+power" which Lord Palmerston with such force of reasoning had
+deprecated; and to substitute for that harmonious concert of all to
+which, in his view, the perfection of our liberties was owing, a
+submission to one, and that the one most liable to be acted upon by
+the violence or caprice of the populace. He was a wise man who said
+that he looked on the tyranny of one man as an evil, but on the
+tyranny of a thousand as a thousand times worse. And for this
+reason also the resolutions which were now adopted seem to have
+been conceived in a spirit of judicious moderation, since, while
+rendering it highly improbable that the Lords would again reject a
+measure relating to taxation, it avoided absolutely to extinguish
+their power to do so. Lord Palmerston, it may be thought, foresaw
+the possibility of an occasion arising when the notoriety that such
+a power still existed might serve as a check to prevent its
+exercise from being required. In the very case which had given rise
+to this discussion he regarded it as certain that the feeling of
+the majority of the nation approved of the action of the peers;
+and, as what had occurred once might occur again, it was certainly
+within the region of possibility that another such emergency might
+arise, when the Lords might interfere with salutary effect to save
+the country from the evil result of ill-considered legislation;
+finance being, above all others, the subject on which a rash or
+unscrupulous minister may find the greatest facility for exciting
+the people by plausible delusions. There is, moreover, another
+reason why it would not only be impolitic, but absolutely unfair,
+to deprive the Lords altogether of their power of rejection even in
+cases of taxation; namely, that the Commons, when imposing taxes,
+are taxing the Lords themselves, as well as the other classes of
+the community; while the Lords alone of the whole nation are
+absolutely unrepresented in the House of Commons. There is a
+frequent cry for a graduated income-tax; and surely if an
+unscrupulous demagogue in office were to contrive such a graduation
+as would subject a peer to three times the income-tax borne by a
+commoner, it would be a monstrous iniquity if the peers were to
+have no power of protecting themselves in their own House.</p>
+<p>In the last sentence of his speech the Chancellor of the
+Exchequer had "respectfully reserved to himself the freedom of
+acting in such a way as should appear to offer any hope of success
+in giving effect by a practical measure to the principle contained
+in the first resolution." And it was, probably, an exemplification
+of the power of which he thus bespoke the use that he the next year
+struck out a scheme for insuring the repeal of the paper-duties,
+including it in one bill with all his other financial propositions,
+instead of dividing them in the ordinary way in several distinct
+bills. It was a manoeuvre which too much resembled the system of
+"tacking," which had been so justly denounced as one of the most
+unseemly manoeuvres of faction in the previous century.[<a href=
+"#note-316">316</a>] But, as some of the principal reasons which in
+the preceding year had led the Lords to condemn the repeal had
+ceased to exist, and the deficiency of the revenue had been
+converted into a surplus, they thought it wiser to prove their
+superiority of wisdom to the House of Commons by showing a more
+conciliatory spirit, and passed the bill; though the course
+adopted, which had the effect of depriving the Lords of that power
+of examination of the details of the financial scheme of the
+government which they had hitherto enjoyed without any question or
+dispute, was strongly protested against in both Houses, and by some
+members who were not generally unfriendly to the
+administration.</p>
+<p>A hundred years had now elapsed since George III. ascended the
+throne. It had been a period full of transactions of great
+importance, developing the constitution in such a manner and to
+such an extent as to make a change in its character but little
+inferior to those which had been produced by the contests of the
+preceding century. One principal result of the Revolution of 1688
+has been described as having been the placing of the political
+power of the state chiefly in the hands of the aristocracy. The
+Reform Bill of 1832, which has been sometimes called a "second
+Revolution," transferred that power to the middle classes.[<a href=
+"#note-317">317</a>] And what may be called the logical sequence of
+the later measures is the contrary of that which was designed to
+flow from the earlier ones. The changes which were effected in 1688
+were intended to promote, and were believed to have insured,
+stability; to have established institutions of a permanent
+character, as far as human affairs can be invested with permanency.
+And down to the death of George II. the policy of succeeding
+ministers, of whom Walpole may be taken as the type, as he was
+unquestionably the most able, aimed chiefly at keeping things as
+they were. <i>Quieta non movere</i>. The Peerage Bill, proposed by
+a Prime-minister thirty years after the Revolution, was but an
+exaggerated instance of the perseverance with which that object was
+kept in view. But the Reform Bill of 1832, like the Emancipation
+Act which preceded it, on the contrary, contained in itself, in its
+very principle, the seeds and elements of farther change.</p>
+<p>The Emancipation Act, following and combined with the repeal of
+the Test Act, rendered it almost inevitable that religious
+toleration would in time be extended to all persuasions, even to
+those adverse to Christianity. And the Reform Bill, as has been
+already pointed out, by the principles on which it based its
+limitations of the franchise, laid the foundation for farther and
+repeated revision and modification.[<a href="#note-318">318</a>]
+The consequence is, that the aim of statesmen of the present day
+differs from that which was pursued by their predecessors. The
+statesman of the present day can no longer hope to avoid farther
+changes, and must, therefore, be content to direct his energies to
+the more difficult task of making them moderate and safe,
+consistent with the preservation of that balance of powers to which
+the country owes the liberty and happiness which it has hitherto
+enjoyed.</p>
+<p>It is in this point of view that the diffusion of education,
+beyond the blessing which it confers on the individual, is of
+especial importance to the state. Political theorists affirm that
+all men have an equal right to political power&mdash;to that
+amount, at least, of political power which is conferred by a vote
+at elections. Men of practical common-sense affirm that no one has
+a right to power of any kind, unless he can be trusted to forbear
+employing it to the injury of his fellow-creatures or of himself.
+And the only safeguard and security for the proper exercise of
+political power is sound and enlightened education. It is
+unnecessary to dwell on this point, because our statesmen of both
+parties (to their honor) give constant proof of their deep
+conviction of its importance.</p>
+<p>But, in closing our remarks, it may be allowable to point out
+the political lesson which, above all others, the teachers of the
+masses should seek to inculcate on their pupils. The art of
+government, and each measure of government, is, above all other
+things, the two-sided shield. There are so many plausible arguments
+which may be advanced on each side of almost every question of
+policy, that no candid man will severely condemn him who in such
+disputable matters forms an opinion different from his own. Age and
+experience are worse than valueless if they do not teach a man to
+think better of his kind; and the history of the period which we
+have been considering teaches no lesson more forcibly than this,
+that the great majority of educated men, and especially of our
+leading statesmen, are actuated by honest and patriotic motives.
+And we would presume to urge that more important than a correct
+estimate of any one transaction of the past, or even of any one
+measure to influence the future, is the habit of putting a candid,
+and therefore a favorable, construction on the characters and
+intentions of those to whom from time to time the conduct of the
+affairs of the nation is intrusted.</p>
+<p>Notes:</p>
+<p><a name="note-276" id="note-276">
+<!-- Note Anchor 276 --></a>[Footnote 276: "Life of Palmerston,"
+vol. i., c. vii.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-277" id="note-277">
+<!-- Note Anchor 277 --></a>[Footnote 277: "Life of the Prince
+Consort," ii, 303.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-278" id="note-278">
+<!-- Note Anchor 278 --></a>[Footnote 278: <i>Ibid</i>., p.
+412.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-279" id="note-279">
+<!-- Note Anchor 279 --></a>[Footnote 279: Amos, "Fifty Years of
+the English Constitution," p. 289.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-280" id="note-280">
+<!-- Note Anchor 280 --></a>[Footnote 280: "Past Gleanings," i.,
+242.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-281" id="note-281">
+<!-- Note Anchor 281 --></a>[Footnote 281: "Life of the Prince
+Consort," iv., 458.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-282" id="note-282">
+<!-- Note Anchor 282 --></a>[Footnote 282: 219 to 210.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-283" id="note-283">
+<!-- Note Anchor 283 --></a>[Footnote 283: "Life of the Prince
+Consort," v., 100.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-284" id="note-284">
+<!-- Note Anchor 284 --></a>[Footnote 284: <i>Ibid</i>., p.
+148.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-285" id="note-285">
+<!-- Note Anchor 285 --></a>[Footnote 285: "Life of Pitt," by Earl
+Stanhope, iii., 210.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-286" id="note-286">
+<!-- Note Anchor 286 --></a>[Footnote 286: "Life of the Prince
+Consort," iv., 329.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-287" id="note-287">
+<!-- Note Anchor 287 --></a>[Footnote 287: <i>Ibid.</i>, p.
+366.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-288" id="note-288">
+<!-- Note Anchor 288 --></a>[Footnote 288: "Constitutional
+History," iii., 319, 3d edition.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-289" id="note-289">
+<!-- Note Anchor 289 --></a>[Footnote 289: It should be added that,
+on a subsequent occasion, Mr. Roundell Palmer, member for Plymouth
+(now Lord Chancellor Selborne, and even then in the enjoyment of
+the highest professional reputation), declared his opinion to be in
+favor of the legality and constitutional propriety of the
+proceeding.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-290" id="note-290">
+<!-- Note Anchor 290 --></a>[Footnote 290: To illustrate this
+position, Lord Lyndhurst said: "The sovereign may by his
+prerogative, if he thinks proper, create a hundred peers with
+descendible qualities in the course of a day. That would be
+consistent with the prerogative, and would be perfectly legal; but
+everybody must feel, and everybody must know, that such an exercise
+of the undoubted prerogative of the crown would be a flagrant
+violation of the principles of the constitution. In the same manner
+the sovereign might place the Great Seal in the hands of a layman
+wholly unacquainted with the laws of the country. That also would
+be a flagrant violation of the constitution of this
+country."&mdash;Hansard's <i>Parliamentary Debates</i>, cxl.,
+February 7, 1856. In the same debate Lord Derby defined
+"prerogative" as "the power of doing that which is beside the law."
+Hallam, in discussing the prosecution of Sir Edward Hales, fully
+recognizes the principle contended for by Lord Lyndhurst, saying
+that "it is by no means evident that the decision of the judges" in
+that case "was against law," but proceeding to show that "the
+unadvised assertion in a court of law" of such an exercise of the
+prerogative "may be said to have sealed the condemnation of the
+house of Stuart."&mdash;<i>Constitutional History</i>, vol. iii.,
+c. xiv., p. 86.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-291" id="note-291">
+<!-- Note Anchor 291 --></a>[Footnote 291: In the reign of Richard
+II. the Earl of Oxford had been made Marquis of Dublin for life,
+but he already had a seat in the House as Earl. Henry V. had
+originally made the peerages of his brothers, the Dukes of Bedford
+and Gloucester, life peerages; but these were afterward surrendered
+and regranted "in the usual descendible form," so that they rather
+made against the present case than for it. Henry VIII. had created
+the Prince of Thomond Earl of Thomond for his life, but he had at
+the same time granted him the barony of Inchiquin "for himself and
+his heirs forever." It was also alleged that these life peerages
+had not been conferred by the King alone, but by the King with the
+authority and consent of Parliament, "these significant words being
+found in the patents."]</p>
+<p><a name="note-292" id="note-292">
+<!-- Note Anchor 292 --></a>[Footnote 292: The division was 153 to
+133. Some years afterward, however, a clause in the act, which
+created a new appellate jurisdiction, empowered the sovereign to
+create peerages of this limited character, one of the clauses
+providing that "every Lord of Appeal in Ordinary should be entitled
+during his life to rank as a Baron by such style as her Majesty may
+be pleased to appoint, and shall during the time that he continues
+in office as a Lord of Appeal in Ordinary, and no longer be
+entitled to a writ of summons to attend, sit, and vote in the House
+of Lords. His dignity as a Lord of Parliament shall not descend to
+his heirs." As this act was passed long after the period at which
+the present volume closes, it does not belong to the writer to
+examine how far this act, in providing that every Lord of Appeal
+shall for the time rank as a Baron (the Lords of Appeal being, of
+course, appointed by the crown), is entitled to be spoken of as
+introducing a great constitutional innovation, big with future
+consequences, as it has been described by some writers.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-293" id="note-293">
+<!-- Note Anchor 293 --></a>[Footnote 293: In one notorious
+instance, that of the Earl of Bristol (<i>confer</i> Hallam, i.,
+518), in the time of Charles I., the House of Lords had interfered
+and compelled the issue of the writ; their action forming a
+precedent for their right of interference in such matters, which in
+the present case the Lord Chancellor denied.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-294" id="note-294">
+<!-- Note Anchor 294 --></a>[Footnote 294: The grant of a pension
+of &pound;1000 a year, with a baronetcy, to General Havelock, and
+more recently to Sir F. Roberts, are, it is believed, the only
+exceptions to this rule.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-295" id="note-295">
+<!-- Note Anchor 295 --></a>[Footnote 295: Bishop Lonsdale, of
+Lichfield, in reference to Simon Magus, from whose offer of money
+to the Apostles the offence derives its name, denying that there
+was any similarity between his sin and the act of purchasing an
+advowson or presentation, remarked that it might just as fitly be
+called magic as simony.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-296" id="note-296">
+<!-- Note Anchor 296 --></a>[Footnote 296: It has been, and will
+probably continue to be, a matter of dispute whether the first
+conception and plan of the insurrection originated with the
+restless boldness of the Mohammedans or the deeper fanaticism of
+the Hindoos. It is notorious that the prophecy that a century had
+been assigned by the Almighty as the allotted period of our
+supremacy in India had for many years been circulated among both;
+and, though the conspiracy was at first generally attributed to the
+Mohammedans, the argument that the period from the battle of
+Plassy, in 1757, to the outbreak in 1857, though an exact century
+according to the Hindoo calendar, is three years longer according
+to the Mohammedan computation, seems an almost irresistible proof
+that the Brahmins were its original authors. Sir John Kaye, in his
+"History of the Sepoy War," at the end of book iii., c. iii.,
+prints the following note, as furnished to him by Mr. E.A. Reade, a
+gentleman of long experience in India: "I do not think I ever met
+one man in a hundred that did not give the Mohammedans credit for
+this prediction. I fully believe that the notion of change after a
+century of tenure was general, and I can testify, with others, to
+have heard of the prediction at least a quarter of a century
+previously. But, call it a prediction or a superstition, the credit
+of it must, I think, be given to the Hindoos. If we take the Hejira
+calendar, 1757 A.D. corresponds with 1171 Hejira; 1857 A.D. with
+1274 Hejira; whereas, by the lunisolar year of the Sumbut, 1757 is
+1814 Sumhut, and 1857 is 1914 Sumbut."]</p>
+<p><a name="note-297" id="note-297">
+<!-- Note Anchor 297 --></a>[Footnote 297: It is worthy of remark
+that, as early as 1829, the Earl of Ellenborough, then President of
+the Board of Control, had come to the conclusion that the Company
+was no longer competent to govern so vast a dominion as that of
+British India had gradually become. In his Diary, recently
+published (ii., 131), he expresses his firm conviction that, "in
+substituting the King's government for that of the Company, we
+shall be conferring a great benefit on India, and effecting the
+measure which is most likely to retain for England the possession
+of India;" and from the same work (ii., 61) we learn that Mr.
+Mountstuart Elphinstone, one of the ablest servants of whom the
+Company could boast, and who had recently been Governor of Bombay,
+even while confessing himself prejudiced in favor "of the existing
+system, under which he had been educated and lived," admitted that
+"the administration of the government in the King's name would be
+agreeable to the civil and military services, and to people in
+England. He doubted whether, as regarded the princes of India, it
+would signify much, as they now pretty well understood us." See
+also <i>ibid</i>., p. 414.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-298" id="note-298">
+<!-- Note Anchor 298 --></a>[Footnote 298: 318 to 173.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-299" id="note-299">
+<!-- Note Anchor 299 --></a>[Footnote 299: The whole bill is given
+in the "Annual Register" for the year 1858, p. 226.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-300" id="note-300">
+<!-- Note Anchor 300 --></a>[Footnote 300: See her letter to Lord
+Derby on the subject, given in the "Life of the Prince Consort,"
+iv., 308; <i>confer</i> also a memorandum of the Prince Consort,
+<i>ibid.</i>, p. 310.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-301" id="note-301">
+<!-- Note Anchor 301 --></a>[Footnote 301: <i>Ibid.</i>, p.
+106.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-302" id="note-302">
+<!-- Note Anchor 302 --></a>[Footnote 302: It should be remarked
+that the arrangement originally carried out awoke among the
+European troops of the Company so deep and general a spirit of
+discontent as at one time threatened to break out in open mutiny;
+the ground of their dissatisfaction being "the transfer of their
+services in virtue of an act of Parliament, but without their
+consent." Accordingly, "on the announcement of the proclamation
+transferring the possessions of the East India Company to the
+crown, some of the soldiers of the Company's European force set up
+a claim for a free discharge or a bounty on re-enlistment." Lord
+Clyde's recommendation "that a concession should be made" was
+overruled by the government of India, and "pronounced inadmissible
+by the law-officers of the crown" in England. The dissatisfaction
+was allayed for the time by the judicious measures, equally
+conciliatory and firm, adopted by Lord Clyde, in whom all ranks of
+both armies felt equal confidence; but eventually the government
+became convinced of the necessity of granting discharges to every
+man who wished for one, provided he had not misconducted
+himself.&mdash;Shadwell's <i>Life of Lord Clyde</i>, ii.,
+407-416.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-303" id="note-303">
+<!-- Note Anchor 303 --></a>[Footnote 303: See <i>ante</i>, p.
+385.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-304" id="note-304">
+<!-- Note Anchor 304 --></a>[Footnote 304: Stanhope's "Life of
+Pitt," i., 173.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-305" id="note-305">
+<!-- Note Anchor 305 --></a>[Footnote 305: Sir Theodore Martin
+quotes a passage from a letter of the <i>Times</i> correspondent,
+giving a report of the effect of the proclamation on the natives:
+"Genuineness of Asiatic feeling is always a problem, but I have
+little doubt it is in this instance literally sincere. The people
+understand an Empress, and did not understand the Company.
+Moreover, they (I am speaking of the masses) have a very decided
+notion that the Queen has hanged the Company for offences 'which
+must have been very great,' and that fact gives hope of future
+justice."&mdash;<i>Life of the Prince Consort</i>, iv., 337.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-306" id="note-306">
+<!-- Note Anchor 306 --></a>[Footnote 306: The "Annual Register"
+says that "neither the Emperor nor the Empress was touched;" but
+Sir Theodore Martin ("Life of the Prince Consort," iv., 155) says
+that "the Emperor's nose was grazed, and that the Empress received
+a blow on the left eye which affected it for some time."]</p>
+<p><a name="note-307" id="note-307">
+<!-- Note Anchor 307 --></a>[Footnote 307: "Life of the Prince
+Consort," iv., 156.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-308" id="note-308">
+<!-- Note Anchor 308 --></a>[Footnote 308: Speech of Lord
+Palmerston, February 19.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-309" id="note-309">
+<!-- Note Anchor 309 --></a>[Footnote 309: It is remarkable that it
+was not a very full House, the numbers of the division being only
+234 to 215. Many members absented themselves, being equally
+unwilling to condemn the bill or to approve the silence of the
+ministry.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-310" id="note-310">
+<!-- Note Anchor 310 --></a>[Footnote 310: 268 to 39.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-311" id="note-311">
+<!-- Note Anchor 311 --></a>[Footnote 311: "Life of the Prince
+Consort," v., 131.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-312" id="note-312">
+<!-- Note Anchor 312 --></a>[Footnote 312: "Life of the Prince
+Consort," i., 99.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-313" id="note-313">
+<!-- Note Anchor 313 --></a>[Footnote 313: Chapter II., <a href=
+"#horton">p. 54</a>.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-314" id="note-314">
+<!-- Note Anchor 314 --></a>[Footnote 314: It is known, from two
+letters from Lord Palmerston to the Queen, published in the "Life
+of the Prince Consort," v., 100&mdash;in one, written before the
+debate in the House of Lords, he expresses a hope that the
+smallness of the majority in the House of Commons will encourage
+the Lords to throw it out, and he "is bound in duty to say that, if
+they do so, they will perform a good public service;" and in
+another, the day after the division in the Lords, he writes again
+"that they have done a right and useful thing," adding that the
+feeling of the public was so strong against the measure, that those
+in the gallery of the House are said to have joined in the cheers
+which broke out when the numbers were announced.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-315" id="note-315">
+<!-- Note Anchor 315 --></a>[Footnote 315: 433 to 36.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-316" id="note-316">
+<!-- Note Anchor 316 --></a>[Footnote 316: See the proceedings of
+1700 (Macaulay, "History of England," v., 278; and of 1704, Lord
+Stanhope's "Reign of Queen Anne," p. 168). The Whig and the Tory
+writer equally condemn the "Tackers."]</p>
+<p><a name="note-317" id="note-317">
+<!-- Note Anchor 317 --></a>[Footnote 317: In the debate on life
+peerages ("Parliamentary History," cxl., 356), Lord Grey spoke of
+"that great transfer of political power from one class to another
+which was accomplished by the Reform Bill" And Lord Campbell,
+speaking of Lord Grey himself in connection with that measure,
+says: "His Reform Bill ought to place him in a temple of British
+worthies by the side of Lord Somers, for it wisely remodelled the
+constitution, and it is hardly less important than the Bill of
+Rights."&mdash;<i>Life of Lord Campbell</i>, ii., 201.]</p>
+<p><a name="note-318" id="note-318">
+<!-- Note Anchor 318 --></a>[Footnote 318: A recent writer,
+professedly belonging to the Radical party, claims for it the
+credit of "being the legitimate issue of the Reform Bill of 1832."
+("The State of Parties," by J.E. Kebbel, <i>Nineteenth Century</i>,
+March, 1881, p. 497.)]</p>
+<hr />
+<a name="IDX" id="IDX"><!-- IDX --></a>
+<h2>INDEX.</h2>
+<pre>
+ABBOTT, Mr., proposes a census.
+Addington, Mr., becomes Prime-minister,  See Sidmouth.
+Additional Force Bill.
+Albert, Prince, marries Queen Victoria.
+Alien' Act, the.
+Althorp, Lord, introduces a bill for the reform of the Poor-laws;
+  his speech on the condition of Ireland;
+  invites the House of Commons to rescind a vote.
+Amelia, Princess, death of.
+Archdall, Mr., on Catholic Emancipation, note.
+Association, Catholic, suppression of.
+</pre>
+<pre>
+BAKER, Mr., moves a resolution on the dismissal of the Coalition
+  Ministry.
+Barrington, Lord, moves the expulsion of Wilkes.
+Battle, wager of, abolished.
+Bernard, trial of, as accomplice of Orsini.
+Bishoprics, provision for the increase of;
+  exclusion of the occupants of the junior bishoprics from the House of
+  Peers;
+  resignation of, by aged bishops.
+Blucher, Field-marshal, proposes to put Napoleon to death.
+Boston, United States, tea ships at, boarded by rioters, and the cargo
+  thrown into the sea.
+Bristol, Lord, denounces the appointment of the Chief-justice to a seat
+  in the cabinet.
+Brougham, Mr., afterward Lord Chancellor, the chief adviser of the
+  Queen;
+  defends the ministry for stopping Lord Powis's bill.
+Brownlow, Mr., opposes Pitt's commercial reforms.
+Buonaparte, Napoleon, detention of.
+Burdett, Sir F., carries a motion for repeal of Roman Catholic
+  disabilities.
+Burke, Mr. B., opposes the expulsion of Wilkes;
+  supports Mr. Grenville's act;
+  complains of the insolence of the House of Peers;
+  supports the repeal of the bill for taxing the American Colonies;
+  on annual Parliaments;
+  brings in a bill for economical reform;
+  his "short account of a late administration";
+  asserts the right of the House of Peers to examine the public
+  accounts;
+  his violent language on the Regency Bill;
+  member of Lord Rockingham's second ministry;
+  his view of the attachment of the Colonies to England.
+Bute, Earl of, Prime-minister in 1762;
+  resigns office.
+</pre>
+<pre>
+CABINET, character of.
+Camden, Earl of, approves the resolution of the House of Commons;
+  opposes the Royal Marriage Act;
+  supports Lord Chatham's views on the American question;
+  moves the Regency bill of 1788.
+Campbell, Lord, his "Lives of the Chancellors" referred to;
+  his denunciation of the Declaratory Act;
+  and of the Regency bill;
+  on the Chief-justice in the cabinet.
+Canada, disquietude in;
+  union of the two provinces.
+Canning, Lord, grants the right of adoption to the Hindoo feudatories.
+Canning, Mr. G., attacks the appointment of the Chief-justice to a seat
+  in the cabinet; becomes Prime-minister;
+  dies;
+  his opinion on the question in which House of Parliament the
+  Prime-minister should be.
+Caroline, Princess of Brunswick, marries the Prince of Wales;
+  investigations into her conduct;
+  she dies.
+Cave, Mr., punished for publishing reports of debates.
+Census established.
+Charlotte, Princess, birth of.
+Chartists, rise of;
+  outrages of, at Birmingham and Newport.
+Chatham, Earl of, Secretary of State in 1760;
+  Lord Privy Seal in 1767; supports Lord Rockingham's resolution on the
+  expulsion of Wilkes;
+  denies the power of the Parliament to tax America.
+Church reform, sketched out by Sir Robert Peel;
+  earned by Lord Melbourne's ministry.
+Clarence, Duke of, opposes the abolition of the slave trade;
+  his leaning toward the Whigs.
+Clarendon, Earl of, omits to reply to the despatch of the French
+  minister.
+Clergy, Roman Catholic, question of endowing the.
+Colborne, Sir John crushes the insurrection in Canada.
+Colonies, general grant of constitutions to, in New Zealand, the Cape,
+  and Australia.
+Commons, House of privileges of, with respect to money bills.
+Conventicle Act, repeal of.
+Conway, General, Secretary of State, introduces a bill of indemnity.
+Cornwallis, Lord, surrenders in America.
+Corporations, reform of.
+Crosby, Brass, Mr, Lord Mayor, commits a messenger of the House of
+  Commons, and is himself committed to the Tower.
+Cumberland, Duke of, marries Mrs Horton.
+Cust, Sir J, Speaker of the House of Commons.
+</pre>
+<pre>
+DASHWOOD, Sir F.,  his revels at Medmenham Abbey.
+Declaratory Act.
+De Grey, Mr, Attorney-general, supports the resolutions against Wilkes.
+Denbigh, Lord, defends the employment of Hanoverian troops at Gibraltar.
+Denman, Lord Chief justice, his charge to the jury in the case of
+  Stockdale v. Hansard.
+Disraeli, Mr B, his act for the trial of election petitions;
+  he denounces Sir Robert Peel for not resigning when defeated on the
+  sugar-duties;
+  condemns Lord Clarendon's omission to reply to the French despatch;
+  supports the House of Lords on the paper duties.
+Dowdeswell, Mr, opposes the Royal Marriage Act.
+Dundas, Mr, moves an amendment to Mr Dunning's resolution.
+Dunning, Mr, afterward Lord Ashburton, supports Mr Glenvilles act;
+  criticizes a resolution on the influence of the crown.
+Dunham, Lord, Governor of Canada.
+</pre>
+<pre>
+EDUCATION, influence of the penal laws on in Ireland.
+Eldon, Lord, on the coronation oath in connection with the Catholic
+  question;
+  on the detention of Napoleon;
+  on life peerages.
+Elgin, Lord, Governor general of Canada.
+Ellenborough, Lord, supports the Additional Force Bill;
+  becomes a member of the Cabinet;
+  is recalled from the government of India by the Company.
+Emancipation of Roman Catholics designed by Pitt;
+  concurred by the Duke of Wellington.
+Erskine, Lord, as Chancellor, presides over the impeachment of Lord
+  Melville;
+  resists Lord Sidmouth's Six Acts.
+</pre>
+<pre>
+FITZGERALD, LORD E., opposes the English government.
+Fitzgerald, Mr Vesey, is defeated in Clare.
+Fitzgibbon, Mr (afterward Lord Clare), opposes the convention of
+  delegates in Dublin;
+  Attorney-general in Ireland, prosecutes the sheriff of Dublin;
+  supports the Regency bill.
+Fitzwilliam, Earl, is dismissed from the Lord-lieutenancy of Yorkshire.
+Five Mile Act repealed.
+Fox, Mr C., opposes Mr Grenville's act;
+  on the privileges claimed by the House of Commons respecting
+  money-bills;
+  <i>note</i>, on Parliamentary reform and annual Parliaments;
+  urges the appointment as Prime-Minister of the Duke of Portland;
+  resigns office;
+  becomes Secretary of State;
+  his India Bill;
+  violence of his attacks on Pitt at the beginning of his ministry;
+  his opinions on Colonial policy;
+  denies the Prince's marriage;
+  opposes the Regency bill;
+  opposes the Alien Act and other bills;
+  opposes Pitt's commercial reforms;
+  becomes Secretary of State;
+  supports the abolition of the slave trade;
+  dies.
+France, new revolution in 1848.
+Franklin, Dr, is examined by the House of Commons on Mr Glenville's
+  measures of taxation.
+</pre>
+<pre>
+GEORGE III., state of affairs at the accession of;
+  illness of in 1764;
+  firmness in the Gordon riots;
+  becomes deranged;
+  is attacked on the street;
+  resists the relaxation of Catholic restrictions;
+  becomes permanently deranged;
+  dies;
+  character of his reign.
+George IV. succeeds to the throne.
+Gladstone, Mr W.E., opposes the fortification of the dockyards;
+  proposes to repeal the paper-duties;
+  carries the repeal of the paper-duties;
+  desires to weaken the power of the House of Lords.
+Gloucester, Duke of, marries Lady Waldegrave.
+Gordon, Lord George, the Gordon riots.
+Goulburn, Mr. H, is Chancellor of the Exchequer.
+Grafton, Duke of, Prime-minister in 1767;
+  disapproves of American taxation.
+Graham, Sir J., as Home-secretary, orders the opening of letters.
+Grampound disfranchised.
+Granville, Earl, defends life peerages.
+Grattan, Mr. H., moves the repeal of Poynings' Act;
+  opposes Pitt's commercial reforms;
+  opposes Pitt's Regency bill.
+Grenville, Mr. G., becomes Prime minister;
+  opposes the expulsion of Wilkes;
+  brings in a bill for the investigation of election petitions;
+  imposes taxes on the North American Colonies.
+Grenville, Lord, introduces the Alien Bill;
+  opposes the Additional Force Bill;
+  brings in a bill for the abolition of the slave trade;
+  refuses a seat in the cabinet in 1812.
+Grey, Mr. (afterward Earl), opposes the Regency bill;
+  opposes the Alien Act;
+  opposes the union with Ireland;
+  proposes to diminish the number of members of the House of Commons;
+  opposes the abolition of slavery;
+  refuses a seat in the cabinet in 1812;
+  becomes Prime minister;
+  his ministry brings in Reform Bill;
+  defends a proposed creation of peers;
+  mentions the sovereign's opinion unconstitutionally;
+  letters from office.
+Grey, Earl (son of the preceding), his doctrine on the true principles
+  of colonial government;
+  on life peerages.
+Gower, Lord F.L., carries a resolution for the endowment of the Roman
+  Catholic clergy.
+Girizot, M., Foreign Secretary in France.
+</pre>
+<pre>
+HALIFAX, Earl of, issues a general warrant against the publishers, etc.,
+  of <i>The North Briton</i>.
+Hanoverian troops, employment of, at Gibraltar.
+Hansard, Mr., publishes the Parliamentary debates.
+Hardy, General, taken prisoner by Sir J. Warren.
+Hill, Mr. Roland, proposes a reform of the Post-office.
+Hillsborough, Lord, writes a circular letter to the North American
+  Colonies.
+Hoche, General, sails for Ireland.
+Holdernesse, Earl of, Secretary of State in 1760.
+Holland, Lord, opposes the Regency Bill.
+Holt, Chief justice, his decision on the question of slavery.
+Holsmann, Mr., supports the House of Lords on the paper duties.
+Humbert, General, taken prisoner in Mayo.
+</pre>
+<pre>
+INDIA, Fox's India Bill;
+  Pitt's India Bill;
+  Mutiny in;
+  transfer of the authority of the Company to the crown;
+  establishment of the Order of the Star of India;
+  is visited by the Prince of Wales.
+Ireland, affairs of;
+  connection with France;
+  rebellion in.
+</pre>
+<pre>
+JAMAICA, planters in, compensated for the diminution of the value
+  of their property by the abolition of slavery;
+  disturbances in;
+  its constitution is suspended.
+Judges, new tenure of their office.
+</pre>
+<pre>
+KING, the, cannot be a witness in any legal proceeding.
+</pre>
+<pre>
+LABOUCHERE, Mr. H., reproaches Sir Robert Peel for not resigning.
+Leopold, King of Belgium, points of the insufficiency of the description
+  of Prince Albert.
+Lewis, Sir. G.C., speech on the history and power of the East India
+  Company.
+Liverpool, Lord, earnest for the universal abolition of the slave trade;
+  becomes Prime minister;
+  makes the Catholic question an open question in the cabinet;
+  brings in, and subsequently withdraws, a "Bill of Pains and
+  Penalties";
+  against the Queen;
+  attacked by apoplexy and dies;
+  contemplates an increased grant to Maynooth.
+Lopes, Sir M., procures the return of Mr. Pool for Westbury.
+Louise, Princess, marriage of.
+Lowther, Sir John, obtains a grant of Inglewood Forest.
+Luttrell, Mr., is declared elected for Middlesex.
+Lyndhurst, Lord, carries an amendment on the Reform Bill;
+  introduces a Regency bill.
+</pre>
+<pre>
+MACINTOSH, Sir J., applies himself to mitigate the severity of the law.
+Mahon, Lord, brings in a bill to diminish the expenses of elections.
+Mansfield, Lord, condemns general warrants;
+  insists on the necessity of a bill of indemnity;
+  vindicates the supremacy of Parliament;
+  his house is burnt by the rioters in 1780.
+Martin, Mr., wounds Wilkes in a duel.
+Massachusetts, riots in.
+Maynooth, foundation of a college at;
+  is enlarged and more fully endowed.
+Melbourne, Lord, becomes Prime-minister;
+  resigns;
+  resumes office;
+  mismanages the arrangements for Prince Albert.
+Melville, Lord, is impeached.
+Metternich, Prince, is driven from Vienna.
+Miles, Mr., defeats the government on the sugar-duties.
+Moira, Lord, employed by the Regent to negotiate with the Whig leaders
+  in 1812.
+Money-bills, power of the House of Lords as to.
+Montesquieu, M. de, his opinion of the English constitution.
+Montmorin, M., Wilberforce writes to him on the subject of the
+  slave-trade.
+</pre>
+<pre>
+NAPOLEON, Louis, is elected President of the French Republic;
+  his <i>coup d'&eacute;tat</i>;
+  conspiracy against.
+Navigation laws, the, repeal of.
+Nelson, Lord, his victory at Copenhagen.
+Newcastle, Duke of, Prime minister in 1760.
+New Shoreham, disfranchisement of for bribery.
+Newspapers, tax on, reduced and afterward abolished.
+Nicholas, Emperor of Russia, writes to the Queen.
+Normanby, Lord, ambassador in Paris, complains of Lord Palmerston.
+North, Lord, supports the decision in favor of Mr. Luttrell;
+  opposes Mr. Grenville's act;
+  opposes Mr. Seymour's bill to limit the <i>Nullum Tempus</i> Act;
+  opposes reform of Parliament;
+  rejects the demands of Ireland.
+Northington, Lord C., defends the embargo on corn;
+  indicates the supremacy of Parliament.
+<i>Nullum Tempus</i> Act, the, extended.
+</pre>
+<pre>
+O'CONNELL, Mr. D., is returned for Clare;
+  is chief of the Catholic Association.
+Octennial act for Ireland.
+"Olive Branch, the,"
+Onslow, Colonel, complains of the publication of the debates.
+Orsini, conspiracy of.
+</pre>
+<pre>
+PALMERSTON, Lord, is dismissed from the Foreign-office;
+  introduces the bill for the transfer of the government of India to
+  the crown;
+  writes to the Queen on the abolition of the authority of the East
+  India Company;
+  is defeated on the Conspiracy Bill and resigns;
+  returns to office;
+  disapproves of the reduction of the paper-duty;
+  desires to uphold the House of Lords.
+Papineau. M., organizes an insurrection in Canada.
+Parke, Sir J., is created a peer for life.
+Parliament, first meeting of the United.
+Peel, Sir Robert, responsible for the change of ministry in 1834;
+  becomes Home-secretary;
+  resigns his seat for Oxford and fails to be re-elected;
+  impropriety of his resignation;
+  speech on introducing the bill for Catholic Emancipation;
+  becomes Prime-minister;
+  declines to form an administration in 1839;
+  supports Lord J. Russell's resolutions in the case of Stockdale <i>v.</i>
+  Hansard;
+  his opinion on the question in which House the Prime-minister should
+  be;
+  becomes Prime-minister in 1841;
+  revises the commercial tariff;
+  suspends the Corn-law;
+  causes its abolition.
+Peel, Colonel, organizes the Volunteers.
+Peerages, life, legality of.
+Peers, the House of, strikes out of a corn bill some clauses giving
+  bounties;
+  their right to inquire into the public expenditure asserted by Lord
+  Camden and others;
+  their privileges as to money-bills;
+  provisions as to Irish peers in the Act of Union;
+  proposed creation of peers to carry the Reform Bill considered;
+  the House of Peers rejects the abolition of the paper-duty.
+Penal laws, in Ireland;
+  repeal of;
+  in the United Kingdom.
+Penu, Mr., sent from America to England with "the Olive Branch."
+Perceval, Mr., becomes Prime-minister;
+  proposes a Regency bill;
+  is murdered.
+Percy, Lord, proposes the entire abolition of slavery.
+Persigny, M. de, French Secretary of State, his despatch on Orsini's
+  conspiracy.
+Pigott, Sir A., brings in a bill on the slave-trade.
+Pitt, see Earl of Chatham.
+Pitt, Mr. T., denounces the influence of the crown.
+Pitt, Mr. W., on the privileges of House of Commons respecting
+  money-bills;
+  <i>note</i>;
+  becomes Prime-minister;
+  his long struggle against, and eventual defeat of the Opposition;
+  comparisons between his father and him;
+  his India bill;
+  his Quebec bill;
+  his Regency bill;
+  founds Maynouth;
+  carries the Irish Union;
+  resigns on the Catholic question.
+Plunkett, Mr., opposes the Irish Union.
+Ponsonby, Mr. G., condemns the policy of open questions.
+Poor-law, the, reform of.
+Portland, Duke of, becomes Prime-minister;
+  again.
+Post-office, reform of;
+  letters opened by the order of the Secretary of State.
+Powis, Earl, brings in a bill to preserve the Welsh sees.
+Pownall, Governor, introduces a corn bill.
+Poynings' Act;
+  repeal of.
+</pre>
+<pre>
+RADETSKY, MARSHAL, his campaign in North Italy.
+Reform of Parliament, Alderman Sawbridge proposes a measure of;
+  Mr. Pitt brings in a bill for;
+  agitation for, in 1818;
+  introduced and carried by Lord Grey's administration;
+  the people indifferent to farther reform.
+Regency bill of 1764;
+  of 1840;
+  former Regency bills had been passed in the reigns of Edward III.,
+  Richard II., Henry VI., and George II.;
+  in Ireland;
+  bill of 1810.
+Registration, extension of, 342.
+Rice, Mr. Spring, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, introduces
+  Post-office reform;
+  as Lord Monteagle proposes the rejection of the paper-duty bill.
+Roberts, Mr., returning officer for New Shoreham.
+Rochfort, Lord, introduces the Royal Marriage Act.
+Rockingham, Marquis of, Prime-minister in 1768;
+  moves a resolution condemning the proceedings against Wilkes;
+  Prime-minister a second time;
+  repeals the American taxes;
+  disapproves of the employment of Hanoverian troops at Gibraltar;
+  wisdom of his policy toward America;
+  his speech on the influence of the crown;
+  becomes Prime-minister a second time.
+Rolle, Mr., moots the question of the Prince's marriage.
+Romilly, Sir S., opposes the Regency bill;
+  applies himself to reforms of the law.
+Rose, Mr., opposes Sir A. Pigott's bill on the slave-trade.
+Russell, Lord J., his opinion on Fox's conduct in Opposition;
+  on the Regency bill;
+  carries the repeal of the Test Act;
+  introduces the Reform Bill;
+  introduces a bill for municipal reform;
+  his resolutions in the case of Stockdale v. Hansard;
+  becomes Prime&mdash;minister.
+Russia, war with.
+</pre>
+<pre>
+SANDWICH, EARL OF, denounces Wilkes's "Essay on Woman."
+Sarsfield, General, takes refuge in France.
+Savile, Sir G., his bill for the limitation of the <i>Nullum Tempus</i> Act.
+Seaforth, Lord, reports of the treatment of slaves in Barbadoes.
+Seditious Meetings Act.
+Shelburne, Lord, denounces the employment of Hanoverian troops at
+  Gibraltar;
+  becomes Prime-minister.
+Sheridan, Mr. R., his language on the Prince's marriage;
+  opposes the Alien Act;
+  conceals Lord Yarmouth's intention to resign.
+Sidmouth, Lord, as Home-secretary, introduces six bills for the
+  suppression of sedition;
+  resigns office.
+Slavery, abolition of.
+Slave-trade, abolition of.
+Smith, Mr. W., M.P. for Norwich, on repeal of the Five Mile Act.
+Somersett, is released by Lord Mansfield.
+Stamp Act, imposed on the American Colonies by Mr. Grenville;
+  repealed by Lord Rockingham.
+Stanley, Mr., afterward Lord, and afterward Lord Derby, denounces the
+  Catholic Association;
+  brings in a bill for the abolition of slavery;
+  fails in the attempt to form a ministry in 1845;
+  becomes Prime-minister in 1852;
+  proposes a committee on life peerages;
+  becomes Prime-minister;
+  resigns.
+St. Vincent, Lord, opposes the abolition of the slave-trade.
+Stockdale, Mr., brings an action against Messrs. Hansard.
+Sugar-duties, Sir Robert Peel's ministry is defeated on a reduction of.
+Sussex, Duke of, protests against some clauses of the Regency Act.
+Sydenham, Lord, Governor-general of Canada.
+</pre>
+<pre>
+TANDY, NAPPER, proposes a congress.
+Temple, Earl, his interview with George III.
+Test and Corporation Acts are repealed.
+Thurlow, Mr., afterward Lord Chancellor, on the case of Wilkes;
+  defends the employment of Hanoverian troops at Gibraltar;
+  denounces Fox's India Bill;
+  approves of the King's employment of Lord Temple.
+Tone, Wolfe, commits suicide.
+Townsend, Lord, Lord-lieutenant of Ireland.
+Townsend, Mr. C., re-imposes taxes on North America.
+Traitorous Correspondence Bill.
+Troy, Dr., petitions for a Roman Catholic college in Ireland.
+</pre>
+<pre>
+UNION, the Irish.
+Union with Scotland, obstacles to, and advantages resulting from.
+</pre>
+<pre>
+VICTORIA, Queen, succeeds to the throne;
+  marries;
+  her careful exercise of her duties;
+  draws up a memorandum for the guidance of the ministers;
+  writes to foreign sovereigns.
+Victoria, the province of, grant of a constitution to.
+Villiers, Mr. C., advocates the repeal of the Corn-laws.
+Volunteers, rise of the Irish, 158; rise of the English.
+</pre>
+<pre>
+WALES, Prince or, son of George III., his conduct and establishment;
+  marries Mrs. Fitzherbert;
+  is attacked in the streets;
+  See George IV.
+Wales, Prince of, son of the Queen, visits India.
+Walpole, Sir R., the case of;
+  on election petitions;
+  refuses to repeal the Test Act;
+  his general policy.
+Walpole, Mr. Spencer, supports the Conspiracy Bill.
+Warburton, Bishop of Gloucester, denounces Wilkes.
+Ward, Mr., his motion on the appropriation of Church funds.
+Wedderburn, Mr., on the case of Wilkes;
+  supports Mr. Grenville's act;
+  his opinion on the Riot Act;
+  the chief legal adviser of the Prince of Wales;
+  suggests the Traitorous Correspondence Bill;
+  excites the King to resist the removal of Catholic disabilities.
+Wellesley, Marquis, proposed to be appointed Prime-minister.
+Wellington, Lord, afterward Duke of, his victories in the Peninsula and
+  in France;
+  becomes Commander-in-chief;
+  advises the King to decline dining with the Lord Mayor;
+  fails in the endeavor to form an administration;
+  becomes temporary Prime-minister, holding several offices;
+  condemns the recall of Lord Ellenborough.
+Westmoreland, Lord, opposes the abolition of the slave-trade.
+Wetherall, Sir Charles, is attacked at Bristol.
+Weymouth, Lord, Secretary of State, writes a letter to the Surrey
+  magistrates.
+Whately, Archbishop, his opinion on the Lord-lieutenancy of Ireland;
+  <i>note</i>.
+Whitbread, Mr., promotes the impeachment of Lord Melville.
+Wilberforce, Mr. W., proposes the admission of Roman Catholics to the
+  militia;
+  devotes himself to the abolition of the slave-trade.
+Wilkes, Mr., sets up <i>The North Briton</i>;
+  criticises the King's speech;
+  is apprehended;
+  is expelled the House of Commons for printing the "Essay on Woman;"
+  is elected for Middlesex, expelled, and re-elected;
+  as Lord Mayor behaves with spirit during the Gordon riots;
+  procures the expunction of the resolutions against him.
+William IV., his conduct on the Reform Bill;
+  dies.
+Windham, Mr., brings in a bill for reenforcing the army.
+Wolseley, Sir C., is elected M.P. by a Birmingham convention.
+</pre>
+<pre>
+YARMOUTH, Earl of, Lord Chamberlain.
+</pre>
+<center>THE END.</center>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Constitutional History of England
+From 1760 to 1860, by Charles Duke Yonge
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diff --git a/old/10807.txt b/old/10807.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..5bc2ee1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/old/10807.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,17091 @@
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Constitutional History of England From
+1760 to 1860, by Charles Duke Yonge
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Constitutional History of England From 1760 to 1860
+
+Author: Charles Duke Yonge
+
+Release Date: January 23, 2004 [EBook #10807]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HISTORY OF ENGLAND ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Ted Garvin, David King, and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team
+
+
+
+
+
+THE
+
+CONSTITUTIONAL HISTORY
+
+OF
+
+ENGLAND
+
+from 1760 to 1860
+
+BY CHARLES DUKE YONGE, M.A.
+REGIUS PROFESSOR OF MODERN HISTORY, QUEEN'S COLLEGE, BELFAST
+AND AUTHOR OF "THE HISTORY OF THE BRITISH NAVY"
+"THE LIFE OF MARIE ANTOINETTE" ETC.
+
+
+1882
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+Mr. Hallam's "Constitutional History" closes, as is well known, with the
+death of George II. The Reformation, the great Rebellion, and the
+Revolution, all of which are embraced in the period of which it treats,
+are events of such surpassing importance, and such all-pervading and
+lasting influence, that no subsequent transactions can ever attract
+entirely equal attention. Yet the century which has elapsed since the
+accession of George III. has also witnessed occurrences not only full of
+exciting interest at the moment, but calculated to affect the policy of
+the kingdom and the condition of the people, for all future time, in a
+degree only second to the Revolution itself. Indeed, the change in some
+leading features and principles of the constitution wrought by the
+Reform Bill of 1832, exceeds any that were enacted by the Bill of Rights
+or the Act of Settlement. The only absolutely new principle introduced
+in 1688 was that establishment of Protestant ascendency which was
+contained in the clause which disabled any Roman Catholic from wearing
+the crown. In other respects, those great statutes were not so much the
+introduction of new principles, as a recognition of privileges of the
+people which had been long established, but which, in too many
+instances, had been disregarded and violated.
+
+But the Reform Bill conferred political power on classes which had never
+before been admitted to be entitled to it; and their enfranchisement
+could not fail to give a wholly new and democratic tinge to the
+government, which has been visible in its effect on the policy of all
+subsequent administrations.
+
+And, besides this great measure, the passing of which has often been
+called a new Revolution, and the other reforms, municipal and
+ecclesiastical, which were its immediate and almost inevitable fruits,
+the century which followed the accession of George III. was also marked
+by the Irish Union, the abolition of slavery, the establishment of the
+principle of universal religious toleration; the loss of one great
+collection of colonies, the plantation of and grant of constitutions to
+others of not inferior magnitude, which had not even come into existence
+at its commencement; the growth of our wondrous dominion in India, with
+its eventual transfer of all authority in that country to the crown;
+with a host of minor transactions and enactments, which must all be
+regarded as, more or less, so many changes in or developments of the
+constitution, as it was regarded and understood by the statesmen of the
+seventeenth century.
+
+It has seemed, therefore, to the compiler of this volume, that a
+narrative of these transactions in their historical sequence, so as to
+exhibit the connection which has frequently existed between them; to
+show, for instance, how the repeal of Poynings' Act, and the Regency
+Bill of 1788, necessitated the Irish Union; how Catholic Emancipation
+brought after it Parliamentary Reform, and how that led to municipal and
+ecclesiastical reforms, might not be without interest and use at the
+present time. And the modern fulness of our parliamentary reports
+(itself one not unimportant reform and novelty), since the accession of
+George III., has enabled him to give the inducements or the objections
+to the different enactments in the very words of the legislators who
+proposed them or resisted them, as often as it seemed desirable to do
+so.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+Mr. Hallam's View of the Development of the Constitution.--Symptoms of
+approaching Constitutional Changes.--State of the Kingdom at the
+Accession of George III.--Improvement of the Law affecting the
+Commissions of the Judges.--Restoration of Peace.--Lord Bute becomes
+Minister.--The Case of Wilkes.--Mr. Luttrell is Seated for Middlesex by
+the House of Commons.--Growth of Parliamentary Reporting.--Mr.
+Grenville's Act for trying Election Petitions.--Disfranchisement of
+Corrupt Voters at New Shoreham.
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+The Regency Bill.--The Ministry of 1766 lay an Embargo on Corn.--An Act
+of Indemnity is Passed.--The _Nullum Tempus_ Act concerning Crown
+Property; it is sought to Extend it to Church Property, but the Attempt
+fails.--The Royal Marriage Act.--The Lords amend a Bill imposing Export
+Duties, etc., on Corn.
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+Mr. Grenville imposes a Duty on Stamps in the North American
+Colonies.--Examination of Dr. Franklin.--Lord Rockingham's Ministry
+Repeals the Duty.--Lord Mansfield affirms a Virtual Representation in
+the Colonies.--Mr. C. Townsend imposes Import Duties in America.--After
+some Years, the Civil War breaks out.--Hanoverian Troops are sent to
+Gibraltar.--The Employment of Hanoverian Regiments at Gibraltar and
+Minorca.--End of the War.--Colonial Policy of the Present
+Reign.--Complaints of the Undue Influence of the Crown.--Motions for
+Parliamentary Reform.--Mr. Burke's Bill for Economical Reform.--Mr.
+Dunning's Resolution on the Influence of the Crown.--Rights of the Lords
+on Money-bills.--The Gordon Riots.
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+Changes of Administration.--The Coalition Ministry.--The Establishment
+of the Prince of Wales.--Fox's India Bill.--The King Defeats it by the
+Agency of Lord Temple.--The Ministry is Dismissed, and Succeeded by Mr.
+Pitt's Administration.--Opposition to the New Ministry in the House of
+Commons.--Merits of the Contest between the Old and the New
+Ministry.--Power of Pitt.--Pitt's India Bill.--Bill for the Government
+of Canada.--The Marriage of the Prince of Wales to Mrs.
+Fitzherbert.--The King becomes Deranged.--Proposal of a
+Regency.--Opinions of Various Writers on the Course adopted.--Spread of
+Revolutionary Societies and Opinions.--Bills for the Repression of
+Sedition and Treason.--The Alien Act.--The Traitorous Correspondence
+Act.--Treason and Sedition Bills.--Failure of some Prosecutions under
+them.
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+The Affairs of Ireland.--Condition of the Irish Parliament.--The
+Octennial Bill.--The Penal Laws.--Non-residence of the Lord-
+lieutenant.--Influence of the American War on Ireland.--Enrolment of the
+Volunteers.--Concession of all the Demands of Ireland.--Violence of the
+Volunteers.--Their Convention.--Violence of the Opposition in
+Parliament: Mr. Brownlow, Mr. Grattan, Mr. Flood.--Pitt's Propositions
+Fail.--Fitzgibbon's Conspiracy Bill.--Regency Question.--Recovery of the
+King.--Question of a Legislative Union.--Establishment of Maynooth
+College.--Lord Edward Fitzgerald.--Arguments for and against the
+Union.--It passes the Irish Parliament.--Details of the Measure.--
+General Character of the Union.--Circumstances which Prevented
+its Completeness.
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+A Census is Ordered.--Dissolution of Pitt's Administration.--Impeachment
+of Lord Melville.--Introduction of Lord Ellenborough into the
+Cabinet.--Abolition of the Slave-trade.--Mr. Windham's Compulsory
+Training Bill.--Illness of the King, and Regency.--Recurrence to the
+Precedent of 1788-'89.--Death of Mr. Perceval.--Lord Liverpool becomes
+Prime-minister.--Question of Appointments in the Household.--Appointment
+of a Prime-minister.
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+The Toleration Act.--Impropriety of making Catholic Emancipation (or any
+other Important Matter) an Open Question.--Joint Responsibility of all
+the Ministers.--Detention of Napoleon at St. Helena.--Question whether
+the Regent could Give Evidence in a Court of Law in a Civil
+Action.--Agitation for Reform.--Public Meetings.--The Manchester
+Meeting.--The Seditious Meetings Prevention Bill.--Lord Sidmouth's Six
+Acts.
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+Survey of the Reign of George III.--The Cato Street Conspiracy.--The
+Queen's Return to England, and the Proceedings against her.--The King
+Visits Ireland and Scotland.--Reform of the Criminal Code.--Freedom of
+Trade.--Death of Lord Liverpool.--The Duke of Wellington becomes
+Prime-minister.--Repeal of the Test and Corporation Act.--O'Connell is
+Elected for Clare.--Peel Resigns his Seat for Oxford.--Catholic
+Emancipation.--Question of the Endowment of the Roman Catholic
+Clergy.--Constitutional Character of the Emancipation.--The Propriety of
+Mr. Peel's Resignation of his Seat for Oxford Questioned.
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+Demand for Parliamentary Reform.--Death of George IV., and Accession of
+William IV.--French Revolution of 1830.--Growing Feeling in Favor of
+Reform.--Duke of Wellington's Declaration against Reform.--His
+Resignation: Lord Grey becomes Prime-minister.--Introduction of the
+Reform Bill.--Its Details.--Riots at Bristol and Nottingham.--Proposed
+Creation of Peers.--The King's Message to the Peers.--Character and
+Consequences of the Reform Bill.--Appointment of a Regency.--
+Re-arrangement of the Civil List.
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+Abolition of Slavery.--Abridgment of the Apprenticeship.--The East India
+Company's Trade is Thrown Open.--Commencement of Ecclesiastical
+Reforms.--The New Poor-law.--State of Ireland.--Agitation against
+Tithes.--Coercion Bill.--Beginning of Church Reform.--Sir Robert Peel
+becomes Prime-minister.--Variety of Offices held Provisionally by the
+Duke of Wellington.--Sir Robert Peel Retires, and Lord Melbourne Resumes
+the Government.--Sir Robert Peel Proposes a Measure of Church
+Reform.--Municipal Reform.--Measures of Ecclesiastical Reform.
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+Death of William IV., and Accession of Queen Victoria.--Rise of the
+Chartists.--Resignation of Lord Melbourne in 1839, and his Resumption of
+Office.--Marriage of the Queen, and Consequent Arrangements.--The
+Precedence of the Prince, etc.--Post-office Reform.--War in
+Afghanistan.--Discontent in Jamaica.--Insurrection in Canada.--New
+Constitution for Canada and other Colonies.--Case of Stockdale and
+Hansard.
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+Sir Robert Peel becomes Prime-minister.--Commercial
+Reforms.--Free-trade.--Religious Toleration.--Maynooth.--The Queen's
+University.--Post-office Regulations.--The Opening of Letters.--
+Naturalization of Aliens.--Recall of Lord Ellenborough.--Reversal of the
+Vote on the Sugar Duties.--Refusal of the Crown to Sanction a Bill.--The
+Question of Increase in the Number of Spiritual Peers.--Repeal of the
+Corn-laws.--Revolution in France, and Agitation on the Continent.--Death
+of Sir Robert Peel.--Indifference of the Country to Reform.--Repeal of
+the Navigation Laws.--Resolutions in Favor of Free-trade.--The Great
+Exhibition of 1851.
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+Dismissal of Lord Palmerston.--Theory of the Relation between the
+Sovereign and the Cabinet.--Correspondence of the Sovereign with French
+Princes.--Russian War.--Abolition of the Tax on Newspapers.--Life
+Peerages.--Resignation of two Bishops.--Indian Mutiny.--Abolition of the
+Sovereign Power of the Company.--Visit of the Prince of Wales to
+India.--Conspiracy Bill.--Rise of the Volunteers.--National
+Fortifications.--The Lords Reject the Measure for the Repeal of the
+Paper-duties.--Lord Palmerston's Resolutions.--Character of the Changes
+during the last Century.
+
+
+INDEX.
+
+
+
+
+CONSTITUTIONAL HISTORY OF ENGLAND.
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+
+Mr. Hallam's View of the Development of the Constitution.--Symptoms of
+approaching Constitutional Changes.--State of the Kingdom at the
+Accession of George III.--Improvement of the Law affecting the
+Commissions of the Judges.--Restoration of Peace.--Lord Bute becomes
+Minister.--The Case of Wilkes.--Mr. Luttrell is Seated for Middlesex by
+the House of Commons.--Growth of Parliamentary Reporting.--Mr.
+Grenville's Act for trying Election Petitions.--Disfranchisement of
+Corrupt Voters at New Shoreham.
+
+
+The learned and judicious writer to whom is due the first idea of a
+"Constitutional History of England," and of whose admirable work I here
+venture to offer a continuation, regards "the spirit of the government"
+as having been "almost wholly monarchical till the Revolution of 1688,"
+and in the four subsequent reigns, with the last of which his volumes
+close, as "having turned chiefly to an aristocracy."[1] And it may be
+considered as having generally preserved that character through the long
+and eventful reign of George III. But, even while he was writing, a
+change was already preparing, of which more than one recent occurrence
+had given unmistakable warning. A borough had been disfranchised for
+inveterate corruption in the first Parliament of George IV.[2] Before
+its dissolution, the same House of Commons had sanctioned the principle
+of a state endowment of the Roman Catholic clergy in Ireland, and had
+given a third reading to a bill for the abolition of all civil
+restrictions affecting members of that religion. It was impossible to
+avoid foreseeing that the Parliamentary Reform inaugurated by the
+disfranchisement of Grampound would soon be carried farther, or that the
+emancipation, as it was termed, of all Christian sects was at least
+equally certain not to be long delayed. And it will be denied by no one
+that those measures, which had no very obscure or doubtful connection
+with each other, have gradually imparted to the constitution a far more
+democratic tinge than would have been willingly accepted by even the
+most liberal statesman of the preceding century, or than, in the days of
+the Tudors or of the Stuarts, would have been thought compatible with
+the maintenance of the monarchy.
+
+When George III. came to the throne, he found the nation engaged in a
+war which was occupying its arms not only on the Continent of Europe,
+but in India and America also, and was extending her glory and her
+substantial power in both hemispheres. _Inter arma silent leges_. And,
+while the contest lasted, neither legislators in Parliament nor the
+people outside had much attention to spare for matters of domestic
+policy. Yet the first year of the new reign was not suffered to pass
+without the introduction of one measure limiting the royal prerogative
+in a matter of paramount importance to the liberty of the people, the
+independence of the judges. The rule of making the commissions of the
+judges depend on their good conduct instead of on the pleasure of the
+crown had, indeed, been established at the Revolution; but it was still
+held that these commissions expired with the life of the sovereign who
+had granted them; and, at the accession of Anne, as also at that of
+George II., a renewal of their commissions had been withheld from some
+members of the judicial bench. But now, even before the dissolution of
+the existing Parliament, the new King recommended to it such a change in
+the law as should "secure the judges in the enjoyment of their offices
+during their good behavior, notwithstanding any demise of the crown;"
+giving the proposal, which was understood to have been originally
+suggested by himself, additional weight by the very unusual step of
+making it the subject of a speech to the two Houses in the middle of the
+session. A bill to give effect to it was at once brought in, and, though
+the Houses sat only a fortnight longer, was carried before the
+dissolution.
+
+The close of the year 1762, however, saw the restoration of peace; and
+the circumstances connected with the treaty which re-established it gave
+birth to a degree of political and constitutional excitement such as had
+not agitated the kingdom for more than half a century. That treaty had
+not been concluded by the minister who had conducted the war. When
+George III. came to the throne he found the Duke of Newcastle presiding
+at the Treasury, but the seals of one Secretary of State in the hands of
+Mr. Pitt, who was universally regarded as the guiding genius of the
+ministry. The other Secretary of State was Lord Holdernesse. But, in the
+spring of 1761, as soon as the Parliament was dissolved,[3] that
+statesman retired from office, and was succeeded by the Earl of Bute, a
+Scotch nobleman, who stood high in the favor of the King's mother, the
+Princess Dowager of Wales, but who had not till very recently been
+supposed to be actuated by political ambition, and who was still less
+suspected of any statesman-like ability to qualify him for the office to
+which he was thus promoted. It was presently seen, however, that he
+aspired to even higher dignity. He at once set himself to oppose Pitt's
+warlike policy; and, on the question of declaring war against Spain, he
+was so successful in inducing the rest of the cabinet to reject Pitt's
+proposals, that that statesman resigned his office in unconcealed
+indignation. Having got rid of the real master of the ministry, Bute's
+next step was to get rid of its nominal chief, and in the spring of 1762
+he managed to drive the Duke of Newcastle from the Treasury, and was
+himself placed by the King at the head of the administration. So rapid
+an elevation of a man previously unknown as a politician could hardly
+fail to create very widespread dissatisfaction, which was in some degree
+augmented by the nationality of the new minister. Lord Bute was a
+Scotchman, and Englishmen had not wholly forgiven or forgotten the
+Scotch invasion of 1745. Since that time the Scotch had been regarded
+with general disfavor; Scotch poverty and Scotch greediness for the good
+things of England had furnished constant topics for raillery and
+sarcasm; and more than one demagogue and political writer had sought
+popularity by pandering to the prevailing taste for attacks on the whole
+nation. Foremost among these was Mr. John Wilkes, member for Aylesbury,
+a man of broken fortunes and still more damaged character, but of a wit
+and hardihood that made his society acceptable to some of high rank and
+lax morality, and caused his political alliance to be courted by some
+who desired to be regarded as leaders of a party; many of the
+transactions of the late reign having, unfortunately, not been favorable
+to the maintenance of any high standard of either public or private
+virtue. On Lord Bute's accession to office, Wilkes had set up a
+periodical paper, whose object and character were sufficiently indicated
+by its title, _The North Briton_, and in which the diligence of Lord
+Bute in distributing places among his kinsmen and countrymen furnished
+the staple of almost every number; while in many the Princess of Wales
+herself was not spared, as the cause, for motives not obscurely hinted
+at, of his sudden elevation. So pertinacious and virulent were the
+attacks thus launched at him, coinciding as they did, at least in one
+point, with the prejudices of the multitude, that they were commonly
+believed to have had some share in driving Lord Bute from office, which,
+in the spring of 1763, he suddenly resigned, hoping, as it might almost
+seem, thus to throw on his successor the burden of defending his
+measures. The most important of these measures had been the conclusion
+of the Treaty of Versailles, which, when it was first announced to
+Parliament, had been vehemently attacked in both Houses by Pitt and his
+followers, but had been approved by large majorities. Wilkes, however,
+not without reason, believed it to be still unpopular with the nation at
+large, and, flushed with his supposed victory over Lord Bute, was
+watching eagerly for some occasion of re-opening the question, when such
+an opportunity was afforded him by the King's speech at the prorogation
+of the Parliament, which took place a few days after Lord Bute's
+resignation.
+
+Lord Bute had been succeeded by Mr. George Grenville, who had for a time
+been one of his colleagues as Secretary of State; and on him, therefore,
+the duty devolved of framing the royal speech the opening sentences of
+which referred to "the re-establishment of peace" in terms of warm
+self-congratulation, as having been effected "upon conditions honorable
+to the crown and beneficial to the people." Wilkes at once caught at
+this panegyric, as affording him just such an opportunity as he had been
+seeking of renewing his attacks on the government, which he regarded as
+changed in nothing but the name of the Prime-minister.[4] And, four days
+after the prorogation,[5] he accordingly issued a new number of _The
+North Briton_ (No. 45), in which he heaped unmeasured sarcasm and
+invective on the peace itself, on the royal speech, and on the minister
+who had composed it. As if conscious that Mr. Grenville was less
+inclined by temper than Lord Bute to suffer such attacks without
+endeavoring to retaliate, he took especial pains to keep within the law
+in his strictures, and, accordingly, carefully avoided saying a
+disrespectful word of the King himself, whom he described as "a prince
+of many great and amiable qualities," "ever renowned for truth, honor,
+and unsullied virtue." But he claimed a right to canvass the speech
+"with the utmost freedom," since "it had always been considered by the
+Legislature and by the public at large as the speech of the minister."
+And he kept this distinction carefully in view through the whole number.
+The speech he denounced with bitter vehemence, as "an abandoned instance
+of ministerial effrontery," as containing "the most unjustifiable public
+declarations" and "infamous fallacies." The peace he affirmed to be
+"such as had drawn down the contempt of mankind on our wretched
+negotiators." And he described the present minister as a mere tool of
+"the favorite," by whom "he still meditated to rule the kingdom with a
+rod of iron." But in the whole number there was but one sentence which
+could be represented as implying the very slightest censure on the King
+himself, and even that was qualified by a personal eulogy. "The King of
+England," it said, "is not only the first magistrate of the country, but
+is invested by the law with the whole executive power. He is, however,
+responsible to his people for the due execution of the royal functions
+in the choice of ministers, etc., equally with the meanest of his
+subjects in his particular duty. The personal character of our present
+amiable sovereign makes us easy and happy that so great a power is
+lodged in such hands; but the favorite has given too just cause for him
+to escape the general odium. The prerogative of the crown is to exert
+the constitutional power intrusted to it in such a way, not of blind
+favor and partiality, but of wisdom and judgment. This is the spirit of
+our constitution. The people, too, have their prerogative; and I hope
+the fine words of Dryden will be engraven on our hearts, 'Freedom is the
+English subject's prerogative.'"
+
+These were the last sentences of No. 45. And in the present day it will
+hardly be thought that, however severe or even violent some of the
+epithets with which certain sentences of the royal speech were assailed
+may have been, the language exceeds the bounds of allowable political
+criticism. With respect to the King, indeed, however accompanied with
+personal compliments to himself those strictures may have been, it may
+be admitted that in asserting any responsibility whatever to the people
+on the part of the sovereign, even for the choice of his ministers, as
+being bound to exercise that choice "with wisdom and judgment," it goes
+somewhat beyond the strict theory of the constitution. Undoubtedly that
+theory is, that the minister chosen by the King is himself responsible
+for every circumstance or act which led to his appointment. This
+principle was established in the fullest manner in 1834, when, as will
+be seen hereafter, Sir Robert Peel admitted his entire responsibility
+for the dismissal of Lord Melbourne by King William IV., though it was
+notorious that he was in Italy at the time, and had not been consulted
+on the matter. But as yet such questions had not been as accurately
+examined as subsequent events caused them to be; and Wilkes's assertion
+of royal responsibility to this extent probably coincided with the
+general feeling on the subject.[6] At all events, the error contained in
+it, and the insinuation that due wisdom and judgment had not been
+displayed in the appointment of Mr. G. Grenville to the Treasury, were
+not so derogatory to the legitimate authority and dignity of the crown
+as to make the writer a fit subject for a criminal prosecution. But Mr.
+Grenville was of a bitter temper, never inclined to tolerate any
+strictures on his own judgment or capacity, and fully imbued with the
+conviction that the first duty of an English minister is to uphold the
+supreme authority of the Parliament, and to chastise any one who dares
+to call in question the wisdom of any one of its resolutions. But _The
+North Briton_ had done this, and more. No. 45 had not only denounced the
+treaty which both Houses had approved, but had insinuated in
+unmistakable language that their approval had been purchased by gross
+corruption (a fact which was, indeed, sufficiently notorious). And,
+consequently, Mr. Grenville determined to treat the number which
+contained the denunciation as a seditious libel, the publication of
+which was a criminal offence; and, by his direction, Lord Halifax, as
+Secretary of State, issued what was termed a general warrant--a warrant,
+that is, which did not name the person or persons against whom it was
+directed, but which commanded the apprehension of "the authors,
+printers, and publishers" of the offending paper, leaving the officers
+who were charged with its execution to decide who came under that
+description, or, in other words, who were guilty of the act charged,
+before they had been brought before any tribunal. The warrant was
+executed. Wilkes and some printers were apprehended; Wilkes himself, as
+if the minister's design had been to make the charge ridiculous by
+exaggeration, being consigned to the great state-prison of the Tower,
+such a use of which was generally limited to those impeached of
+high-treason. And, indeed, the commitment did declare that No. 45 of
+_The North Briton_ was "a libel tending to alienate the affections of
+the people from his Majesty, and to excite them to traitorous
+insurrections against the government." Wilkes instantly sued out a writ
+of _habeas corpus_, and was without hesitation released by the Court of
+Common Pleas, on the legal ground that, "as a member of the House of
+Commons, he was protected from arrest in all cases except treason,
+felony, or a breach of the peace;" a decision which, in the next session
+of Parliament, the minister endeavored to overbear by inducing both
+Houses to concur in a resolution that "privilege of Parliament did not
+extend to the case of publishing seditious libels."
+
+In his life of Lord Camden,[7] who was Chief-justice of the Common Pleas
+at the time, Lord Campbell expresses a warm approval of this resolution,
+as one "which would now be considered conclusive evidence of the law."
+But, with all respect to the memory of a writer who was himself a
+Chief-justice, we suspect that in this case he was advancing a position
+as an author engaged in the discussion of what had become a party
+question, which he would not have laid down from the Bench.[8] The
+resolution certainly did not make it law, since it was not confirmed by
+any royal assent; and to interpret the law is not within the province of
+the House of Commons, nor, except when sitting as a Court of Appeal, of
+the House of Lords. We may, however, fully agree with the principle
+which Lord Campbell at the same time lays down, that "privilege of
+Parliament should not be permitted to interfere with the execution of
+the criminal law of the country." And this doctrine has been so fully
+acquiesced in since, that members of both Houses have in more than one
+instance been imprisoned on conviction for libel.
+
+The legality of the species of warrant under which Wilkes had been
+arrested was, however, a question of far greater importance; and on that
+no formal decision was pronounced on this occasion, the Lieutenant of
+the Tower, in his return to the writ of _habeas corpus_, and the counsel
+employed on both sides, equally avoiding all mention of the character of
+the warrant. But it was indirectly determined shortly afterward. The
+leaders of the Opposition would fain have had the point settled by what,
+in truth, would not have settled it--another resolution of the House of
+Commons. But, though it was discussed in several warm debates, Grenville
+always contrived to baffle his adversaries, though on one occasion his
+majority dwindled to fourteen.[9] What, however, the House of Commons
+abstained from affirming was distinctly, though somewhat
+extra-judicially, asserted by Lord Camden, as Chief-justice of the
+Common Pleas. Wilkes, with some of the printers and others who had been
+arrested, had brought actions for false imprisonment, which came to be
+tried in his court; and they obtained such heavy damages that the
+officials who had been mulcted applied for new trials, on the plea of
+their being excessive. But the Chief-justice refused the applications,
+and upheld the verdict, on the ground that the juries, in their
+assessment of damages, had been "influenced by a righteous indignation
+at the conduct of those who sought to exercise arbitrary power over all
+the King's subjects, to violate Magna Charta, and to destroy the liberty
+of the kingdom, by insisting on the legality of this general warrant."
+Such a justification would hardly be admitted now. But, in a subsequent
+trial, a still higher authority, the Chief-justice of the King's Bench,
+Lord Mansfield, held language so similar, that, once more to quote the
+words of Lord Campbell, "without any formal judgment, general warrants
+have ever since been considered illegal."
+
+However, the release of Wilkes on the ground of his parliamentary
+privilege gave him but a momentary triumph, or rather respite. The
+prosecution was not abated by the decision that he could not be
+imprisoned before trial; while one effect of his liberation was to
+stimulate the minister to add another count to the indictment preferred
+against him, on which he might be expected to find it less easy to
+excite the sympathy of any party. Wilkes had not always confined his
+literary efforts to political pamphlets. There was a club named the
+Franciscans (in compliment to Sir Francis Dashwood, Lord Bute's
+Chancellor of the Exchequer, who, as well as Lord Sandwich, the First
+Lord of the Admiralty, was one of its members), which met at Medmenham
+Abbey, on the banks of the Thames, and there held revels whose license
+recalled the worst excesses of the preceding century. To this club
+Wilkes also belonged; and, in indulgence of tastes in harmony with such
+a brotherhood, he had composed a blasphemous and indecent parody on
+Pope's "Essay on Man," which he entitled "An Essay on Woman," and to
+which he appended a body of burlesque notes purporting to be the
+composition of Pope's latest commentator, the celebrated Dr. Warburton,
+Bishop of Gloucester. He had never published it (indeed, it may be
+doubted whether, even in that not very delicate age, any publisher could
+have been found to run the risk of issuing so scandalous a work), but he
+had printed a few copies in his own house, of which he designed to make
+presents to such friends as he expected to appreciate it. He had not,
+however, so far as it appears, given away a single copy, when, on the
+very first day of the next session of Parliament, Lord Sandwich himself
+brought the parody under the notice of the House of Lords. If there was
+a single member of the House whose delicacy was not likely to be
+shocked, and whose morals could not be injured by such a composition, it
+was certainly Lord Sandwich himself; but his zeal as a minister to
+support his chief kindled in him a sudden enthusiasm for the support of
+virtue and decency also; and, having obtained a copy by some
+surreptitious means, he now made a formal complaint of it to the House,
+contending that the use of the name of the Bishop of Gloucester as
+author of the notes constituted a breach of the privileges of the House.
+And he was seconded by the bishop himself, whose temper and judgment
+were, unhappily, very inferior to his learning and piety. It is recorded
+that he actually compared Wilkes to the devil, and then apologized to
+Satan for the comparison. But the Lords were in a humor to regard no
+violence against Wilkes as excessive; and, submitting to the guidance of
+the minister and the prelate, resolved that the "Essay on Woman,"[10] as
+also another poem by the same writer, a paraphrase of the "Veni
+Creator," was "a most scandalous, obscene, and impious libel," and
+presented an address to the King, requesting his Majesty "to give the
+most effectual orders for the immediate prosecution of the author." And,
+in the course of the next few weeks, the House of Commons outran the
+peers themselves in violence and manifest unfairness. They concurred
+with the Lords in ordering No. 45 of _The North Briton_ to be burnt by
+the common hangman, an order which was not carried out without great
+opposition on the part of the London populace, who made it the occasion
+of a very formidable riot, in which the sheriffs themselves incurred no
+little danger; and, by another resolution, they ordered Wilkes to attend
+in his place to answer the charge of having published the two works. But
+at the time when they made this order it was well known that he could
+not obey it. A few days before he had been challenged by a Mr. Martin,
+who till very recently had been one of the Secretaries of the Treasury,
+and who was generally believed to have prepared himself for the conflict
+by diligent practice with a pistol; and in the duel which ensued Wilkes
+had been severely wounded. It was not only notorious that he had been
+thus disabled, but he sent a physician and surgeon of admitted eminence
+in their profession, and of unquestioned honor, to testify to the fact
+at the bar of the House; and subsequently he forwarded written
+certificates to the same purport from some French doctors who had
+special knowledge of gunshot wounds. But the Commons declined to accept
+this evidence as sufficient, and directed two other doctors to examine
+him. Wilkes, however, refused to admit them: his refusal was treated as
+a sufficient ground for pronouncing him "guilty of a contempt of the
+authority of the House," and for deciding on his case in his absence;
+and, on the 19th of January, before the case had come on for trial, a
+resolution was carried that "Mr. Wilkes was guilty of writing and
+publishing _The North Briton_ (No. 45), which this House had voted to be
+a false, scandalous, and seditious libel, and that, for the said
+offence, he be expelled the House." At a later period of the year, he
+was tried on the two charges of publishing No. 45 and the "Essay on
+Woman," was found guilty of both, and, as he did not appear to receive
+judgment, in November, 1764, he was outlawed.
+
+So far, it may be said to have been a drawn battle. If, on the one hand,
+the minister had procured the expulsion of Wilkes, on the other hand
+Wilkes had gained great notoriety and a certain amount of sympathy, and
+had, moreover, enriched himself by considerable damages; and again, if
+the nation at large was a gainer by the condemnation of general
+warrants, even that advantage might be thought to be dearly gained by
+the discredit into which the Parliament had fallen through its
+intemperance. But the contest between Wilkes and the ministry was only
+closed for a time; and when it was revived, a singular freak of fortune
+caused the very minister who had led the proceedings against him on this
+occasion to appear as his advocate. To avoid the consequences of his
+outlawry, he had taken up his abode in Paris, waiting for a change of
+ministry, which, as he hoped, might bring into power some to whom he
+might look for greater favor. But when, though in the course of the next
+two years two fresh administrations were formed, it was seen that
+neither Lord Rockingham, the head of the first, nor the Duke of Grafton
+and Mr. Pitt (promoted to the Earldom of Chatham), the heads of the
+second, had any greater sympathy with him than Mr. Grenville, he became
+desperate, and looked out for some opportunity of giving effect to his
+discontent. He found it in the dissolution of Parliament, which took
+place in the spring of 1768. In spite of his outlawry, he instantly
+returned to England, and offered himself as a candidate for London.
+There, indeed, he did not succeed, though the populace was uproarious in
+his support, and drew his carriage through the streets as if in triumph.
+But, before the end of the month, he was returned at the head of the
+poll for Middlesex, when the mob celebrated his victory by great riot
+and outrages, breaking the windows of Lord Bute, as his old enemy, and
+of the Lord Mayor, as the representative of the City of London, which
+had rejected him, and insulting, and even in some instances beating,
+passers-by who refused to join in their cheers for "Wilkes and Liberty."
+
+He had already pledged himself to take the necessary steps to procure
+the reversal of his outlawry; and, in pursuance of his promise, he
+surrendered in the Court of King's Bench. But his removal to prison
+caused a renewal of the tumults with greater violence than before. The
+mob even rescued him from the officers who had him in custody; and when,
+having escaped from his deliverers, he, with a parade of obedience to
+the law, again surrendered himself voluntarily at the gate of the King's
+Bench Prison, they threatened to attack the jail itself, kindled a fire
+under its walls, which was not extinguished without some danger, and day
+after day assembled in such tumultuous and menacing crowds, that at last
+Lord Weymouth, the Secretary of State, wrote a letter to the Surrey
+magistrates, enjoining them to abstain from no measures which might seem
+necessary for the preservation of peace, even if that could only be
+effected by the employment of the soldiery. The riots grew more and more
+formidable, till at last the magistrates had no resource but to call out
+the troops, who, on one occasion, after they had been pelted with large
+stones, and in many instances severely injured, fired, killing or
+wounding several of the foremost rioters. So tragical an event seemed to
+Wilkes to furnish him with exactly such an opportunity as he desired to
+push himself into farther notoriety. He at once printed Lord Weymouth's
+letter, and circulated it, with an inflammatory comment, in which he
+described it as a composition having for its fruit "a horrid massacre,
+the consummation of a hellish plot deliberately planned." Too angry to
+be prudent, Lord Weymouth complained to the House of Lords of this
+publication as a breach of privilege, and the Lords formally represented
+it to the House of Commons as an insult deliberately offered to them by
+one of its members. There could be no doubt that such language as Wilkes
+had used was libellous. In its imputation of designs of deliberate
+wickedness, it very far exceeded the bitterest passages of _The North
+Briton_; and Lord Weymouth's colleagues, therefore, thought they might
+safely follow the precedent set in 1764, of branding the publication as
+a libel, and again procuring the expulsion of the libeller from the
+House of Commons. There were circumstances in the present case, such as
+the difference between the constituencies of Aylesbury and Middlesex,
+and the enthusiastic fervor in the offender's cause which the populace
+of the City had displayed, which made it very doubtful whether the
+precedent of 1764 were quite a safe one to follow; but the ministers not
+only disregarded every such consideration, but, as if they had wantonly
+designed to give their measure a bad appearance, and to furnish its
+opponents with the strongest additional argument against it, they mixed
+up with their present complaint a reference to former misdeeds of Wilkes
+with which it had no connection. On receiving the message of the Lords,
+they had summoned him to appear at the bar of the House of Commons, that
+he might be examined on the subject; but this proceeding was so far from
+intimidating him, that he not only avowed the publication of his comment
+on Lord Weymouth's letter, but gloried in it, asserting that he deserved
+the thanks of the people for bringing to light the true character of
+"that bloody scroll." Such language was regarded as an aggravation of
+his offence, and the Attorney-general moved that his comment on the
+letter "was an insolent, scandalous, and seditious libel;" and, when
+that motion had been carried, Lord Barrington followed it up with
+another, to the effect that "John Wilkes, Esq., a member of this House,
+who hath at the bar of this House confessed himself to be the author and
+publisher of what the House has resolved to be an insolent, scandalous,
+and seditious libel, and who has been convicted in the Court of King's
+Bench of having printed and published a seditious libel, and three[11]
+obscene and impious libels, and by the judgment of the said Court has
+been sentenced to undergo twenty-two months' imprisonment, and is now in
+execution under the said judgment, be expelled this House." This motion
+encountered a vigorous opposition, not only from Mr. Burke and the
+principal members of the Rockingham party, which now formed the regular
+Opposition, but also from Mr. Grenville, the former Prime-minister, who
+on the former occasion, in 1764, had himself moved the expulsion of the
+same offender. His speech on this occasion is the only one which is
+fully reported; and it deserved the distinction from the exhaustive way
+in which it dealt with every part of the question. It displayed no
+inclination to extenuate Wilkes's present offence, but it pointed out
+with great force the circumstance that the supporters of the motion were
+far from agreement as to the reasons by which they were guided; that
+some members of the greatest authority in the House, while they had
+avowed their intention of voting for the expulsion, had at the same time
+been careful to explain that the comment on Lord Weymouth's letter was
+not the ground of their vote; that so great a lawyer as Mr. Blackstone
+had asserted that that comment "had not been properly and regularly
+brought before the House," but had founded his intention to vote for the
+expulsion solely "upon that article of the charge which related to the
+three obscene and impious libels mentioned in it, disavowing in the most
+direct terms all the other articles." That, on the other hand, other
+members of deserved weight and influence, such as Lord Palmerston and
+Lord F. Campbell, had disdained the idea of regarding "the article of
+the three obscene and impious libels as affording any ground for their
+proceeding." So practised a debater as Mr. Grenville had but little
+difficulty, therefore, in arguing against the advocates of expulsion,
+when they were so divided that one portion of them did, in fact, reply
+to the other. But it would be superfluous here to enter into the
+arguments employed on either side to justify the expulsion, or to prove
+it to be unjustifiable, from a consideration of the character of either
+Wilkes or his publication. The strength and importance of Mr.
+Grenville's speech lay in the constitutional points which it raised.
+
+Some supporters of the ministers had dwelt upon the former expulsion,
+insisting that "a man who had been expelled by a former House of Commons
+could not possibly be deemed a proper person to sit in the present
+Parliament, unless he had some pardon to plead, or some merit to cancel
+his former offences." By a reference to the case of Sir R. Walpole, Mr.
+Grenville proved that this had not been the opinion of former
+Parliaments; and he contended, with unanswerable logic, that it would be
+very mischievous to the nation if such a principle should be now acted
+on, and such a precedent established, since, though employed in the
+first instance against the odious and the guilty, it might, when once
+established, be easily applied to, and made use of against, the
+meritorious and the innocent; and so the most eminent and deserving
+members of the state, under the color of such an example, by one
+arbitrary and discretionary vote of one House of Parliament, the worst
+species of ostracism, might be excluded from the public councils, cut
+off and proscribed from the rights of every subject of the realm, not
+for a term of years alone, but forever. He quoted from "L'Esprit des
+Lois" an assertion of Montesquieu, that "one of the excellences of the
+English constitution was, that the judicial power was separated from the
+legislative, and that there would be no liberty if they were blended
+together; the power over the life and liberty of the citizens would then
+be arbitrary, for the judge would be the legislator." And, having thus
+proved that it would be a violation of the recognized constitution to
+found a second expulsion on the first, he proceeded to argue that to
+expel him for this new offence would be impolitic and inexpedient, as a
+step which would inevitably lead to a contest with the constituency
+which he represented, since, "in the present disposition of the county
+of Middlesex, no one could entertain a doubt that Wilkes would be
+re-elected. The House would then probably think itself under a necessity
+of again expelling him, and he would as certainly be again re-elected.
+The House might, indeed, refuse to issue a new writ, which would be to
+deprive the freeholders of Middlesex of the right of choosing any other
+representative; but he could not believe that the House would think it
+fit to inflict such a punishment on the electors of a great county.
+Should it not do so, the other alternative would be to bring into the
+House as representative and knight of the shire for Middlesex a man
+chosen by a few voters only, in contradiction to the declared sense of a
+great majority of the freeholders on the face of the poll, upon the
+supposition that all the votes of the latter were forfeited and thrown
+away on account of the expulsion of Mr. Wilkes." It seemed premature to
+discuss that point before it arose, and therefore the Speaker contented
+himself for the present with saying that "he believed there was no
+example of such a proceeding; and that, if it should appear to be new
+and unfounded as the law of the land, or even if any reasonable doubt
+could be entertained of its legality, the attempt to forfeit the
+freeholders' votes in such a manner would be highly alarming and
+dangerous."
+
+Few prophecies have been more exactly fulfilled. The House did expel Mr.
+Wilkes; he did offer himself for re-election, and was re-elected; and
+the minister, in consequence, moved and carried a resolution that "John
+Wilkes, Esq., having been, in this session of Parliament, expelled this
+House, was and is incapable of being elected a member to serve in this
+present Parliament." And, in pursuance of this vote, a writ was again
+issued. At the end of another month the proceeding required to be
+repeated. Wilkes had again offered himself for re-election. No other
+candidate had presented himself, and, in answer to an inquiry, the
+under-sheriff reported that "no other candidate had been proposed but
+John Wilkes, Esq., and that no elector had given or tendered his vote
+for any other person." Once more the House resolved that he was
+"incapable of being elected," and issued a new writ. But on this second
+occasion the ministry had provided a rival candidate in the person of
+the Honorable H.K. Luttrell. He was duly proposed and seconded; a poll
+was taken and kept open for several days, and, as it appeared at the
+close that 1143 votes had been given for Wilkes and 296 for Mr.
+Luttrell, the sheriff again returned Wilkes as duly elected.
+
+A debate of singularly angry excitement arose on the reception of this
+return. Even lawyers, such as Mr. De Grey, the Attorney-general, and Sir
+Fletcher Norton, who had been Attorney-general, were not ashamed to
+denounce the conduct of the sheriff in returning Mr. Wilkes as "highly
+improper and indecent," as "a flying in the face of a resolution of the
+House of Commons;" and Sir Fletcher even ventured to advance the
+proposition that, "as the Commons were acting in a judicial capacity,
+their resolutions were equal to law." Lord North, too, the Chancellor of
+the Exchequer, as we learn from the "Parliamentary History," "spoke
+long, but chiefly to the passions. He described Mr. Wilkes and his
+actions in a lively manner; showed the variety of troubles which he had
+given the ministry; and that unless, by voting in Mr. Luttrell, an end
+were put to this debate, the whole kingdom would be in confusion; though
+he owned that he did not think that measure would put an end to the
+distractions. He spoke much more to the expediency than to the legality
+of the measure proposed."
+
+On the other side, it was contended by several members, Burke and Mr.
+Grenville being of the number, that "the House of Commons alone could
+not make a law binding any body but themselves. That, if they could
+disqualify one person, they could disqualify as many as they pleased,
+and thus get into their own hands the whole power of the government;"
+and precedents were produced to prove that votes of the House of Lords,
+and also of the House of Commons, regarding their own members, had been
+disregarded by the judges of the Court of King's Bench as being contrary
+to law. But the minister was secure of the steadiness of his adherents,
+and a majority of 221 to 152 declared that Mr. Luttrell had been duly
+elected.
+
+But Lord North was correct in his anticipation that their vote would not
+put an end to the agitation on the question, and it was renewed in the
+next session in a manner which at one time threatened to produce a
+breach between the two Houses.
+
+The "Parliamentary History" closes its report of the debate on the
+resolution by which Mr. Luttrell was seated with a summary of the
+arguments used in it, taken from the "Annual Register," which, as is
+universally known, was at this time edited by Mr. Burke. It is a very
+fair and candid abstract, which, in fact, puts the whole question on one
+single issue, "that the House of Commons is the sole court of judicature
+in all cases of election, and that this authority is derived from the
+first principles of our government, viz., the necessary independence of
+the three branches of the Legislature." But, though that doctrine was
+fully admitted by the Opposition, they made "that very admission a
+ground for reviving the question in the next session, by moving for a
+resolution which should declare that, 'being a Court of Judicature, the
+House of Commons, in deciding matters of election, was bound to judge
+according to the law of the land, and the known and established law of
+Parliament, which was part thereof.'" It was understood that this
+resolution, if carried, was intended as a stepping-stone to others which
+should condemn the decision of the previous session; yet it seemed such
+a truism that even the ministers could not venture to deny it; but they
+proposed to defeat the object of its framers by adding to it a
+declaration that the late decision was "agreeable to the said law of the
+land." And we might pass on to the subsequent debate, in which the
+constitutional correctness of that addition was distinctly challenged,
+did it not seem desirable to notice two arguments which were brought
+forward against the motion, one by an independent member, Mr. Ongley,
+the other by the Attorney-general. Mr. Ongley contended that "a power of
+preserving order and decency is essentially necessary to every aggregate
+body; and, with respect to this House, if it had not power over its
+particular members, they would be subject to no control at all." The
+answer to this argument is obvious: that a right on the part of the
+House to control the conduct of its members is a wholly different thing
+from a right to determine who are or ought to be members; and that for
+the House to claim this latter right, except on grounds of qualification
+or disqualification legally proved, would be to repeat one of the most
+monstrous of all Cromwell's acts of tyranny, when, in 1656, he placed
+guards at the door of the House, with orders to refuse admission to all
+those members whom, however lawfully elected, he did not expect to find
+sufficiently compliant for his purposes. Mr. De Grey's argument was of a
+different character, being based on what he foretold would be the
+practical result of a decision that expulsion did not involve an
+incapacity to be re-elected. If it did not involve such incapacity, and
+if, in consequence, Mr. Wilkes should be re-elected, he considered that
+the House would naturally feel it its duty to re-expel him as often as
+the constituency re-elected him. But one answer given to this argument
+was, that to expel a second time would be to punish twice for one
+offence, a proceeding at variance not only with English law but with
+every idea of justice. Another, and one which has obtained greater
+acceptance, was, that the legitimate doctrine was, that the issue of a
+new writ gave the expelled member an appeal from the House to the
+constituency, and that the constituency had a constitutional right to
+overrule the judgment of the House, and to determine whether it still
+regarded the candidate as its most suitable representative.
+
+The ministers, however, were, as before, strong enough in the House to
+carry their resolution. But the Opposition returned to the charge,
+taking up an entirely different though equally general position, "That,
+by the law of the land and the known law and usage of Parliament, no
+person eligible by common right can be incapacitated by vote or
+resolution of this House, but by act of Parliament only." It is
+remarkable that, in the debate which ensued, two members who
+successively rose to the dignity of Lord Chancellor, Mr. Thurlow and Mr.
+Wedderburn, took different sides; but nothing could shake the
+ministerial majority. The resolution was rejected. And when Lord
+Rockingham proposed the same resolution in the House of Lords, though it
+was supported by all the eloquence of Lord Chatham, he was beaten by a
+majority of more than two to one, and the ministers even carried a
+resolution declaring "that any interference of the House of Lords with
+any judgment of the House of Commons, in matters of election, would be a
+violation of the constitutional rights of the Commons."
+
+Even these decisive defeats of the Opposition did not finally terminate
+the struggle. The notoriety which Wilkes had gained had answered his
+purpose to no slight extent. The City had adopted his cause with
+continually increasing earnestness and effect. It had made him Sheriff,
+Alderman, Lord Mayor, and had enriched him with the lucrative office of
+City Chamberlain; and, as one of the City magistrates, he subsequently
+won the good opinion of many who had previously condemned him, by his
+conduct during the Gordon Riots, in which he exerted his authority with
+great intrepidity to check and punish the violence of the rioters. And
+when, in 1782, Lord Rockingham became, for the second time,
+Prime-minister, he thought he might well avail himself of the favor he
+had thus acquired, and of the accession to office of those whom the line
+which they had formerly taken bound to countenance him, to bring forward
+a motion for the expunction of the resolutions against him which had
+been passed in 1770. It was carried by a largo majority; and though this
+was as evidently a party division as those had been by which he had been
+defeated twelve years before, still, as the last resolution on the
+subject, it must be regarded as decisive of the law and practice of
+Parliament, and as having settled the doctrine that expulsion does not
+incapacitate a member who has been expelled from immediate
+re-election.[12]
+
+The establishment of this rule, and the abolition of general warrants,
+were, however, not the only nor the most important result of these
+proceedings. They led indirectly to an innovation which, it is hardly
+too much to say, has had a greater influence on the character and
+conduct of Parliament, and indeed on the whole subsequent legislation of
+the country, than can be attributed to any other single cause. Hitherto
+the bulk of the people had enjoyed but very scanty and occasional means
+of acquiring political education. At times of vehement political
+excitement, or any special party conflict, pamphlets and periodical
+essays had enlightened their readers--necessarily a select and small
+body--on particular topics. But standing orders of both Houses, often
+renewed, strictly forbade all publication of the debates which took
+place in either. To a certain extent, these orders had come to be
+disregarded and evaded. Almost ever since the accession of the House of
+Brunswick, a London publisher had given to the world an annual account
+of the Parliamentary proceedings and most interesting discussions of the
+year; and before the middle of the reign of George II, two monthly
+magazines had given sketches of speeches made by leading members of each
+party. The reporters, however, did not venture to give the names of the
+speakers at full length, but either disguised them under some general
+description, or at most gave their initials; and sometimes found that
+even this profession of deference to the standing orders did not insure
+them impunity. As late as the year 1747, Cave, the proprietor and editor
+of the _Gentleman's Magazine_, was brought to the bar of the House of
+Commons for publishing an account of a recent debate, and only obtained
+his release by expressions of humble submission and the payment of heavy
+fees. The awe, however, which his humiliation and peril had been
+intended to diffuse gradually wore off; the keen interest which was
+awakened by the ministerial changes at the beginning of the reign of
+George III., which have been already mentioned, naturally prompted a
+variety of efforts to gratify it by a revelation of the language
+concerning them which was held by statesmen of different parties; and
+these revelations were no longer confined to yearly or monthly
+publications. More than one newspaper had of late adopted the practice
+of publishing what it affirmed to be a correct report of the debates of
+the previous day, though, in fact, each journal garbled them to suit the
+views of the party to which it belonged, and, to quote the words of the
+historian of the period, "misrepresented the language and arguments of
+the speakers in a manner which could hardly be considered
+accidental."[13] The speakers on the ministerial side in the debates on
+the Middlesex election had been especial objects of these
+misrepresentations; and, at the beginning of 1771, one of that party,
+Colonel Onslow, M.P. for Guilford, brought the subject before the House,
+complaining that many speeches, and his own among them, had been
+misrepresented by two newspapers which he named, and that "the practice
+had got to an infamous height, so that it had become absolutely
+necessary either to punish the offenders or to revise the standing
+orders."[14] And he accordingly moved "that the publication of the
+newspapers of which he complained was a contempt of the orders and a
+breach of the privileges of the House, and that the printers be ordered
+to attend the House at its next sitting." The habitual unfairness of the
+reports was admitted by the Opposition; but the publishers complained of
+evidently felt assured of their sympathy (which, indeed, was
+sufficiently, and not very decorously, shown by its leaders inflicting
+on the House no fewer than twenty-three divisions in a single night),
+and, relying on their countenance, they paid no attention to the order
+of the House. A fresh order for their arrest having been issued, the
+Sergeant-at-arms reported that he had been unable to execute it, by
+reason of their absence from their homes; on which the House, not
+disposed to allow itself to be thus trifled with, now addressed his
+Majesty with a request that he would issue his royal proclamation for
+their apprehension. And Colonel Onslow made a fresh motion, with a
+similar complaint of the publishers of six more newspapers--"three
+brace," as he described them in language more sportsman like than
+parliamentary. Similar orders for their appearance and, when these were
+disregarded, for their apprehension, were issued. And at last one of
+those who had been mentioned in the royal proclamation, Mr. Wheble,
+printer of the _Middlesex Journal_, was apprehended by an officer named
+Carpenter, and carried before the sitting magistrate at Guildhall, who,
+by a somewhat whimsical coincidence, happened to be Alderman Wilkes.
+Wilkes not only discharged him, on the ground that there was "no legal
+cause of complaint against him," but when Wheble, in retaliation, made a
+formal complaint of the assault committed on him by Carpenter in
+arresting him, bound Wheble over to prosecute, and Carpenter to answer
+the complaint, at the next quarter sessions, and then reported what he
+had done in an official Letter to the Secretary of State. Thomson,
+another printer, was in like manner arrested; and, when brought before
+Mr. Oliver, another alderman, was discharged by him. And when, a day or
+two afterward, a third (Mr. Miller) was apprehended by Whetham, a
+messenger of the House of Commons, Mr. Brass Crosby, the Lord Mayor, and
+the two Aldermen, signed a warrant committing Whetham to prison for
+assaulting Miller. Whetham was bailed by the Sergeant-at-arms, who
+reported what had occurred to the House; and the House, as the Lord
+Mayor and Alderman Oliver were members of it, as representatives for
+London and Honiton, ordered that they should attend the House in their
+places, to explain their conduct, and that Mr. Wilkes should attend at
+the bar of the House. Wilkes, declining to recognize the validity of the
+resolutions which had seated Colonel Luttrell for Middlesex, refused
+compliance with such an order, writing a letter to the Speaker, in which
+he "observed that no notice was taken of him as a member of the House;
+and that the Speaker's order did not require him to attend in his
+place." And he "demanded his seat in Parliament, and promised, when he
+had been admitted to his seat, to give the House a most exact detail of
+his conduct." But the Lord Mayor pleaded the charters of the City as a
+justification of his act in releasing a citizen of London who had been
+arrested on a warrant which had not been backed by a City magistrate,
+and demanded to be heard by counsel in support of his plea. His demand,
+however, was refused, and he and Alderman Oliver were committed to the
+Tower; but, as if the ministers were afraid of re-opening the question
+of Colonel Luttrell's election for Middlesex, they evaded taking notice
+of Wilkes's disobedience to their order by a singularly undignified
+expedient, issuing a fresh order for his appearance on the 8th of April,
+and adjourning till the 9th.
+
+The ministers now moved the appointment of a select committee to
+investigate the whole affair; and the committee, before the end of the
+month, made an elaborate report, which, however, abstained from all
+mention of the offence committed by the printers, and confined itself to
+an assertion that "the power and authority of the House to compel the
+attendance of any commoner had ever extended as well to the City of
+London, without exception on account of charters from the crown or any
+pretence of separate jurisdiction, as to every other part of the realm."
+And this assertion may be regarded as having been uphold by the refusal
+of the judges to release the Lord Mayor and Alderman when they sued out
+writs of _habeas corpus_; and they consequently remained prisoners in
+the Tower till they were released by the prorogation.
+
+But with this report of the committee the matter was suffered to drop.
+The transaction had caused almost unprecedented excitement, which was
+not confined to the City, for the grand-juries of many English counties
+and a committee of the Dublin merchants showed their sympathy with the
+Opposition by sending up addresses to the imprisoned City magistrates;
+and the ministers had a prudent fear of keeping alive an agitation which
+had not been always free from danger to the public tranquillity.[15] In
+effect, the victory remained with the Opposition. No farther attempt was
+made to punish any of the printers; and, though the standing orders
+which forbid such publication have never been formally repealed, ever
+since that time the publishers of newspapers and other periodicals have
+been in the constant habit of giving regular details of the proceedings
+of both Houses of Parliament. And one enterprising publisher, Mr.
+Hansard, has for many years published a complete record of the debates
+in both Houses, which is continually appealed to in the Houses
+themselves, by members of both parties, as a manual of political and
+parliamentary history.
+
+The practice, as it now prevails, is one of the many instances of the
+practical wisdom with which this nation often deals with difficult
+subjects. The standing order is retained as an instrument which, in
+certain cases, it may possibly be expedient to employ; as, in fact, it
+has been employed in one or two instances in the present reign, when
+matters have been under consideration which, however necessary to be
+discussed, were of such a nature that the publication of the details
+into which some speakers deemed it desirable to go was regarded by
+others as calculated to be offensive to the taste, if not injurious to
+the morals, of the community at large. But the very fact of such an
+occasional enforcement of the standing orders under very peculiar
+circumstances implies a recognition of the propriety of its more
+ordinary violation; of the principle that publication ought to be the
+general rule, and secrecy the unusual exception. And, indeed, it is,
+probably, no exaggeration to say that such publication is not only
+valuable, as the best and chief means of the political education of the
+people out-of-doors, but is indispensable to the working of our
+parliamentary system such as it has now become. The successive Reform
+Bills, which have placed the electoral power in the hands of so vast a
+body of constituents as was never imagined in the last century, have
+evidently regarded the possession by the electors of a perfect knowledge
+of the language held and the votes given by their representatives as
+indispensable to the proper exercise of the franchises which they have
+conferred. And, even if there had previously been no means provided for
+their acquisition of such information, it is certain that the electors
+would never have consented to be long kept in the dark on subjects of
+such interest. In another point of view, the publication of the debates
+is equally desirable, in the interest of the members themselves, whether
+leaders or followers of the different parties. Not to mention the
+stimulus that it affords to the cultivation of eloquence--an incentive
+to which even those least inclined or accustomed to put themselves
+forward are not entirely insensible--it enables the ministers to
+vindicate their measures to the nation at large, the leaders of the
+Opposition to explain their objections or resistance to those measures
+in their own persons, and not through the hired agency of pamphleteers,
+and each humbler member to prove to his constituents the fidelity with
+which he has acted up to the principles his assertion of which induced
+them to confide their interests and those of the kingdom to his judgment
+and integrity. Secrecy and mystery may serve, or be supposed to serve,
+the interests of arbitrary rulers; perfect openness is the only
+principle on which a free constitution can be maintained and a free
+people governed.
+
+It seems convenient to take all the measures which, in this first
+portion of the reign before us, affected the proceedings or constitution
+of Parliament together; and, indeed, one enactment of great importance,
+which was passed in 1770, it is hardly unreasonable to connect in some
+degree with the decision of the House which adjudged the seat for
+Middlesex to Colonel Luttrell. Ever since the year 1704 it had been
+regarded as a settled point that the House of Commons had the exclusive
+right of determining every question concerning the election of its
+members. But it was equally notorious that it had exercised that right
+in a manner which violated every principle of justice and even of
+decency. Election petitions were decided by the entire House, and were
+almost invariably treated as party questions, in which impartiality was
+not even professed. Thirty years before, the Prime-minister himself (Sir
+Robert Walpole) had given notice to his supporters that "no quarter was
+to be given in election petitions;" and it was a division on one
+petition which eventually drove him from office. There was not even a
+pretence made of deciding according to evidence, for few of the members
+took the trouble to hear it. A few years after the time of which we are
+speaking, Lord George Germaine thus described the mode of proceeding
+which had previously prevailed: "The managers of petitions did not ask
+those on whose support they calculated to attend at the examination of
+witnesses, but only to let them know where they might be found when the
+question was going to be put, that they might be able to send them word
+in time for the division." The practice had become a public scandal, by
+which the constituencies and the House itself suffered equally--the
+constituencies, inasmuch as they were liable to be represented by one
+who was in fact only the representative of a minority; the House itself,
+since its title to public confidence could have no solid or just
+foundation but such as was derived from its members being in every
+instance the choice of the majority. Yet, so long as petitions were
+judged by the whole House, there seemed no chance of the abuse being
+removed, the number of judges conferring the immunity of shamelessness
+on each individual. To remedy such a state of things, in the spring of
+1770 Mr. G. Grenville brought in a bill which provided for the future
+trial of all such petitions by a select committee of fifteen members,
+thirteen of whom should be chosen by ballot, one by the sitting member
+whose seat was petitioned against, and one by the petitioner. The
+members of the committee were to take an oath to do justice similar to
+that taken by jurymen in the courts of law; and the committee was to
+have power to compel the attendance of witnesses, to examine them on
+oath, and to enforce the production of all necessary papers; it was also
+to commence its sittings within twenty-four hours of its appointment,
+and to sit from day to day till it should be prepared to present its
+report. It was not to the credit of the ministers that they made the
+passing of such a bill a party question. The abuse which it was designed
+to remedy was notorious, and Mr. Grenville did not exaggerate its
+magnitude when he declared that, "if it were not checked, it must end in
+the ruin of public liberty." He was supported by Burke, and by two
+lawyers, Mr. Dunning and Mr. Wedderburn, both destined to rise to some
+of the highest offices in their profession; but he was opposed by the
+Attorney-general, by Lord North, as leader of the House, and by Mr.
+Fox--not yet turned into a patriot by Lord North's dismissal of him from
+office. The debates, both in the whole House and in committee, were long
+and earnest. Some of the ministerial underlings were not ashamed to deny
+the necessity of any alteration in the existing practice; but their more
+favorite argument was founded on the impropriety of the House
+"delegating its authority to a committee," which was asserted to be "an
+essential alteration of the constitution of the House of Commons." Lord
+North himself had too keen an instinct of propriety to deny the
+existence of a great evil, and contented himself with pleading for time
+for farther consideration; while the Attorney-general confined his
+objections to some details of the bill, which it would be easy to amend.
+Others, with too accurate a foresight, doubted the efficacy of the
+measure, and prophesied that the additional sanction of the oath, by
+which its framer hoped to bind the committees to a just and honest
+decision, would, "like oaths of office and Custom-house oaths, soon fall
+into matters of form, and lose all sanction, and so make bad worse." On
+the other hand, besides the arguments founded on the admitted greatness
+of the evil to be remedied, it was shown that the institution of
+committees, such as the bill proposed the appointment of, was sanctioned
+by numerous precedents; and though the committees--sometimes consisting
+of as many as two hundred members--were by far too large to make it
+probable that all would bestow a careful attention on the whole case,
+there was "nothing in the journals of the House to show that their
+decisions were not regarded as final, or as requiring no subsequent
+confirmation from the whole House." Generally speaking, Lord North could
+trust the steadiness of his majority; but, to his great surprise, on
+this occasion he found himself deserted by the country gentlemen, who
+voted in a body for the bill, although their spokesman, Sir W. Bagot,
+had been in no slight degree offended by some remarks of Burke, who,
+with a strange imprudence, had claimed a monopoly of the title of
+"friends of the constitution" for himself and his party, and had sneered
+at the country gentlemen, as "statesmen of a very different description,
+though, by a late description given of them, a Tory was now the best
+species of Whig." And the union of the two bodies proved irresistible;
+the bill was carried by a majority of sixty-two, and the government did
+not venture to carry on their resistance to it in the House of Lords,
+any interference by which would, indeed, have been resented by the
+Commons, as a violation of their privileges.
+
+At first the duration of the bill was limited to seven years; but in
+1774 it was made perpetual by a still larger majority, the experience of
+its working having converted many who had at first opposed it, but who
+now bore willing testimony to its efficacy. Unhappily, though the House
+could make the bill perpetual, at least till formally repealed, it could
+not invest its good effects with equal durability. After a time, the
+same complaints were advanced against the decision of election
+committees that had formerly been employed to discredit the judgments of
+the whole House. The success or failure of a petition again became a
+party question; and as in a committee of an odd number the
+ministerialists or the Opposition must inevitably have a majority of at
+least one member, before the end of the reign it had become as easy to
+foretell the result of a petition from the composition of the committee
+as it had been in the time of Walpole. And it was with the approval of
+almost all parties--an approval extorted only by the absolute necessity
+of the case--that, after one or two modifications of Mr. Grenville's act
+had been tried, Mr. Disraeli induced the House to surrender altogether
+its privilege of judging of elections, and to submit the investigations
+of petitions on such subjects to the only tribunal sufficiently above
+suspicion to command and retain the confidence of the nation, the judges
+of the high courts of law.
+
+We shall probably be doing the House of Commons of the day no injustice,
+if we surmise that the degree in which public attention had recently
+been directed to the representation, and the interest which the people
+were beginning to show in the purity of elections, as the principle on
+the maintenance of which the very liberties of all might depend, had
+some share in leading the House to establish the wholly new, though most
+necessary, precedent of punishing a constituency for habitual and
+inveterate corruption. It may be called the first fruits of Mr.
+Grenville's act. At the end of the same year in which that statute had
+been passed, a select committee had sat to try the merits of a petition
+which complained of an undue return for the borough of New Shoreham. And
+its report brought to light an organized system of corruption, which
+there was too much reason to fear was but a specimen of that which
+prevailed in many other boroughs as yet undetected. It appeared from the
+report, founded as it was on the evidence and confession of many of the
+persons inculpated, that a society had long existed in New Shoreham,
+entitled the Christian Club, which, under this specious name, was
+instituted, as they frankly acknowledged, for the express purpose of
+getting as much money as possible at every election from the candidates
+they brought in. The members of the club were under an oath and bond of
+L500 not to divulge the secrets of the club, and to be bound by the
+majority. On every election, a committee of five persons was nominated
+by the club to treat with the candidates for as much money as they could
+get. And, in pursuance of this system, when, on the death of Sir Stephen
+Cornish, one of the members for the borough, five candidates offered
+themselves to supply the vacancy, this committee of five opened
+negotiations with them all. The offers of the rival purchasers were
+liberal enough. One (General Smith) proposed to buy the entire club in
+the lump for L3000, adding a promise to build 600 tons of shipping in
+the town. A second (a Mr. Rumbold) was willing to give every freeman
+L35; and his offer was accepted by the committee, who, however,
+cautioned him that no freeman was entitled to the money who was not a
+member of the Christian Club. He willingly agreed to this limitation of
+his expenditure, and both he and the club regarded the matter as
+settled. He paid every freeman who belonged to the club his stipulated
+bribe, and on the polling day they tendered eighty-seven votes in his
+favor, the entire constituency being something under one hundred and
+fifty. The general, finding his L3000 declined, did not go to the poll;
+but a Mr. Purling and Mr. James did, the latter polling only four votes,
+the former only thirty-seven. What bribe Mr. Purling had given was never
+revealed; but by some means or other he had contrived to render himself
+the most acceptable of all the candidates to Mr. Roberts, the returning
+officer. Roberts had himself been a member of the Christian Club, but
+had quarrelled with it, and on the day of the election, as Rumbold's
+voters came up, he administered to each of them the oath against
+bribery. They took it without scruple; but he took it on himself to
+pronounce seventy-six of them disqualified, and to refuse their votes;
+and, having thus reduced Mr. Rumbold's voters to eleven, he returned Mr.
+Purling as duly elected.
+
+Mr. Rumbold, not unnaturally, petitioned against such a return; when Mr.
+Roberts admitted the facts alleged against him, but pleaded that he had
+acted under the advice of counsel, who had assured him that it was
+within his own discretion to admit or to refuse any votes that might be
+tendered, and that he might lawfully refuse any "which in his own mind
+he thought illegal." It is a striking proof of the laxity which
+prevailed on every quarter in electioneering practices, that the House,
+to a great extent, admitted his justification or excuse as valid. By a
+strange stretch of lenity, they gave him credit for an honest intention,
+and contented themselves with ordering him to be reprimanded by the
+Speaker. But the case of the bribed freemen and of the borough generally
+was too gross to be screened by any party. All agreed that the borough
+must be regarded as incurably corrupt, and deserving of heavy
+punishment. The Attorney-general was ordered to prosecute the five
+members of the managing committee for "an illegal and corrupt
+conspiracy;" and a bill was brought in to disfranchise and declare
+forever incapable of voting at any election eighty-one freemen who had
+been proved to have received bribes, and to punish the borough itself,
+by extending the right of voting at future elections to all the
+freeholders in the rape of Bramber, the district of Sussex in which New
+Shoreham lies, an arrangement which reduced the borough itself to
+comparative insignificance. Mr. Fox opposed the bill, on the ground that
+the offence committed could be sufficiently punished by the ordinary
+courts of law. But he stood alone in his resistance; the bill was
+passed, and a salutary precedent was established; the penalty inflicted
+on New Shoreham being for many years regarded as the most proper
+punishment for all boroughs in which similar practices were proved to
+prevail.
+
+And it might have continued to be thought so, had corruption been
+confined to the smaller boroughs; but there was no doubt that in many
+large towns corruption was equally prevalent and inveterate, while there
+were also many counties in which the cost of a contest was by far too
+large to be accounted for by any legitimate causes of expenditure. And
+consequently, as time wore on, severer measures were considered
+necessary. Some boroughs were deprived of the right of election
+altogether; in others, whose population or constituency was too numerous
+to make their permanent disfranchisement advisable, the writ was
+suspended for a time, that its suspension might serve both as a
+punishment and as a warning, a practice which is still not unfrequently
+adopted. But no plan could be devised for dealing with the evil in
+counties, till what seemed hopeless to achieve by direct legislation
+was, in a great degree, effected by the indirect operation of the Reform
+Bill of 1832. The shortening of the duration of an election, which was
+henceforth concluded in a single day, and the multiplication of polling
+places, which rendered it impossible to ascertain the progress of the
+different candidates till the close of the poll, were provisions having
+an inevitable and most salutary effect in diminishing alike the
+temptation to bribe on the part of the candidate, and the opportunity of
+enhancing the value of his vote by the elector. The vast increase of
+newspapers, by diffusing political education and stimulating political
+discussion, has had, perhaps, a still greater influence in the same
+direction. And, as bribery could only be brought to bear on electors too
+ignorant to estimate the importance of the exercise of the franchise by
+any higher test than the personal advantage it might bring to
+themselves, it is to the general diffusion of education among the poorer
+classes, and their gradually improved and improving intelligence that a
+complete eradication of electoral corruption can alone be looked for.
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 1: "Constitutional History," vol. iii., p. 380; ed. 3, 1832.
+The first edition was published in 1827.]
+
+[Footnote 2: Grampound. Corrupt voters had been disfranchised in New
+Shoreham as early as 1771, and the franchise of the borough of Cricklade
+had been transferred to the adjoining hundreds in 1782.]
+
+[Footnote 3: Parliament was dissolved March 19. Lord Bute succeeded Lord
+Holdernesse March 25.]
+
+[Footnote 4: The greater part of Lord Bute's colleagues did, in fact,
+retain their offices. Lord Egremont and Lord Halifax continued to be
+Secretaries of State; Lord Henley (afterward Lord Northington) retained
+the Great Seal; Lord North and Sir John Turner remained as Lords of the
+Treasury; and Mr. Yorke and Sir Fletcher Norton were still Attorney and
+Solicitor General.]
+
+[Footnote 5: Parliament was prorogued April 19, and _The North Briton_
+(No. 45) was published April 23.]
+
+[Footnote 6: A letter of the Prince Consort examines the principle of
+ministerial responsibility with so remarkable a clearness of perception
+and distinctness of explanation, that we may be excused for quoting it
+at length: "The notion that the responsibility of his advisers impairs
+the monarch's dignity and importance is a complete mistake. Here we have
+no law of ministerial responsibility, for the simple reason that we have
+no written constitution; but this responsibility flows as a logical
+necessity from the dignity of the crown and of the sovereign. 'The King
+can do no wrong,' says the legal axiom, and hence it follows that
+somebody must be responsible for his measures, if these be contrary to
+law or injurious to the country's welfare. Ministers here are not
+responsible _qua_ ministers, that is, _qua_ officials (as such they are
+responsible to the crown), but they are responsible to Parliament and
+the people, or the country, as 'advisers of the crown.' Any one of them
+may advise the crown, and whoever does so is responsible to the country
+for the advice he has given. The so-called accountability of ministers
+to Parliament does not arise out of an abstract principle of
+responsibility, but out of the practical necessity which they are under
+of obtaining the consent of Parliament to legislation and the voting of
+taxes, and, as an essential to this end, of securing its confidence. In
+practice, ministers are liable to account for the way and manner in
+which they have administered the laws which they, conjointly with the
+Parliament, have made, and for the way they have expended the moneys
+that have been voted for definite objects. They are bound to furnish
+explanations, to justify their proceedings, to satisfy reasonable
+scruples, and the answer, 'We have, as dutiful subjects, obeyed the
+sovereign,' will not be accepted. 'Have you acted upon conviction, or
+have you not?' is the question. 'If you have not, then you are civil
+servants of the crown, who counsel and do what you consider wrong or
+unjust, with a view to retain your snug places or to win the favor of
+the sovereign.' And this being so, Parliament withdraws its confidence
+from them. Herein, too, lies that ministerial power of which sovereigns
+are so much afraid. They can say, 'We will not do this or that which the
+sovereign wishes, because we cannot be responsible for it.' But why
+should a sovereign see anything here to be afraid of? To him it is, in
+truth, the best of safeguards. A really loyal servant should do nothing
+for which he is not prepared to answer, even though his master desires
+it. This practical responsibility is of the utmost advantage to the
+sovereign. Make independence, not subservience, the essential of
+service, and you compel the minister to keep his soul free toward the
+sovereign, you ennoble his advice, you make him staunch and patriotic,
+while time-servers, the submissive instruments of a monarch's extreme
+wishes and commands, may lead, and often have led, him to destruction.
+
+"But to revert to the law of responsibility. This ought not to be in
+effect a safeguard for law itself. As such, it is superfluous in this
+country, where law reigns, and where it would never occur to any one
+that this could be otherwise. But upon the Continent it is of the
+highest importance; as, where the government is an outgrowth of a
+relation of supremacy and subordination between sovereign and subject,
+and the servant, trained in ideas natural to this relation, does not
+know which to obey, the law of the sovereign, the existence of such a
+law would deprive him of the excuse which, should he offend the law, and
+so be guilty of a crime, is ready to his hand in the phrase, 'The
+sovereign ordered it so, I have merely obeyed,' while it would be a
+protection to the sovereign that his servants, if guilty of a crime,
+should not be able to saddle him with the blame of it."--_Life of the
+Prince Consort_, v., 262.]
+
+[Footnote 7: "Lives of the Lord Chancellors," c. cxliii.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Indeed, the opinion which Lord Campbell thus expresses is
+manifestly at variance with that which he had previously pronounced in
+his life of Lord Northington, where he praised the House of Lords for
+"very properly rejecting the bill passed by the Commons declaring
+general warrants to be illegal, leaving this question to be decided (as
+it was, satisfactorily) by the Courts of Common Law."]
+
+[Footnote 9: From a speech of Mr. Grenville delivered at a later period
+(February 3, 1769, "Parliamentary History," xvi., 548), it appears that
+the Secretaries of State who signed this general warrant did so against
+their own judgment. "They repeatedly proposed to have Wilkes's name
+inserted in the warrant of apprehension, but were overruled by the
+lawyers and clerks of the office, who insisted that they could not
+depart from the long-established precedents and course of proceeding."
+And in one of these debates, Mr. Pitt, while denouncing with great
+severity Grenville's conduct in procuring the issue of this particular
+warrant, was driven to a strange confession of his own inconsistency,
+since he was forced to admit that, while Secretary of State, he had
+issued more than one general warrant in exactly similar form.]
+
+[Footnote 10: Strange to say, it does not seem absolutely certain that
+Wilkes was the author of the "Essay on Woman." Horace Walpole eventually
+learned, or believed that he had learned, that the author was a Mr.
+Thomas Potter. (See Walpole's "George III.," i., 310; and Cunningham's
+"Note on his Correspondence," iv., 126.)]
+
+[Footnote 11: These are the words of the resolution.--_Parliamentary
+History_, xvi., 537. But it does not appear what the three libels were.
+The "Essay on Woman" was one, the paraphrase of "Veni Creator" was a
+second; no third of that character is mentioned.]
+
+[Footnote 12: The last resolution is approved by Mr. Hallam. "If a few
+precedents were to determine all controversies of constitutional law, it
+is plain enough from the journals that the House has assumed the power
+of incapacitation. But as such authority is highly dangerous and
+unnecessary for any good purpose, and as, according to all legal rules,
+so extraordinary a power could not be supported except by a sort of
+prescription that cannot be shown, the final resolution of the House of
+Commons, which condemned the votes passed in times of great excitement,
+appears far more consonant to first principles."--_Constitutional
+History_, iii., 357.]
+
+[Footnote 13: Adolphus, "History of England," i., 484.]
+
+[Footnote 14: An idea of the license which the newspapers complained of
+had permitted themselves at this time may be derived from the manner in
+which one of them had introduced a speech of Mr. Jeremiah Dyson, M.P.
+for Weymouth, and a Commissioner of the Treasury: "Jeremiah Weymouth,
+the d----n of the kingdom, spoke as follows." And it may seem that the
+Opposition (for the affair was made a party question) can hardly be
+acquitted of a discreditable indifference to the dignity of the House in
+supporting a resolution of Colonel Barre, that "Jeremiah Weymouth, the
+d----n of this kingdom, is not a member of this House." On which the
+previous question was moved by the ministers, and carried by 120 to
+38.--_Parliamentary History_, xvii., 78. And an instance of rather the
+opposite kind, of the guarded way in which the most respectable
+publications were as yet accustomed to relate the transactions of
+Parliament, may be gathered from the account of the proceedings in the
+case of Wilkes, given in the "Annual Register" for 1770--drawn up,
+probably, by Burke himself--in which Lord Camden is only mentioned as "a
+great law lord;" Lord Chatham as "Lord C----m;" Lord Rockingham as "a
+noble Marquis who lately presided at the head of public affairs;" the
+King as "the K----;" Parliament as "P.;" and the House of Commons as the
+"H. of C."--_Annual Register_, 1770, pp. 59-67.]
+
+[Footnote 15: On more than one occasion there had been disturbances in
+the City, and in the streets adjacent to the Houses of Parliament, which
+were little short of riot. One day the mob paraded effigies of the
+principal ministers, which, after hanging and beheading them, they
+committed to the flames with great uproar. On another day Mr. Charles
+Fox (as yet a vehement Tory) complained to the House that the mob in
+Palace Yard had insulted him, breaking the glasses of his chariot, and
+pelting him with oranges, stones, etc.--_Parliamentary History_, xvii.,
+163.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+
+The Regency Bill.--The Ministry of 1766 lay an Embargo on Corn.--An Act
+of Indemnity is Passed.--The _Nullum Tempus_ Act concerning Crown
+Property; it is sought to Extend it to Church Property, but the Attempt
+fails.--The Royal Marriage Act.--The Lords amend a Bill imposing Export
+Duties, etc., on Corn.
+
+
+The prosecution of Wilkes was not the only act of Mr. Grenville's
+administration which excited both the Parliament and the people. In 1764
+the King was attacked by a serious illness, and, as the Prince of Wales
+was an infant scarcely two years old, it was manifestly necessary to
+make arrangements for a Regency, in the event of the throne becoming
+vacant while the heir was still a minor. A similar necessity had arisen
+in the preceding reign on the death of the present King's father, and a
+bill had accordingly been introduced by Mr. Pelham, the minister of the
+day, which, in the event of the reigning sovereign dying during the
+minority of the boy who had now become the immediate heir to the throne,
+vested both the guardianship of his person and the Regency of the
+kingdom in his mother, the Princess Dowager of Wales, who, however, in
+the latter capacity, was only to act with the advice of a council,
+composed of her brother-in-law, the Duke of Cumberland, and nine
+principal officers of state. It was not concealed by either the King or
+the Duke that they would have preferred a different arrangement, one
+which would have conferred an uncontrolled Regency on the Duke himself;
+but the bill was passed by great majorities in both Houses, and served
+in some respects as a model for that which was now to be brought
+forward, the difference being that the Regent was not to be expressly
+named in it. To quote the words of the royal speech, the King "proposed
+to the consideration of the two Houses whether, under the present
+circumstances, it would not be expedient to vest in him the power of
+appointing from time to time, by instrument in writing under his
+sign-manual, either the Queen or any other member of the royal family
+usually residing in Great Britain, to be the guardian of the person of
+his successor, and the Regent of these kingdoms, until such successor
+should attain the age of eighteen years, subject to such restrictions
+and regulations as were specified and contained in an act passed on a
+similar occasion in the fourteenth year of the late King; the Regent so
+appointed to be assisted by a council, composed of the several persons
+who, by reason of their dignities and offices, were constituted members
+of the council established by that act, together with those whom the
+Parliament might think proper to leave to his nomination."
+
+It may be doubted whether such a power as his Majesty desired was quite
+consistent with the principles of the constitution. Parliament had,
+indeed, granted Henry VIII. the still greater power of nominating a
+series of successors; but the appointment which he consequently made by
+will was eventually superseded, when, on the failure of his immediate
+descendants, the representative of his elder sister, whom he had passed
+over, was seated on the throne, to the exclusion of the descendants of
+his younger sister, to whom he had given the preference. In France, the
+last two kings, Louis XIII. and XIV., had both, when on their
+death-beds, assumed the right of making the arrangements for the Regency
+which would become necessary, the heir to the throne being in each case
+a minor; but in each instance the arrangements which they had made were
+disregarded.
+
+However, on the present occasion the minister (who must be taken to have
+framed the King's speech) and the Parliament agreed in the propriety of
+conferring the nomination of the Regent on the King himself;[16] and the
+bill might have passed almost without notice, had it not been for a
+strange display of the Prime-minister's ill-temper and mismanagement.
+Mr. Grenville was at all times uncourtly and dictatorial in his manner,
+even to the King himself; he was also of a suspicious disposition; and
+though he was universally believed to have owed his promotion to his
+present office to the recommendation of Lord Bute,[17] he was extremely
+jealous of his predecessor. He professed to believe, and probably did
+believe, that the King was still greatly under Lord Bute's influence
+(though, in fact, they had never met since that minister had quitted the
+Treasury), that Lord Bute was still as closely connected with the
+Princess of Wales as scandal had formerly reported him to be, and that
+George III., under the pressure of their combined influence, would be
+induced to name his mother rather than his wife as the future Regent.
+And he was so entirely swayed by this ridiculous and wholly groundless
+fear, that, when the bill to give effect to the royal recommendation was
+introduced into the House of Lords, he instigated one of his friends to
+raise the question who were included in the general term "the royal
+family," which Lord Halifax, as Secretary of State, answered by saying
+that he regarded it as meaning "those only who were in order of
+succession to the throne." Such a definition would have excluded the
+Queen as effectually as the Princess Dowager; and when Mr. Grenville
+found the peers reluctant to accept this view (which, indeed, his own
+Lord Chancellor pronounced untenable), he then sent another of his
+colleagues to represent to the King that his mother was so unpopular
+that, even if the Lords should pass the bill in such a form as rendered
+her eligible for nomination, the Commons would introduce a clause to
+exclude her by name. With great unwillingness, and, it is said, not
+without tears, George III. consented to the bill being so drawn as to
+exclude her, and it passed the Lords in such a form. But when it reached
+the Commons it was found that if the leaders of the Opposition hated
+Bute much, they hated Grenville more. They moved the insertion of the
+name of the Princess Dowager as one of the members of the royal family
+whom the King might nominate Regent, if it should please him. Even
+Grenville had not the boldness publicly to disparage his royal master's
+royal mother; the Princess's name was inserted by a unanimous vote in
+the list of those from whom the King was empowered to select the Regent,
+and the amendment was gladly accepted by the House of Lords.[18]
+
+In spite, however, of the unanimity of the two Houses on the question,
+it will probably be thought that the authors of the amendment, by which
+it was proposed to address the King with an entreaty to name in the bill
+the person to whom he desired to intrust the Regency, acted more in the
+spirit of the constitution than those who were contented that the name
+should be omitted; indeed, that statesmen of the present century agree
+in holding that an arrangement of such importance should be made by the
+Houses of Parliament, in concurrence with the sovereign, and not by the
+sovereign alone, is shown by the steps taken to provide for a Regency in
+the event of the demise of the reigning sovereign while the heir was a
+minor, in the last and in the present reign, the second bill (that of
+1840) being in this respect of the greater authority, since Lord
+Melbourne, the Prime-minister, did not propose it without previously
+securing the approval of the Duke of Wellington, in his character of
+leader of the Opposition.
+
+We pass over for a moment the administration of Lord Rockingham, as we
+have already passed over the taxation of our North American Colonies by
+Mr. Grenville, because it will be more convenient to take all the
+transactions relating to that subject together when we arrive at the
+time when the troubles arising out of the policy of the different
+administrations toward those Colonies were brought to a head by the
+breaking out of civil war. Lord Rockingham's ministry, which succeeded
+Mr. Grenville's, had, as is well known, but a brief existence, and was
+replaced by the cabinet so whimsically composed by Mr. Pitt, who
+reserved to himself the office of Privy Seal, with the Earldom of
+Chatham; the Duke of Grafton being the nominal head of the Treasury, but
+the direction of affairs being wholly in the hands of the new Earl, till
+the failure of his health compelled his temporary retirement from public
+life. Lord Chatham was brother-in-law to Mr. Grenville, to whom in the
+occasional arrogance and arbitrariness of his disposition he bore some
+resemblance; and one of the earliest acts of his administration, when
+coupled with the language which he held on the subject in the House of
+Lords, displayed that side of his character in a very conspicuous light.
+
+The summer of 1766 had been unusually wet and cold, both at home and
+abroad, and the harvest had, in consequence, been so deficient as to
+cause a very general apprehension of scarcity, while rumors were spread
+that the high prices which the shortness of the crops could not fail to
+produce were artificially raised by the selfish covetousness of some of
+the principal corn-dealers, who were buying up all the grain which came
+into the market, and storing it, with the object of making an exorbitant
+profit out of the necessities of the consumer, not only at home but
+abroad. The poorer classes, seeing themselves, as they believed,
+threatened with famine, rose in riotous crowds, in some places attacking
+the barns in which the corn was stored, and threatening destruction to
+both the storehouses and the owners. The ministry first tried to repress
+the discontent by the issue of a proclamation against "forestallers and
+regraters," framed in the language and spirit of the Middle Ages; and,
+when that proved ineffectual to restore confidence, they issued an Order
+in Council absolutely prohibiting the exportation of any kind of grain,
+and authorizing the detention of any vessels lying in any British harbor
+which might be loaded with such a cargo. Our annals furnished no
+instance of such an embargo having been laid on any article of commerce
+in time of peace; but the crisis was difficult, the danger to the
+tranquillity of the kingdom was great and undeniable, the necessity for
+instant action seemed urgent, and probably few would have been inclined
+to cavil at Lord Chatham's assertion, that the embargo "was an act of
+power which, during the recess of Parliament, was justifiable on the
+ground of necessity," had the ministry at once called Parliament
+together to sanction the measure by an act of indemnity. But Lord
+Chatham was at all times inclined to carry matters with a high hand, and
+willingly adopted the opinion advanced by the Chancellor (Lord
+Northington), that "the measure was strictly legal, and that no
+indemnity was necessary." Lord Northington's language on the subject
+Lord Campbell describes as "exhibiting his characteristic rashness and
+recklessness, which seemed to be aggravated by age and experience,"[19]
+and the censure does not seem too severe, since he presently "went so
+far as to maintain that the crown had a right to interfere, even against
+a positive act of parliament, and that proof of the necessity amounted
+to a legal justification." But, however ill-considered his language may
+have been, Lord Chatham adopted it, and acted on it so far as to decline
+calling the Parliament together before the appointed time, though, when
+the Houses did meet, he allowed General Conway, as Secretary of State,
+to introduce a bill of indemnity in the House of Commons. It was warmly
+opposed in that House, partly on the ground that, if such a measure as
+the embargo had been necessary, it would have been easy to have
+assembled Parliament before the Order in Council was issued (for, in
+fact, the proclamation against forestallers and regraters had been
+issued on the 10th of September, when Parliament, if not farther
+prorogued, would have met within a week). But on that same day
+Parliament was farther prorogued from the 16th of September till the
+11th of November,[20] and it was not till after that prorogation, on the
+24th of September, that the Order in Council was issued.
+
+In the House of Lords it seems to have been admitted that the embargo
+was, under all the circumstances, not only desirable, but "indispensably
+necessary."[21] But the Opposition in that House, being led by a great
+lawyer (Chief-justice Lord Mansfield), took a wider view of the whole
+case; and, after denouncing the long prorogation of Parliament as having
+been so culpably advised that there was no way left of meeting the
+emergency but by an interposition of the royal power, directed the
+principal weight of their argument against the doctrine of the existence
+of any dispensing power. It was urged that the late Order in Council
+could only be justified by "the general proposition that of any, and, if
+of any, of every, act of parliament the King, with the advice of the
+Privy Council, may suspend the execution and effect whenever his
+Majesty, so advised, judges it necessary for the immediate safety of the
+people." And this proposition was denounced as utterly inconsistent with
+the principles of the Revolution, which had been "nothing but a most
+lawless and wicked invasion of the rights of the crown," if such a
+dispensing power were really one of the lawful prerogatives of the
+sovereign. Reference was made to the powers in more than one instance,
+and especially in the case of ship-money claimed and exercised by
+Charles I.; and it was affirmed that "the dispensing and suspending
+power, and that of raising money without the consent of Parliament, were
+precisely alike, and stood on the very same ground. They were born
+twins; they lived together, and together were buried in the same grave
+at the Revolution, past all power of resurrection." It was even argued
+that the dispensing or suspending power was yet more dangerous than that
+of raising money without a Parliamentary vote, since it was a power
+which might do the most mischief, and with the greatest speed, so many
+were the subjects which it included. It would be a return to the maxims
+of the idolators of prerogative as understood in those earlier days,
+that is, of absolute and arbitrary power, _a Deo Rex, a Rege Lex_. It
+was farther argued that, unless it could be said that the moment
+Parliament breaks up the King stands in its place, and that the
+continuance of acts is consigned into his hands, he cannot of right
+suspend any more than he can make laws, both acts requiring the same
+power. The law is above the King, and the crown as well as the subject
+is bound by it as much during the recess as in the session of
+Parliament; and therefore the wisdom of the constitution has excluded
+every discretion in the crown over a positive statute, and has
+emancipated Parliament from the royal prerogative, leaving the power of
+suspension, which is but another name for a temporary repeal, to reside
+where the legislative power is lodged--that is, in King, Lords, and
+Commons, who together constitute the only supreme authority of this
+government. Precedents were cited to prove that in former times
+different ministries had avoided thus taking the law into their own
+hands, as when, in 1709 and again in 1756, there was a similar
+apprehension of scarcity, even though both those years were years of
+war. And the Bill of Rights was quoted as the statute in which every
+sort of dispensing power was condemned, though, as exercised by James
+II., it had only been exerted in dispensing with penal laws and
+remitting penalties.
+
+"Finally," said one speaker, who perhaps was Lord Mansfield himself, "he
+is not a moderate minister who would rashly decide in favor of
+prerogative in a question where the rights of Parliament are involved,
+nor a prudent minister who, even in a doubtful case, commits the
+prerogative, by a wanton experiment, to what degree the people will bear
+the extent of it. The opposite course was that by which a minister would
+consult the best interests of the crown, as well as of the people. The
+safety of the crown, as well as the security of the subject, requires
+the closing up of every avenue that can lead to tyranny."[22]
+
+These arguments prevailed, and the indemnity bill was passed, to quote
+the words of the "Annual Register"--at that time written by Burke--"very
+much to the satisfaction of the public." And that it should have been so
+accepted is creditable to the good-sense of both parties. The precedent
+which was thus established does, indeed, seem to rest on a principle
+indispensable to the proper working of a constitutional government. In
+so extensive an empire as ours, it is scarcely possible that sudden
+emergencies, requiring the instant application of some remedy, should
+not at times arise; and, unless Parliament be sitting at the time, such
+can only be adequately dealt with if the ministers of the crown have the
+courage to take such steps as are necessary, whether by the suspension
+of a law or by any other expedient, on their own responsibility,
+trusting in their ability to satisfy the Parliament, instantly convoked
+to receive their explanation, of the necessity or wisdom of their
+proceedings; and in the candor of the Parliament to recognize, if not
+the judiciousness of their action, at all events the good faith in which
+it has been taken, and the honest, patriotic intention which has
+dictated it. The establishment of the obligation instantly to submit the
+question to the judgment of Parliament will hardly be denied to be a
+sufficient safeguard against the ministerial abuse of such a power; and
+the instances in which such a power has since been exercised, coupled
+with the sanction of such exercise by Parliament, are a practical
+approval and ratification by subsequent Parliaments of the course that
+was now adopted.[23]
+
+The next year a not very creditable job of the ministry led to the
+enactment of a statute of great importance to all holders of property
+which had ever belonged to the crown. In the twenty-first year of James
+I. a bill had been passed giving a secure tenure of their estates to all
+grantees of crown lands whose possession of them had lasted sixty years.
+The Houses had desired to make the enactment extend to all future as
+well as to all previous grants. But to this James had refused to
+consent; and, telling the Houses that "beggars must not be choosers," he
+had compelled them to content themselves with a retrospective statute.
+Since his time, and especially in the reigns of Charles II. and William
+III., the crown had been more lavish and unscrupulous than at any former
+period in granting away its lands and estates to favorites. And no one
+had been so largely enriched by its prodigality as the most grasping of
+William's Dutch followers, Bentinck, the founder of the English house of
+Portland. Among the estates which he had obtained from his royal
+master's favor was one which went by the name of the Honor of Penrith.
+Subsequent administrations had augmented the dignities and importance of
+his family. Their Earldom had been exchanged for a Dukedom; but the
+existing Duke was an opponent of the present ministry, who, to punish
+him, suggested to Sir James Lowther, a baronet of ancient family, and of
+large property in the North of England, the idea of applying to the
+crown for a grant of the forest of Inglewood, and of the manor of
+Carlisle, which hitherto had been held by Portland as belonging to the
+Honor of Penrith, but which, not having been expressly mentioned in the
+original grant by William III., it was now said had been regarded as
+included in the honor only by mistake. It was not denied that Portland
+had enjoyed the ownership of these lands for upward of seventy years
+without dispute; and, had the statute of James been one of continual
+operation, it would have been impossible to deprive him of them. But, as
+matters stood, the Lords of the Treasury willingly listened to the
+application of Sir James Lowther; they even refused permission to the
+Duke to examine the original deed and the other documents in the office
+of the surveyor, on which he professed to rely for the establishment of
+his right; and they granted to Sir James the lands he prayed for at a
+rent which could only be regarded as nominal. The injustice of the
+proceeding was so flagrant, that in the beginning of 1768 Sir George
+Savile brought in a bill to prevent any repetition of such an act by
+making the statute of James I. perpetual, so that for the future a
+possession for sixty years should confer an indisputable and
+indefeasible title. The ministers opposed it with great vehemence, even
+taking some credit to themselves for their moderation in not requiring
+from the Duke a repayment of the proceeds of the lands in question for
+the seventy years during which he had held them. But the case was so bad
+that they could only defeat Sir George Savile by a side-wind and a
+scanty majority, carrying an amendment to defer any decision of the
+matter till the next session. Sir George, however, was not discouraged;
+he renewed his motion in 1769, when it was carried by a large majority,
+with an additional clause extending its operation to the Colonies in
+North America; and thus, in respect of its territorial rights, the crown
+was placed on the same footing as any private individual, and the same
+length of tenure which enabled a possessor to hold a property against
+another subject henceforth equally enabled him to hold it against the
+crown. The policy not less than the justice of such an enactment might
+have been thought to commend it to every thinking man as soon as the
+heat engendered by a party debate had passed away. It had merely placed
+the sovereign and the subject on the same footing in respect of the
+security which prescription gave to possession. And it might, therefore,
+have been thought that the vote of 1769 had settled the point in every
+case; since what was the law between one private individual and another,
+and between the sovereign and a subject, might well have been taken to
+be of universal application. But the ministry were strangely unwilling
+to recognize such a universal character in the late act, and found in
+the peculiar character of ecclesiastical bodies and ecclesiastical
+property a pretext for weakening the force of the late enactment, by
+denying the applicability of the principle to the claims of
+ecclesiastical chapters. In 1772 Mr. Henry Seymour, one of the members
+for Huntingdon, moved for leave to bring in a bill, which he described
+as one "for quieting the subjects of the realm against the dormant
+claims of the Church;" or, in other words, for putting the Church on the
+same footing with respect to property which had passed out of its
+possession as the crown had been placed in by the act of 1769. He
+contended that such a bill ought to be passed, not only on the general
+principle that possessors who derived their property from one source
+ought not to be less secure than they who derived it from another, but
+also on the grounds that, as ecclesiastical bodies occasionally used
+their power, "length of possession, which fortified and strengthened
+legal right and just title in every other case, did in this alone render
+them more weak and uncertain," from the difficulty which often occurred
+in finding documentary proof of very ancient titles; and that this was
+not an imaginary danger, since a member of the House then present had
+recently lost L120,000 by a bishop reviving a claim to an estate after
+the gentleman's family had been in undisturbed possession of it above a
+hundred years. The defence of the Church, however, was taken up by Mr.
+Skinner, Attorney-general for the Duchy of Lancaster, who argued that
+though, in the case of the crown, the _nullum tempus_ which it had
+formerly claimed, and which had been put an end to in 1769, was "an
+engine in the hands of the strong to oppress the weak, the _nullum
+tempus_ of the Church was a defence to the weak against the strong," as
+its best if not its sole security "against the encroachment of the
+laity." The "Parliamentary History" records that in the course of a long
+debate Lord North opposed the bringing in of the bill, as did "the
+Lord-advocate of Scotland, who gave as a reason in favor of the bill,
+though he voted against it, that a law of similar nature had passed in
+Scotland, and that the whole kingdom, clergy as well as laity, found the
+very best effects from it."[24] Burke argued in favor of the bill with
+great force, declaring that in so doing "he did not mean anything
+against the Church, her dignities, her honor, her privileges, or her
+possessions; he should wish even to enlarge them all; but this bill was
+to take nothing from her but the power of making herself odious." But
+the ministerial majority was too well disciplined to be broken, and Mr.
+Seymour could not even obtain leave to bring in the bill.
+
+The year 1772 was marked by the discussion of a measure which the King
+seems to have regarded as one of private interest only, affecting his
+personal rights over his own family. But it is impossible to regard
+transactions which may affect the right of succession to the throne as
+matters of only private interest. And indeed the bill was treated as one
+involving a constitutional question by both sides of both Houses, and as
+such was discussed with remarkable earnestness, and with vehemence
+equalling that of any other debate which had as yet taken place since
+the commencement of the reign. The bill had its origin in the personal
+feelings of the King himself, who had been greatly annoyed at the
+conduct of his brother, the Duke of Cumberland, in marrying a widow of
+the name of Horton, daughter of Lord Irnham, and sister of the Colonel
+Luttrell whom the vote of the House of Commons had seated as member for
+Middlesex; and perhaps still more at the discovery that his other
+brother, the Duke of Gloucester, to whom he was greatly attached, had
+married another subject, the widowed Lady Waldegrave. His Majesty's
+dissatisfaction was, perhaps, heightened by the recollection that he
+himself, in early manhood, had also been strongly attracted by the
+charms of another subject, and had sacrificed his own inclinations to
+the combined considerations of pride of birth and the interests of his
+kingdom. And, though there was a manifest difference between the
+importance of the marriage of the sovereign himself and that of princes
+who were never likely to become sovereigns, he thought it not
+unreasonable that he should be empowered to exercise such a general
+guardianship over the entire family, of which he was the head, as might
+enable him to control its members in such arrangements, by making his
+formal sanction indispensable to the validity of any matrimonial
+alliances which they might desire to contract. A somewhat similar
+question had been raised in 1717, when George I., having quarrelled with
+the Prince of Wales (afterward George II.), asserted a claim to control
+and direct the education of all the Prince's children, and, when they
+should be of marriageable age, to arrange their marriages. The Prince,
+on the other hand, insisted on his natural and inalienable right, as
+their father, to have the entire government of his own offspring, a
+right which, as he contended, no royal prerogative could be enabled or
+permitted to override. That question was not, however, brought before
+Parliament, to which, at that time, the King could, probably, not have
+trusted for any leanings in his favor; but he referred it, in an
+informal way, to the Lord Chancellor (Lord Cowper) and the Common-law
+Judges. They investigated it with great minuteness. A number of
+precedents were adduced for the marriage and education of the members of
+the royal family being regulated by the sovereign, beginning with Henry
+III., who gave his daughter Joan, without her own consent, in marriage
+to the King of Scotland, and coming down to the preceding century, at
+the commencement of which the Council of James I. committed the Lady
+Arabella Stuart and Mr. Seymour to the Tower for contracting a secret
+marriage without the King's permission, and at the end of which King
+William exercised the right of selecting a tutor for the Duke of
+Gloucester, the son of the Princess Anne, without any consultation with
+the Princess herself; and finally the judges, with only two dissenting
+voices, expressed their conviction that the King was entitled to the
+prerogative which he claimed. The case does not, however, seem to have
+been regularly argued before them; there is no trace of their having
+been assisted in their deliberations by counsel on either side, and
+their extra-judicial opinion was clearly destitute of any formal
+authority;[25] so that it came before Parliament in some degree as a new
+question.
+
+But George III. was not of a disposition to allow such matters to remain
+in doubt, and, in compliance with his desire, a bill was, in 1772,
+introduced by Lord Rochfort, as Secretary of State, which proposed to
+enact that no descendants of the late King, being children or
+grandchildren, and presumptive heirs of the sovereign, male or female,
+other than the issue of princesses who might be married into foreign
+families, should be capable of contracting a valid marriage without the
+previous consent of the reigning sovereign, signified under his
+sign-manual, and that any marriage contracted without such consent
+should be null and void. The King or the ministers apparently doubted
+whether Parliament could be prevailed on to make such a prohibition
+life-long, and therefore a clause was added which provided that if any
+prince or princess above the age of twenty-five years should determine
+to contract a marriage without such consent of the sovereign, he or she
+might do so on giving twelve months' notice to the Privy Council; and
+such marriage should be good and valid, unless, before the expiration of
+the twelve months, both Houses of Parliament should declare their
+disapproval of the marriage. The concluding clause of the bill made it
+felony "to presume to solemnize, or to assist, or to be present, at the
+celebration of any such marriage without such consent being first
+obtained."
+
+The bill was stoutly resisted in both Houses at every stage, both on the
+ground of usage and of general principle. It was positively denied that
+the "sovereign's right of approving of all marriages in the royal
+family," which was asserted in the preamble of the bill, was either
+founded in law, or established by precedent, or warranted by the opinion
+of the judges. And it was contended that there never had been a time
+when the possession of royal rank had been considered necessary to
+qualify any one to become consort of an English prince or princess. It
+had not even been regarded as a necessary qualification for a queen.
+Three of the wives of Henry VIII. had been English subjects wholly
+unconnected with the royal family; nor had the Parliament nor the people
+in general complained of any one of those marriages; moreover, two of
+his children, who had in their turn succeeded to the crown, had been the
+offspring of two of those wives; and in the last century James II.,
+while Duke of York, had married the daughter of an English gentleman;
+and, though it had not been without notorious reluctance that his royal
+brother had sanctioned that connection, it was well known that Charles
+II. himself had proposed to marry the niece of Cardinal Mazarin. In the
+House of Peers, Lord Camden especially objected to the clause annulling
+a marriage between persons of full age; and in the Commons, Mr.
+Dowdeswell, who had been Chancellor of the Exchequer in Lord
+Rockingham's administration, dwelt with especial vigor on the
+unreasonableness of the clause which fixed twenty-five as the age before
+which no prince or princess could marry without the King's consent.
+"Law, positive law," he argued, "and not the arbitrary will of an
+individual, should be the only restraint. Men who are by law allowed at
+twenty-one[26] to be fit for governing the realm may well be supposed
+capable of choosing and governing a wife."[27] Lord Folkestone condemned
+with great earnestness the expression in the preamble that the bill was
+dictated "by the royal concern for the honor and dignity of the crown,"
+as implying a doctrine that an alliance of a subject with a branch of
+the royal family is dishonorable to the crown--a doctrine which he
+denounced as "an oblique insult" to the whole people, and which, as
+such, "the representatives of the people were bound to oppose." And he
+also objected to the "vindicatory part," as he termed the clause which
+declared those who might assist, or even be present, at a marriage
+contracted without the royal permission guilty of felony.[28]
+
+The ministry, however, had a decided majority in both Houses, and the
+bill became and remains the law of the land, though fourteen peers,
+including one bishop, entered a protest against it on nine different
+grounds, one of which condemned it as "an extension of the royal
+prerogative for which the great majority of the judges found no
+authority;" while another, with something of prophetic sagacity, urged
+that the bill "was pregnant with civil discord and confusion, and had a
+natural tendency to produce a disputed title to the crown."
+
+It may be doubted whether the circumstances which had induced George
+III. to demand such a power as that with which the bill invested him
+justified its enactment. He was already the father of a family so
+numerous as to render it highly improbable that either of his brothers
+or any of their children would ever come to the throne; while, as a
+previously existing law barred any prince or princess who might marry a
+Roman Catholic from the succession, the additional restraint imposed by
+the new statute practically limited their choice to an inconveniently
+small number of foreign royal houses, many of which, to say the least,
+are not superior in importance or purity of blood to many of our own
+nobles.
+
+Nor can it be said to have been successful in accomplishing his
+Majesty's object. It is notorious that two of his sons, and very
+generally believed that one of his daughters, married subjects; the
+Prince of Wales having chosen a wife who was not only inferior in rank
+and social position to Lady Waldegrave or Mrs. Horton, but was moreover
+a Roman Catholic; and that another of his sons petitioned more than once
+for permission to marry an English heiress of ancient family. And our
+present sovereign may be thought to have pronounced her opinion that the
+act goes too far, when she gave one of her younger daughters in marriage
+to a nobleman who, however high in rank, has no royal blood in his
+veins. The political inconvenience which might arise from the
+circumstance of the reigning sovereign being connected by near and
+intimate relationship with a family of his British subjects will,
+probably, always be thought to render it desirable that some restriction
+should be placed on the marriage of the heir-apparent; but where the
+sovereign is blessed with a numerous offspring, there seems no
+sufficient reason for sending the younger branches of the royal house to
+seek wives or husbands in foreign countries. And as the precedent set in
+the case of the Princess Louise has been generally approved, it is
+probable that in similar circumstances it may be followed, and that such
+occasional relaxation of the act of 1772 will be regarded as justified
+by and consistent with the requirements of public policy as well as by
+the laws of nature.[29] Generally speaking, the two Houses agreed in
+their support of the ministerial policy both at home and abroad; but, in
+spite of this political harmony, a certain degree of bad feeling existed
+between them, which on one occasion led to a somewhat singular scene in
+the House of Commons. The Commons imputed its origin to the discourtesy
+of the Lords, who, when members of the Commons were ordered by their
+House to carry its bills up to the peers, sometimes kept them "waiting
+three hours in the lobby among their lordships' footmen before they
+admitted them." Burke affirmed that this had happened to himself, and
+that he "spoke of it, not out of any personal pride, nor as an indignity
+to himself, but as a flagrant disgrace to the House of Commons, which,
+he apprehended, was not inferior in rank to any other branch of the
+Legislature, but co-ordinate with them." And the irritation which such
+treatment excited led the Commons, perhaps not very unnaturally, to seek
+some opportunity to vindicate their dignity. They found it in an
+amendment which the Lords made on a corn bill. In the middle of April,
+1772, resolutions had been passed by the Commons, in a committee of the
+whole House, imposing certain duties on the importation of wheat[30] and
+other grain when they were at a certain price, which was fixed at 48s.,
+and granting bounties on exportation when the price fell below 44s. The
+Lords made several amendments on the bill, and, among others, one to
+strike out the clause which granted bounties. But when the bill thus
+amended came back to the Commons, even those who disliked the principle
+of bounties resented this act of the Lords in meddling with that
+question, which they regarded as a violation of their peculiar and most
+cherished privilege, the exclusive right of dealing with questions of
+taxation. Governor Pownall, who had charge of the bill, declared that
+the Lords had forgotten their duty when they interfered in raising money
+by the insertion of a clause that "no bounty should be paid upon
+exported corn." And on this ground he moved the rejection of the
+bill.[31] In the last chapter of this volume, a more fitting occasion
+for examining the rights and usages of the House of Lords with respect
+to money-bills will be furnished by a series of resolutions on the
+subject, moved by the Prime-minister of the day. It is sufficient here
+to say that the power of rejection is manifestly so different from that
+of originating grants--which is admitted to belong exclusively to the
+Commons--and that there were so many precedents for the Lords having
+exerted this power of rejection in the course of the preceding century,
+that they probably never conceived that in so doing now they were
+committing any encroachment on the constitutional rights and privileges
+of the Lower House. But on this occasion the ill-feeling previously
+existing between the two Houses may be thought to have predisposed the
+Commons to seek opportunity for a quarrel. And there never was a case in
+which both parties in the House were more unanimous. Governor Pownall
+called the rejection of the clause by the Lords "a flagrant encroachment
+upon the privileges of the House," and affirmed that the Lords had
+"forgotten their duty." Burke termed it "a proof that the Lords did not
+understand the principles of the constitution, an invasion of a known
+and avowed right inherent in the House as the representatives of the
+people," and expressed a hope that "they were not yet so infamous and
+abandoned as to relinquish this essential right," or to submit to "the
+annihilation of all their authority." Others called it "an affront which
+the House was bound to resent, and the more imperatively in consequence
+of the absence of a good understanding between the two Houses." And the
+Speaker, Sir John Cust, went beyond all his brother members in violence,
+declaring that "he would do his part in the business, and toss the bill
+over the table." The bill was rejected _nem. con._, and the Speaker
+tossed it over the table, several of the members on both sides of the
+question kicking it as they went out;[32] and to such a pitch of
+exasperation had they worked themselves up, that "the Game Bill, in
+which the Lords had made alterations, was served in a similar manner,"
+though those alterations only referred to the penalties to be imposed
+for violations of the Game-law, and could by no stretch of ingenuity be
+connected with any question of taxation.
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 16: A motion was, indeed, made (but the "Parliamentary
+History," xvi., 55, omits to state by whom) that the House should
+"humbly entreat his Majesty, out of his tender and paternal regard for
+his people, that he would be graciously pleased to name the person or
+persons whom, in his royal wisdom, he shall think fit to propose to the
+consideration of Parliament for the execution of those high trusts, this
+House apprehending it not warranted by precedent nor agreeable to the
+principles of this free constitution to vest in any person or persons
+not particularly named and approved of in Parliament the important
+offices of Regent of these kingdoms and guardian of the royal offspring
+heirs to the crown." But "it passed in the negative," probably, if we
+may judge by other divisions on motions made by the same party, by an
+overwhelming majority.]
+
+[Footnote 17: No one doubted that this choice had been made under the
+influence of Lord Bute, and was designed for the preservation of that
+influence.--Lord Stanhope, _History of England_, v., 41.]
+
+[Footnote 18: In his speech in the House of Lords on the Regency Bill of
+1840, the Duke of Sussex stated that George III. had nominated the Queen
+as Regent in the first instance, and, in the event of her death, the
+Princess Dowager.]
+
+[Footnote 19: "Lives of the Chancellors," c. cxli.]
+
+[Footnote 20: It appears from these dates that it was not yet understood
+that Parliament could not be prorogued for a longer period than forty
+days.]
+
+[Footnote 21: These words occur in a speech attributed to Lord
+Mansfield. There is no detailed account of the debates on this subject
+in either House. All that exists in the "Parliamentary History" is a
+very brief abstract of the discussion in the Commons, and a document
+occupying above sixty pages of the same work (pp. 251-314), entitled "A
+Speech on behalf of the Constitution against the Suspending and
+Dispensing Prerogative," etc., with a foot-note explaining that "this
+speech was supposed to be penned by Lord Mansfield, but was, in fact,
+written by Mr. Macintosh, assisted by Lord Temple and Lord Lyttleton."
+It certainly seems to contain internal evidence that it was not written
+by any lawyer, from the sneers at and denunciations of lawyers which it
+contains, as a class of men who "have often appeared to be the worst
+guardians of the constitution, and too frequently the wickedest enemies
+to, and most treacherous betrayers of, the liberties of their country."
+But, by whomsoever it was "penned" and published, the arguments which it
+contains against the dispensing power were, probably, those which had
+been urged by the great Chief-justice, and as such I have ventured to
+cite them here.]
+
+[Footnote 22: In his "Lives of the Chief-justices" (c. xxxvi., life of
+Lord Mansfield), Lord Campbell says, with reference to this case: "The
+Chief-justice's only considerable public exhibition during this period
+was his attack on the unconstitutional assertion of Lord Chatham and
+Lord Camden, that, in a case of great public emergency, the crown could
+by law dispense with an act of parliament. The question arising from the
+embargo on the exportation of corn, in consequence of apprehended
+famine, he proved triumphantly that, although the measure was expedient
+and proper, it was a violation of law, and required to be sanctioned by
+an act of indemnity." And Lord Campbell adds, in a note: "This doctrine,
+acted upon in 1827, during the administration of Mr. Canning, and on
+several subsequent occasions, is now universally taken for
+constitutional law" (ii., 468).]
+
+[Footnote 23: To adduce a single instance, worthy of remark as affecting
+the personal liberty of the subject, in 1818 a bill of indemnity was
+passed to sanction the action of the ministry in arresting and detaining
+in prison, without bringing them to trial, several persons accused of
+being implicated in seditious proceedings (_vide infra_).]
+
+[Footnote 24: Vol. xvii., 304.]
+
+[Footnote 25: The case is mentioned by Lord Campbell in his "Lives of
+the Chancellors," c. cxxi. (life of Lord Macclesfield) and c. cxxiv.
+(life of Lord Chancellor King).]
+
+[Footnote 26: In fact, however, the age at which a young prince was
+considered competent to exercise the royal authority in person had been
+fixed at eighteen; and it is so stated in the speech in which the King,
+in 1765, recommended the appointment of a Regent to Parliament.--
+_Parliamentary History_, xvi., 52.]
+
+[Footnote 27: This idea was expanded into an epigram, which appeared in
+most of the daily papers, and has been thought worthy of being preserved
+in the "Parliamentary History," xvii., 401 (note):
+
+  "Quoth Dick to Tom, 'This act appears
+    Absurd, as I'm alive,
+  To take the crown at eighteen years,
+    A wife at twenty-five.
+  The mystery how shall we explain?
+    For sure, as Dowdeswell said,
+  Thus early if they're fit to _reign_,
+    They must be fit to _wed_.'
+  Quoth Tom to Dick, 'Thou art a fool,
+    And nothing know'st of life;
+  Alas! it's easier far to rule
+    A kingdom than a wife.'"]
+
+[Footnote 28: It is remarkable that this clause on one occasion proved
+an obstacle to the punishment of the abettors of such a marriage. In
+1793 the Duke of Sussex married Lady Augusta Murray, first at Rome, and
+afterward, by banns, at St. George's, Hanover Square. And when the
+affair came to be investigated by the Privy Council, Lord Thurlow
+denounced the conduct of the pair in violent terms, and angrily asked
+the Attorney-general, Sir John Scott, why he had not prosecuted all the
+parties concerned in this abominable marriage. Sir John's reply, as he
+reported it himself, was sufficiently conclusive: "I answered that it
+was a very difficult business to prosecute; that the act, it was
+understood, had been drawn by Lord Mansfield, the Attorney-general
+Thurlow, and the Solicitor-general Wedderburn, who, unluckily, had made
+all persons present at the marriage guilty of felony. And as nobody
+could prove the marriage except a person who had been present at it,
+there could be no prosecution, because nobody present could be compelled
+to be a witness."--THORP'S _Life of Eldon_, i., 235.]
+
+[Footnote 29: A protest against the bill, entered by fourteen peers,
+including one bishop (of Bangor), denounced it, among other objections,
+as "contrary to the original inherent rights of human nature ...
+exceeding the power permitted by Divine Providence to human legislation
+... and shaking many of the foundations of law, religion, and public
+security."--_Parliamentary History_, xvii., 391.]
+
+[Footnote 30: The import duty on wheat was fixed at 6_d_. a quarter on
+grain, and 2_d_. per cwt. on flour, when the price of wheat in the
+kingdom should be at or above 48s.; when it was at or above 44s., the
+exportation was to be altogether prohibited.--_Parliamentary History_,
+xvii., 476.]
+
+[Footnote 31: See Hallam, "Constitutional History," iii., 38-46, ed.
+1833, where, as far as the imperfection of our early Parliamentary
+records allows, he traces the origin of the assertion of this peculiar
+privilege by the Commons, especially referring to a discussion of the
+proper limits of this privilege in several conferences between the two
+Houses; where, as on some other occasions, he sees, in the assertion of
+their alleged rights by the Commons, "more disposition to make
+encroachments than to guard against those of others." A few years before
+(in 1763), the House of Lords showed that they had no doubt of their
+right to reject a money-bill, since they divided on the Cider Bill,
+which came under that description. As, however, the bill was passed,
+that division was not brought under the notice of the House. But in
+1783, in the time of the Coalition Ministry, the peers having made
+amendments on the American Intercourse Bill, "the Speaker observed that,
+as the bill empowered the crown to impose duties, it was, strictly
+speaking, a money-bill, and therefore the House could not, consistently
+with its own orders, suffer the Lords to make any amendments on it, and
+he recommended that the consideration of their amendments should be
+postponed for three months, and in the mean time a new bill framed
+according to the Lords' amendments should be passed." The recommendation
+was approved by Mr. Pitt, as leader of the Opposition, and approved and
+acted on by Mr. Fox, as leader of the ministry in that House. But, at
+the same time, Mr. Fox fully admitted the right of the Lords to discuss
+such questions, "for it would be very absurd indeed to send a loan bill
+to the Lords for their concurrence, and at the same time deprive them of
+the right of deliberation. To lay down plans and schemes for loans
+belonged solely to the Commons; and he was willing, therefore, that the
+amended bill should be rejected, though he was of opinion that the order
+of the House respecting money-bills was often too strictly construed."
+And he immediately moved for leave to bring in a new bill, which was
+verbatim the same with the amended bill sent down by the
+Lords.--_Parliamentary History_, xxiii., 895. The question was revived
+in the present reign, on the refusal of the Lords to concur in the
+abolition of the duty on paper, when the whole subject was discussed
+with such elaborate minuteness, and with so much more command of temper
+than was shown on the present occasion, that it will be better to defer
+the examination of the principle involved till we come to the history of
+that transaction.]
+
+[Footnote 32: "Parliamentary History," xvii., 515.]
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+
+Mr. Grenville imposes a Duty on Stamps in the North American
+Colonies.--Examination of Dr. Franklin.--Lord Rockingham's Ministry
+Repeals the Duty.--Lord Mansfield affirms a Virtual Representation in
+the Colonies.--Mr. C. Townsend imposes Import Duties in America.--After
+some Years, the Civil War breaks out.--Hanoverian Troops are sent to
+Gibraltar.--The Employment of Hanoverian Regiments at Gibraltar and
+Minorca.--End of the War.--Colonial Policy of the Present
+Reign.--Complaints of the Undue Influence of the Crown.--Motions for
+Parliamentary Reform.--Mr. Burke's Bill for Economical Reform.--Mr.
+Dunning's Resolution on the Influence of the Crown.--Rights of the Lords
+on Money-bills.--The Gordon Riots.
+
+
+But during these years another matter had been gradually forcing its way
+to the front, which, though at first it attracted but comparatively
+slight notice, when it came to a head, absorbed for several years the
+whole attention, not only of these kingdoms, but of foreign countries
+also. It was originally--in appearance, at least--merely a dispute
+between Great Britain and her Colonies in North America on the mode of
+obtaining a small revenue from them. But, in its progress, it eventually
+involved us in a foreign war of great magnitude, and thus became the one
+subject of supreme interest to every statesman in Europe. England had
+not borne her share in the seven years' war without a considerable
+augmentation of the national debt, and a corresponding increase in the
+amount of yearly revenue which it had become necessary to raise;[33] and
+Mr. Grenville, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, had to devise the means
+of meeting the demand. A year before, he had supported with great warmth
+the proposal of Sir Francis Dashwood, his predecessor at the Exchequer,
+to lay a new tax upon cider. Now that he himself had succeeded to that
+office, he cast his eyes across the Atlantic, and, on the plea that the
+late war had to a certain extent been undertaken for the defence of the
+Colonies in North America, he proposed to make them bear a share in the
+burden caused by enterprises from which they had profited. Accordingly,
+in March, 1764, he proposed a series of resolutions imposing a variety
+of import duties on different articles of foreign produce imported into
+"the British Colonies and plantations in America," and also export
+duties on a few articles of American growth when "exported or conveyed
+to any other place except to Great Britain." Another resolution affirmed
+"that, toward defraying the said expense, it might be proper to charge
+certain stamp-duties in the said Colonies and plantations."
+
+The resolutions imposing import and export duties were passed by both
+Houses almost without comment. That relating to a stamp-duty he did not
+press at the moment, announcing that he postponed it for a year, in
+order to ascertain in what light it would be regarded by the Colonists
+themselves; and as most, if not all, of the Colonies had a resident
+agent in London, he called them together, explained to them the object
+and anticipated result of the new imposition (for such he admitted it to
+be), and requested them to communicate his views to their constituents,
+adding an offer that, if they should prefer any other tax likely to be
+equally productive, he should be desirous to consult their wishes in the
+matter.
+
+He probably regarded such language on his part as a somewhat superfluous
+exercise of courtesy or conciliation, so entire was his conviction of
+the omnipotence of Parliament, and of the impossibility of any loyal man
+or body of men calling its power in question. But he was greatly
+deceived. His message was received in America with universal
+dissatisfaction. Of the thirteen States which made up the body of
+Colonies, there was scarcely one whose Assembly did not present a
+petition against the proposed measure, and against any other which might
+be considered as an alternative. Grenville, however, was not a man to be
+moved by petitions or remonstrances. He was rather one whom opposition
+of any kind hardened in his purpose; and, as no substitute had been
+suggested, at the opening of the session of 1765 he proposed a series of
+resolutions requisite to give effect to the vote of the previous year,
+and imposing "certain stamp-duties and other duties" on the settlements
+in America, perhaps thinking to render his disregard of the objections
+which had been made less unpalatable by the insertion of words binding
+the government to apply the sums to be thus raised to "the expenses of
+defending, protecting, and securing" the Colonies themselves. The
+resolutions were passed, as the "Parliamentary History" records, "almost
+without debate," on the 6th of March.[34] But the intelligence was
+received in every part of the Colonies with an indignant
+dissatisfaction, which astonished even their own agents in England.[35]
+Formidable riots broke out in several provinces. In Massachusetts the
+man who had been appointed Distributor of Stamps was burnt in effigy;
+the house of the Lieutenant-governor was attacked by a furious mob, who
+avowed their determination to murder him if he fell into their hands;
+and resolutions were passed by the Assemblies of the different States to
+convene a General Congress at New York in the autumn, to organize a
+resistance to the tax, and to take the general state of affairs into
+consideration.
+
+Before, however, that time came, a series of events having no connection
+with these transactions had led to a change of ministry in England, and
+the new cabinet was less inclined to carry matters with a high hand.
+Indeed, even the boldest statesman could hardly have learned the state
+of feeling which had been excited in America without apprehension, and
+those who had the chief weight in the new administration were not men to
+imperil the state by an insistance on abstract theories of right and
+prerogative. Accordingly, when, after Lord Rockingham had become
+Prime-minister, Parliament met in December, 1765, the royal speech
+recommended the state of affairs in America to the consideration of
+Parliament (a recommendation which manifestly implied a disposition on
+the part of the King's advisers to induce the House of Commons to
+retrace its steps), papers were laid before Parliament, and witnesses
+from America were examined, and among them a man who had already won a
+high reputation by his scientific acquirements, but who had not been
+previously prominent as a politician, Dr. Benjamin Franklin. He had come
+over to England as agent for Pennsylvania, and his examination, as
+preserved in the "Parliamentary History," may be taken as a complete
+statement of the matter in dispute from the American point of view, and
+of the justification which the Colonists conceived themselves to have
+for refusing to submit to pay such a tax as had now been imposed upon
+them. At a later day he was one of the most zealous, as he was probably
+one of the earliest, advocates of separation from England; but as yet
+neither his language nor his actions afforded any trace of such a
+feeling.
+
+He affirmed[36] the general temper of the Colonists toward Great Britain
+to have been, till this act was passed, the best in the world. They
+considered themselves as a part of the British empire, and as having one
+common interest with it. They did not consider themselves as foreigners.
+They were jealous for the honor and prosperity of this nation, and
+always were, and always would be, ready to support it as far as their
+little power went. They considered the Parliament of Great Britain as
+the great bulwark and security of their liberties and privileges, and
+always spoke of it with the utmost respect and veneration. They had
+given a practical proof of their goodwill by having raised, clothed, and
+paid during the last war nearly 25,000 men, and spent many millions; nor
+had any Assembly of any Colony ever refused duly to support the
+government by proper allowances from time to time to public officers.
+They had always been ready, and were ready now, to tax themselves. The
+Colonies had Assemblies of their own, which were their Parliaments. They
+were, in that respect, in the same situation as Ireland. Their
+Assemblies had a right to levy money on the subject, then to grant to
+the crown, and, indeed, had constantly done so; and he himself was
+specially instructed by the Assembly of his own State to assure the
+ministry that, as they always had done, so they should always think it
+their duty to grant such aids to the crown as were suitable to their
+circumstances and abilities, whenever called upon for the purpose in a
+constitutional manner; and that instruction he had communicated to the
+ministry. But the Colonies objected to Parliament laying on them such a
+tax as that imposed by the Stamp Act. Some duties, they admitted, the
+Parliament had a right to impose, but he drew a distinction between
+"those duties which were meant to regulate commerce and internal taxes."
+The authority of Parliament to regulate commerce had never been disputed
+by the Colonists. The sea belonged to Britain. She maintained by her
+fleets the safety of navigation on it; she kept it clear of pirates; she
+might, therefore, have a natural and equitable right to some toll or
+duty, on merchandise carried through that part of her dominions, toward
+defraying the expenses she was at in ships to maintain the safety of
+that carriage. But the case of imposition of internal taxes was wholly
+different from this. The Colonists held that, by the charters which at
+different times had been granted to the different States, they were
+entitled to all the privileges and liberties of Englishmen. They found
+in the Great Charters, and the Petition and Declarations of Right, that
+one of the privileges of English subjects is that they are not to be
+taxed but by their common consent; and these rights and privileges had
+been confirmed by the charters which at different times had been granted
+to the different States. In reply to a question put to him, he allowed
+that in the Pennsylvania charter there was a clause by which the King
+granted that he would levy no taxes on the inhabitants unless it were
+with the consent of the Colonial Assembly, or by an act of Parliament;
+words which certainly seemed to reserve a right of taxation to the
+British Parliament; but he also demonstrated that, in point of fact, the
+latter part of the clause had never been acted on, and the Colonists
+had, therefore, relied on it, from the first settlement of the province,
+that the Parliament never would nor could, by the color of that clause
+in the charter, assume a right of taxing them till it had qualified
+itself to exercise such right by admitting representatives from the
+people to be taxed. And, in addition to objections on principle, he
+urged some that he regarded as of great force as to the working of this
+particular tax imposed by the Stamp Act. It was not an equal tax, as the
+greater part of the revenue derived from it must arise from lawsuits for
+the recovery of debts, and be paid by the lower sort of people; it was a
+heavy tax on the poor, and a tax on them for being poor. In the back
+settlements, where the population was very thin, the inhabitants would
+often be unable to get stamps without taking a long journey for the
+purpose. The scarcity of specie, too, in the country would cause the
+pressure to be felt with great severity, as, in his opinion, there was
+not gold and silver enough in the Colonies to pay the stamp-duty for a
+single year. In reply to another question, whether the Colonists would
+be satisfied with a repeal of the Stamp Act without a formal
+renunciation of the abstract right of Parliament to impose it, he
+replied that he believed they would be satisfied. He thought the
+resolutions of right would give them very little concern, if they were
+never attempted to be carried into practice. The Colonies would probably
+consider themselves in the same situation in that respect as Ireland.
+They knew that the English Parliament claimed the same right with regard
+to Ireland, but that it never exercised it; and they might believe that
+they would never exercise it in the Colonies any more than in Ireland.
+Indeed, they would think that it never could exercise such a right till
+representatives from the Colonies should be admitted into Parliament,
+and that whenever an occasion arose to make Parliament regard the
+taxation of the Colonies as indispensable, representatives would be
+ordered.
+
+This last question put to the witness, like several others in the course
+of his examination, had been framed with the express purpose of
+eliciting an answer to justify the determination on the subject to which
+Lord Rockingham and his colleagues had come. It could not be denied that
+the government was placed in a situation of extreme difficulty--
+difficulty created, in part, by the conduct of the Colonists themselves.
+That, as even their most uncompromising advocate, Mr. Pitt, admitted,
+had been imprudent and intemperate, though it was the imprudence of men
+who "had been driven to madness by injustice." On the one hand, to
+repeal an act the opposition to which had been marked by fierce riots,
+such as those of Boston, and even in the Assemblies of some of the
+States by language scarcely short of treason,[37] seemed a concession to
+intimidation scarcely compatible with the maintenance of the dignity of
+the crown or the legitimate authority of Parliament. On the other hand,
+to persist in the retention of a tax which the whole population affected
+by it was evidently determined to resist to the uttermost, was to incur
+the still greater danger of rebellion and civil war. In this dilemma,
+the ministers resolved on a course calculated, as they conceived, to
+avoid both evils, by combining a satisfaction of the complaints of the
+Colonists with an assertion of the absolute supremacy of the British
+crown and Parliament for every purpose. And on February 24, 1766, the
+Secretary of State brought in a bill which, after declaring, in its
+first clause, "that the King's Majesty, by and with the consent of the
+Lords spiritual and temporal, and Commons of Great Britain, in
+Parliament assembled, had, hath, and of right ought to have, full power
+and authority to make laws and statutes of sufficient force and validity
+to bind the Colonists and people of America, subjects of the crown of
+Great Britain, in all cases whatsoever," proceeded to repeal the Stamp
+Act, giving a strong proof of the sincerity of the desire to conciliate
+the Colonists by the unusual step of fixing the second reading of the
+bill for the next day.
+
+But in its different clauses it encountered a twofold opposition, which
+he had, probably, not anticipated. It is unnecessary to notice that
+which rested solely on the inexpediency of repealing the Stamp Act, "the
+compulsory enforcement of which was required by the honor and dignity of
+the kingdom." But the first clause was even more strenuously resisted,
+on grounds which its opponents affirmed to rest on the fundamental
+principles of the constitution. It was urged in the House of Commons by
+Mr. Pitt that, "as the Colonies were not represented in Parliament,
+Great Britain had no legal right nor power to lay a tax upon them--that
+taxation is no part of the governing or legislative power. Taxes," said
+the great orator, "are the voluntary gift and grant of the Commons
+alone. In legislation the three estates of the realm are alike
+concerned; but the concurrence of the peers and the crown to a tax is
+only necessary to clothe it with the form of a law; the gift and grant
+is in the Commons alone.... The distinction between legislation and
+taxation is essentially necessary to liberty."
+
+Mr. Pitt had no claim to be considered as a great authority in the
+principles of constitutional law. George II., slight as was his
+political knowledge or wisdom, complained on one occasion of the
+ignorance of a Secretary of State who had never read Vattel; and in this
+very debate he even boasted of his ignorance of "law-cases and acts of
+Parliament." But his coadjutor in the House of Lords (Lord Camden, at
+this time Chief-justice of the Common Pleas) owed the chief part of the
+respect in which he was held to his supposed excellence as a
+constitutional lawyer, and he fully endorsed and expanded Pitt's
+arguments when the bill came up to the House of Lords. He affirmed that
+he spoke as "the defender of the law and the constitution; that, as the
+affair was of the greatest consequence, and in its consequences might
+involve the fate of kingdoms, he had taken the strictest review of his
+arguments, he had examined and re-examined all his authorities; and that
+his searches had more and more convinced him that the British Parliament
+had no right to tax the Americans. The Stamp Act was absolutely illegal,
+contrary to the fundamental laws of nature, contrary to the fundamental
+laws of this constitution--a constitution governed on the eternal and
+immutable laws of nature. The doctrine which he was asserting was not
+new; it was as old as the constitution; it grew up with it; indeed, it
+was its support. Taxation and representation are inseparably united. God
+hath joined them; no British government can put them asunder. To
+endeavor to do so is to stab our very vitals." And he objected to the
+first clause (that which declared the power and right to tax), on the
+ground that if the ministers "wantonly pressed this declaration,
+although they were now repealing the Stamp Act, they might pass it again
+in a month." He even argued that "they must have future taxation in
+view, or they would hardly assert their right to enjoy the pleasure of
+offering an insult." He was answered by Lord Northington (the
+Chancellor) and by Lord Mansfield (the Chief-justice), both of whom
+supported the motion to repeal the tax, but who also agreed in denying
+the soundness of his doctrine that, as far as the power was concerned,
+there was any distinction between a law to tax and a law for any other
+purpose; and Lord Mansfield farther denied the validity of the argument
+which it had been attempted to found on the circumstance that the
+Colonies were not represented in Parliament, propounding, on the
+contrary, what Lord Campbell calls "his doctrine of virtual
+representation." "There can," said he, "be no doubt but that the
+inhabitants of the Colonies are represented in Parliament, as the
+greatest part of the people of England are represented, among nine
+millions of whom there are eight who have no votes in electing members
+of Parliament. Every objection, therefore, to the dependency of the
+Colonies upon Parliament which arises upon the ground of representation
+goes to the whole present constitution of Great Britain.... For what
+purpose, then, are arguments drawn from a distinction in which there is
+no real difference of a virtual and an actual representation? A member
+of Parliament chosen for any borough represents not only the
+constituents and inhabitants of that particular place, but he represents
+the inhabitants of every other borough in Great Britain. He represents
+the City of London and all the other Commons of the land, and the
+inhabitants of all the colonies and dominions of Great Britain, and is
+in duty and conscience bound to take care of their interests."
+
+Lord Mansfield's doctrine of a virtual representation of the Colonies
+must be admitted to be overstrained. The analogy between the case of
+colonists in a country from no part of which representatives are sent to
+Parliament, and that of a borough or county where some classes of the
+population which may, in a sense, be regarded as spokesmen or agents of
+the rest form a constituency and return members, must be allowed to
+fail; yet the last sentences of this extract are worth preserving, as
+laying down the important constitutional principle, subsequently
+expanded and enforced with irresistible learning and power of argument
+by Burke, that a member of the House of Commons is not a delegate,
+bound, under all circumstances, to follow the opinions or submit to the
+dictation of his constituents, but that from the moment of his election
+he is a councillor of the whole kingdom, bound to exercise an
+independent judgment for the interests of the whole people, rather than
+to guide himself by the capricious or partial judgments of a small
+section of it. But in its more immediate objects--that of establishing
+the two principles, that the constitution knows of no limitation to the
+authority of Parliament, and of no distinction between the power of
+taxation and that of any other kind of legislation--Lord Mansfield's
+speech is now universally admitted to have been unanswerable.[38]
+
+The abstract right was unquestionably on the side of the minister and
+the Parliament who had imposed the tax. But he is not worthy of the name
+of statesman who conceives absolute rights and metaphysical distinctions
+to be the proper foundation for measures of government, and pays no
+regard to custom, to precedent, to the habits and feelings of the people
+to be governed; who, disregarding the old and most true adage, _summum
+jus summa injuria_, omits to take into his calculations the expediency
+of his actions when legislating for a nation which he is in the daily
+habit of weighing in his private affairs. The art or science of
+government are phrases in common use; but they would be void of meaning
+if all that is requisite be to ascertain the strict right or power, and
+then unswervingly to act upon it in all its rigor. And, therefore, while
+it must be admitted that the character of the power vested in King,
+Lords, and Commons assembled in Parliament is unlimited and illimitable,
+and that the legal competency to enact a statute depends in no degree
+whatever on the wisdom or folly, the justice or wickedness, of the
+statute, the advice given to a constitutional sovereign by his advisers
+must be guided by other considerations. To quote by anticipation the
+language addressed to the Commons on this subject by Burke eight years
+afterward, the proper policy was "to leave the Americans as they
+anciently stood ... To be content to bind America by laws of trade.
+Parliament had always done it. And this should be the reason for binding
+their trade. Not to burden them by taxes; Parliament was not used to do
+so from the beginning; and this should be the reason for not taxing.
+These are the arguments of states and kingdoms."[39]
+
+The ministry were strong enough to carry their resolutions through both
+Houses. Their measure was divided into two acts, one known as the
+Declaratory Act, asserting the absolute and universal authority of
+Parliament; the other repealing the Stamp Act of the preceding year. And
+both were passed without alteration, though the Lords divided against
+them on both the second and third readings of the bill for repeal
+founded on them,[40] some of them entering long protests in the journals
+of the House. The right to tax was asserted, but the tax itself was
+repealed. And Franklin's estimate of the feelings on the subject
+entertained by his countrymen was fully verified by the reception which
+the intelligence met with in the Colonies. To quote the description of
+Lord Stanhope: "In America the repeal of the Stamp Act was received with
+universal joy and acclamation. Fireworks and festivals celebrated the
+good news, while addresses and thanks to the King were voted by all the
+Assemblies.... The words of the Declaratory Act, indeed, gave the
+Americans slight concern. They fully believed that no practical
+grievance could arise from it. They looked upon it merely as a salve to
+the wounded pride of England; as only that 'bridge of gold' which,
+according to the old French saying, should always be allowed to a
+retreating assailant."[41]
+
+A recent writer, however, has condemned the addition of the declaration
+of the abstract right to tax with great vehemence. "Nothing," says Lord
+Campbell,[42] "could exceed the folly of accompanying the repeal of the
+Stamp Act with the statutable declaration of the abstract right to tax."
+But it does not seem difficult to justify the conduct of the ministry in
+this particular. For, besides the great weight deservedly attached to
+Franklin's assurance that the declaration would not be objected to by
+the Colonists, and besides the consideration that, on a general view, it
+was desirable, if not indispensable, to impress on all classes of
+subjects, whether at home or abroad, the constitutional doctrine of the
+omnipotence of Parliament, the line of argument adopted by Mr. Pitt and
+Lord Camden, in denying that omnipotence, left the ministers no
+alternative but that of asserting it, unless they were prepared to
+betray their trust as guardians of the constitution. Forbearance to
+insist on the Declaratory Act could not fail to have been regarded as an
+acquiescence on their part in a doctrine which Lord Campbell in the same
+breath admits to be false. It may be added, as a consideration of no
+small practical weight, that, without such a Declaratory Act, the King
+would have been very reluctant to consent to the other and more
+important Repealing Act. And, on the whole, the conduct of the ministry
+may, we think, be regarded as the wisest settlement both of the law and
+of the practice. It asserted the law in a manner which offended no one;
+and it made a precedent for placing the spirit of statesmanship above
+the letter of the law, and for forbearing to put forth in its full
+strength the prerogatives whose character was not fully understood by
+those who might be affected by them, and also could plead that
+Parliament itself had contributed to lead them to misunderstand it by
+its own conduct in never before exerting it.
+
+For the moment, then, contentment and tranquillity were restored in the
+Colonies. Unhappily, they were not lasting. The same year which saw the
+triumph of the Rockingham administration in the repeal of the Stamp Act,
+witnessed also its fall before a discreditable intrigue. And the
+ministry which succeeded it had not been a year in office before the new
+Chancellor of the Exchequer, Charles Townsend, revived the discontents
+in America which Lord Rockingham had appeased. It cannot be said,
+however, that the blame should all belong to him; or that the Rockingham
+party in the House of Commons were entirely free from a share in it.
+They were--not unnaturally, perhaps--greatly irritated at the intrigue
+by which Lord Chatham had superseded them, and were not disinclined to
+throw difficulties in the way of their successors, for which the events
+of the next year afforded more than one opportunity. Lord Chatham, as
+has been mentioned, was universally recognized as the chief of the new
+ministry, though he abstained from taking the usual office of First Lord
+of the Treasury, and contented himself with the Privy Seal; but he had
+constructed it of such discordant elements[43] that no influence but his
+own could preserve consistency in its acts or harmony among its members,
+as nothing but his name could give it consideration either in Parliament
+or in the country. In the first months of the next year, 1767, he was
+attacked with an illness which for a time disabled him from attending
+the cabinet, being, apparently, the forerunner of that more serious
+malady which, before the end of the summer, compelled his long
+retirement from public life; and the Opposition took advantage of the
+state of disorganization and weakness which his illness caused among his
+colleagues, to defeat them on the Budget in the House of Commons, by an
+amendment to reduce the land-tax, which caused a deficiency in the
+supplies of half a million. This deficiency it, of course, became
+necessary to meet by some fresh tax; and Townsend--who, though endowed
+with great richness of eloquence, was of an imprudent, not to say rash,
+temper, and was possessed of too thorough a confidence in his own
+ingenuity and fertility of resource ever to be inclined to take into
+consideration any objections to which his schemes might be
+liable--proposed to raise a portion of the money which was needed by
+taxes on glass, paper, tea, and one or two other articles, to be paid as
+import duties in the American Colonies. His colleagues, and especially
+the Duke of Grafton himself, the First Lord of the Treasury, and as such
+the nominal Prime-minister, having been also, as Secretary of State, a
+member of Lord Rockingham's ministry, which had repealed the former
+taxes, did not consent to the measure without great and avowed
+reluctance; but yielded their own judgment to the strong feeling in its
+favor which notoriously existed in the House of Commons.[44] Indeed,
+that House passed the clauses imposing these import duties without
+hesitation, being, probably, influenced in no small degree by the
+evidence given in the preceding year by Dr. Franklin, who, as has been
+already seen, had explained that the Colonists drew a distinction
+between what he called "internal taxes" and import duties "intended to
+regulate commerce," and that to the latter class they were not inclined
+to object. And a second consideration was, that these new duties were
+accompanied and counterbalanced by a reduction of some other taxes; so
+that the ministry contended that the effect of these financial measures,
+taken altogether, would be to lower to the Colonists the price of the
+articles affected by them rather than to raise it. But one of the
+resolutions adopted provided that the whole of the money to be raised
+from these taxes should not be spent in America, but that, after making
+provision for certain Colonial objects specified, "the residue of such
+duties should be paid into the receipt of his Majesty's Exchequer, and
+there reserved, to be from time to time disposed of by Parliament toward
+defraying the necessary expenses of defending, protecting, and securing
+the said Colonies and plantations." And this clause seems to have been
+understood as designed to provide means for augmenting the number of
+regular troops to be maintained in the Colonies, whose employment in the
+recent disturbances had made them more unpopular than formerly.[45]
+
+At all events, the intelligence of these new taxes, though only import
+duties, found the Colonists in a humor to resist any addition of any
+kind to their financial burdens. The events of the last two years had
+taught them their strength. It was undeniable that the repeal of the
+Stamp Act had been extorted by the riots in Boston and other places, and
+the success of this system of intimidation could not fail to encourage
+its repetition. Accordingly, the news of this fresh attempt at taxation
+was met by a unanimous determination to resist it. Newspaper writers and
+pamphleteers denounced not only the duties but the ministry which
+imposed them. Petitions from almost every State were sent over to
+England, addressed to the King and to the Parliament; but the violent
+temper of the leaders of the populace was not content to wait for
+answers to them. Associations were at once formed in Boston and one or
+two other cities, where resolutions were adopted in the spirit of
+retaliation (as their framers avowed), to desist from the importation of
+any articles of British commerce, and to rely for the future on American
+manufactures. The principal Custom-house officers at Boston were badly
+beaten, and others were compelled to seek refuge in a man-of-war which
+happened to be in the harbor.
+
+It would be painful, and at the present day useless, to trace the steps
+by which these local disturbances gradually grew into one general
+insurrection. The spirit of resistance was undoubtedly fanned by a party
+which from the first contemplated a total separation from England as its
+ultimate result,[46] if, indeed, they had not conceived the design even
+before Grenville had given the first provocation to discontent. But the
+Colonists were not without advocates in England, even among the members
+of the government. The Duke of Grafton, while he remained
+Prime-minister, was eager to withdraw all the duties of which they
+complained; but he was overruled by the majority of his colleagues. He
+prevailed, however, so far that Lord Hillsborough, the Secretary of
+State, was authorized to write a circular-letter to the governors of the
+different provinces, in which he disowned, in the most distinct language
+possible, "a design to propose to Parliament to lay any farther taxes
+upon America for the purpose of raising a revenue," and promised for the
+next session a repeal of all the taxes except that on tea; and when the
+Duke retired from the Treasury, and was succeeded by Lord North, that
+statesman himself brought forward the promised repeal in an elaborate
+speech,[47] in which he explained that the duty on tea, which he alone
+proposed to retain, had been originally a boon to the Americans rather
+than an injury, as being accompanied by the removal of a far heavier
+tax. But he admitted that even that consideration was not the one which
+influenced him in his opinion that that duty should be maintained, so
+greatly was the perception that the real object of those who complained
+of it was, not the redress of a grievance, but the extinction of a right
+which was an essential part of "the controlling supremacy of England."
+The fact that the right to tax had been denied made it a positive duty
+on the part of the English minister to exert that right. "To temporize
+would be to yield, and the authority of the mother country, if now
+unsupported, would be relinquished forever." And he avowed his idea of
+the policy proper to be pursued to be "to retain the right of taxing
+America, but to give it every relief that might be consistent with the
+welfare of the mother country." He carried his resolution, though the
+minority--which on this occasion was led by Mr. Pownall, who had himself
+been Governor of Massachusetts, and who moved an amendment to include
+tea in the list of taxes proposed to be repealed--was stronger than
+usual.[48] But the concession failed to conciliate a single Colonist; it
+had become, as Burke said four years afterward, a matter of feeling,[49]
+and the irritation fed on itself, till, in 1773, a fresh act, empowering
+the East India Company to export tea to the Colonies direct from their
+own warehouses without its being subject to any duty in England--which
+Lord North undoubtedly intended as a boon to the Colonists--only
+increased the exasperation. The ships which brought the tea to Boston
+were boarded and seized by a formidable body of rioters disguised as
+native savages, and the tea was thrown into the sea. The intelligence
+was received in England with very different feelings by the different
+parties in the state. The ministers conceived themselves forced to
+assert the dignity of the crown, and proposed bills to inflict severe
+punishment on both the City of Boston and the whole Province of
+Massachusetts. The Opposition insisted on removing the cause of these
+disturbances by a total repeal of the tea-duty. The minister prevailed
+by a far larger majority than before, but his success only increased the
+exasperation in the Colonies; and it was an evil omen for peace that the
+leaders of the resistance began to search the records of the English
+Long Parliament "for the revolutionary precedents and forms of the
+Puritans of that day."[50] The next year saw fresh attempts to procure
+the repeal of the obnoxious tax rejected by the House of Commons; but,
+before the news of this division reached America, blood had already been
+shed.[51] Civil war began. The next year the Colonies, now united in one
+solid body, asserted their Independence, taking the title of the United
+States; and, though the government at home made more than one effort to
+recall the Colonists to their allegiance, and sent out commissioners of
+high rank, with large powers of concession; and though in one remarkable
+instance the mission of Mr. Penn, in the summer of 1775, with the
+petition to the King known as "the Olive Branch," seemed to show a
+desire for a maintenance of the union on the part of the Colonial
+Congress,[52] from the moment that the sword was drawn all hope of
+preserving the connection of the Colonies must have been seen by all
+reasonable men to be at an end.
+
+It is beside our present purpose to recapitulate the military operations
+of the war, though they verified another of Burke's warnings, that,
+supposing all moral difficulties to be got over, the ocean
+remained--that could not be dried up; and, as long as it continued in
+its present bed, so long all the causes which weakened authority by
+distance must continue. In fact, distance from England was one of the
+main circumstances which decided the contest. The slowness of
+communication--almost inconceivable to the present generation--rendered
+impossible that regularity in the transport of re-enforcements and
+supplies which was indispensable to success; and, added to the strange
+absence of military skill shown by every one of the British generals,
+soon placed the eventual issue of the war beyond a doubt. But one
+measure by which Lord North's government endeavored to provide for the
+strengthening of the army employed in America was so warmly challenged
+on constitutional grounds, that, though the fortunate separation of
+Hanover from Great Britain has prevented the possibility of any
+recurrence of such a proceeding, it would be improper to pass it over.
+
+In his speech at the opening of the autumnal session of 1775, the King
+announced to the Houses that, in order to leave a larger portion of the
+established forces of the kingdom available for service in North
+America, he "had sent a part of his Electoral troops to the garrisons of
+Gibraltar and Port Mahon." And the announcement aroused a vehement
+spirit of opposition, which found vent in the debates of both Houses on
+the address, and in two substantive motions condemning the measure as a
+violation of the constitution as established by the Bill of Rights and
+the Act of Settlement. It was strenuously maintained that both these
+statutes forbade the raising or keeping on foot a standing army in the
+kingdom in time of peace, and also the introduction of foreign troops
+into this kingdom, without the previous consent of Parliament, on any
+pretence whatever; and that "the fact that Gibraltar and Minorca were
+detached from these islands did not exclude them from the character of
+forming a part of the British dominion." And on these grounds Lord
+Shelburne, who supported Lord Rockingham on an amendment to the address,
+did not hesitate to denounce this employment of the Hanoverian
+regiments, as "fundamentally infringing the first principles of our
+government," and to declare it "high-treason against the constitution."
+He asked, "if there were a settled plan to subdue the liberties of this
+country, what surer means could be adopted than those of arming Roman
+Catholics and introducing foreign troops?"[53] and compared the measure
+under discussion to the case of the Dutch regiments of William III.,
+"which the Parliament wisely refused to allow him to retain." In the
+House of Commons, the Opposition was led by Sir James Lowther and
+Governor Johnstone, the latter of whom "appealed to the clause in the
+Act of Settlement which enacted that no person born of other than
+English parents should enjoy any office or place of trust, civil or
+military, within the kingdom;" and argued that to employ foreign
+officers in the protection of a British fortress was to place them in an
+"office of great military trust."
+
+The discussion brought to light strange divisions and weakness in the
+ministry. The ministerial lawyers differed on the grounds on which they
+relied, the Attorney-general, Thurlow, denying that the expression "this
+kingdom" in the Bill of Rights included the foreign dependencies of the
+crown[54] (a narrowing of its force which the Chancellor, Lord Bathurst,
+wholly repudiated), while the argument on which he himself insisted most
+strongly, that the existence of rebellion in America put end to all
+conditions which supposed the kingdom to be at peace, could not obtain
+the support of any one of his colleagues. But a plea urged by an
+independent member, Lord Denbigh, was regarded by some of the speakers
+with greater favor; his contention being that neither the Bill of Rights
+nor the Act of Settlement had been violated, since both those great
+statutes must be interpreted with reference to the time at which they
+were framed, and to the recent acts of James II. and William III., the
+recurrence of which they had been designed to prevent, acts to which the
+present proceeding bore no resemblance.
+
+A stronger justification, however, might have been found in very recent
+precedents. In 1745 the ministers had brought over six thousand Dutch
+troops to re-enforce the army of the Duke of Cumberland, and their act
+had been subsequently approved by Parliament. And in 1756, at the
+commencement of the seven years' war, when the loss of Minorca had led
+to such a distrust of our fleets that a French invasion was very
+generally apprehended, both Houses presented addresses to George II.,
+begging him to bring over some Hanoverian regiments; and, in the course
+of the next year, other addresses to thank him for compliance with their
+entreaty.
+
+Looking at the strict law of the question, few lawyers doubt that the
+expression "this kingdom" in the Bill of Rights includes the entire
+dominions of the crown, or that that great statute was undoubtedly
+intended to protect the privileges of all their inhabitants, whether
+within the four seas or in foreign settlements. But it also seems that
+the clause against raising and keeping on foot a standing army without
+the consent of Parliament was not more violated by keeping a mixed
+garrison in Gibraltar and Port Mahon than garrisons consisting of native
+soldiers only; and undoubtedly the keeping of an armed force in both
+these fortresses had been sanctioned by Parliament. Nor could the
+colonel of a foreign regiment in garrison under the command of a British
+governor be fairly said to be in an office of great military trust. So
+far, therefore, the charge against the ministry may be thought to have
+failed. But the accusation of having transgressed the clause which
+prohibits "the introduction of foreign troops into this kingdom without
+the previous consent of Parliament on any pretence whatever," must, on
+the other hand, be regarded as proved. And, indeed, Lord North himself
+may be taken to have shown some consciousness that it was so, since he
+justified his conduct in omitting to procure that previous consent by
+the necessity of the case, by the plea that, as Parliament was in
+vacation, the time which would have been consumed in waiting for its
+sanction would have neutralized the advantage desired from the
+employment of the Hanoverians, since the regiments which they were to
+replace at Gibraltar and Port Mahon could not, after such delay, have
+reached America in time to be of service; and since he also consented
+eventually to ask Parliament for an Act of Indemnity, the preamble of
+which affirmed the existence of doubts as to the legality of the step
+which had been taken. And the fate of this act afforded a still more
+striking proof of the divisions in the ministry, since, after Lord North
+himself had proposed it in the House of Commons, and it had been passed
+there by a large majority, it was rejected in the House of Lords, where
+his own colleagues, Lord Gower, Lord Suffolk, and Lord Weymouth, spoke
+and voted against it as needless, because, in their judgment, no doubt
+of the state of the law on the subject could exist.
+
+From a statesman-like point of view, the employment of the Hanoverians
+seems abundantly defensible, if force were still to be employed to bring
+back the Colonists to their obedience. The circumstance of their being
+subjects of our sovereign in his other character of Elector of Hanover,
+clearly distinguished it from the hiring of the Hessian and Brunswick
+mercenaries, which has been deservedly condemned. And, as the entire
+number fell short of two thousand,[55] Lord Shelburne's expression of
+fear for the liberties and religion of Englishmen was an absurd
+exaggeration. Moreover, the warm approval which, less than twenty years
+before, Parliament had given to the introduction of a far larger body of
+the same troops into England itself, justified the anticipation that a
+similar sanction would now be cheerfully given. That sanction--which,
+indeed, might have been thought to be invited by the announcement of the
+measure in the King's speech--was undoubtedly requisite. And, if it was,
+a Bill of Indemnity for having acted without it was equally necessary.
+But, as has been seen in the last chapter, for an administration, on
+urgent occasions, to take action on its own responsibility, and then to
+apply for indemnity, is a course in strict harmony with the practice of
+the constitution; and if in this instance the ministers are in any
+respect blamable, their error would seem to have been limited to their
+abstaining from instantly calling Parliament together to sanction their
+act, and being contented to wait for the ordinary time of the Houses
+meeting.
+
+The war, therefore, went on. The assertion of their independence by the
+Colonies divided, and, so far, weakened, the advocates of their cause in
+Parliament, one section of whom, led by Lord Chatham, regarded any
+diminution of our dominion as not only treasonable, but ruinous; on the
+other hand, it procured them the alliance of France and Spain. But it
+cannot be said that either of these incidents produced any practical
+effect on the result of the war. Lord Chatham's refusal to contemplate
+their independence could not retard its establishment; and the alliance
+of France and Spain, which brought nothing but disaster to those
+countries, could not accelerate it by a single moment. For nearly six
+years the war continued with alternations of success, the victories
+gained by the British arms being the more numerous, the triumphs of the
+Americans being incomparably the more important, involving as they did
+the surrender of two entire armies, the latter of which, that of Lord
+Cornwallis, in 1781, did, in fact, terminate the war, and with the war
+the existence of the ministry which had conducted it. A singularly rapid
+succession of new administrations ensued--so rapid that the negotiations
+for peace which the first, that of Lord Rockingham, opened, were not
+formally completed till the third,[56] known as the Coalition Ministry,
+was on the point of dismissal. It would be beside our purpose to enter
+into the details of the treaty which constituted the United States, as
+they were now called, a nation by our formal recognition of their
+independence. Even in that recognition, which was the most important
+article of the treaty, no constitutional principle was involved, though
+it affords the only instance in our history which can seem to throw a
+doubt on our inheritance of that capacity for government which the Roman
+poet claimed as, in ancient times, the peculiar attribute of his own
+countrymen. It presents the only instance of a loss of territory peopled
+by men who came of our blood, and who still spoke our language. It was a
+stern and severe lesson; and yet, fraught with discredit and disaster as
+it was, it nevertheless bore fruit in a later age which we may be
+excused for regarding as an example of the generally predominating
+influence of sober practical sense in our countrymen, when not led away
+by the temporary excitement of passion, as shown in our capacity to take
+home to ourselves and profit by the teachings of experience. The loss of
+the American Colonies was caused by the submission of the Parliament and
+nation to men of theory rather than of practice; ideologists, as
+Napoleon called them; doctrinaires, to use the modern expression; men
+who, because Parliament had an abstract right of universal legislation,
+regarded it as a full justification for insisting on its exercise,
+without giving a thought to the feelings, or prejudices, or habits of
+those who might be affected by their measures. Abstractedly considered,
+Lord Chatham and Lord Camden were undoubtedly wrong in denying the power
+of Parliament to tax the Colonies; but there was better judgment in
+their counsels, though founded on false premises, than in those of
+Grenville and Townsend, though theirs was the more correct view of the
+constitutional power of legislation. The two peers were wrong in their
+principle; the two Chancellors of the Exchequer were unwise in their
+application of their principle; and the practical error was the more
+disastrous one.
+
+It is now generally admitted that the true statesman-like course toward
+the Colonies was that adopted by Lord Rockingham and his colleagues in
+1765--to avoid weakening the supreme power of Parliament by any
+disavowal of the right to tax but to avoid imperilling the sovereign
+authority of the King by a novel exertion of it. As much of our common
+English law is made up of precedent, so, in a still greater degree, are
+our feelings and ideas of our rights and privileges regulated by
+precedent. And we lost America because in 1764 and 1767 neither minister
+nor Parliament took men's feelings and prejudices into account. The loss
+of the United States, therefore, was a lesson not undeserved; and by our
+statesmen since that day it has been taken in the right spirit of
+profiting by its teaching as a guide to their own conduct. Since that
+day the enterprise of our people has planted our flag in regions far
+more distant, and has extended the dominion of our sovereign over
+provinces far more extensive than those which we then lost. And on some
+of the administrations of the present reign the duty has fallen of
+framing schemes of government for those new acquisitions, as also for
+some of those previously possessed. In how different a spirit from that
+which actuated the early ministers of George III.[57] those to whom the
+task was committed by Queen Victoria applied themselves to their task
+may be seen in a maxim laid down by the present Lord Grey, when he
+presided at the Colonial Office (1846-1852), that "the success of free
+institutions in any country depends far less upon the particular form of
+those institutions than upon the character of the people on whom they
+are conferred." But how he and others in the same office carried out
+that principle must be reserved for a later chapter.
+
+Besides the numerous motions which were brought forward by the
+Opposition respecting the continuance and conduct of the war, there were
+several also which were indirectly prompted by it. The Opposition
+claimed to be on this subject not only the champions of the real
+interests of the nation, but also its spokesmen, who expressed the
+opinions and feelings of all the thinking and independent portion of the
+people. That their efforts were overborne they attributed to the
+subservience of the Parliament to the ministers, and of the ministers to
+the crown.[58] And consequently several motions were made by members of
+that party, the object of which was, in one way or another, to diminish
+what they regarded as the undue influence of the crown. In one instance,
+and that the most successful, a direct denunciation of that influence
+was employed, but the earlier and more frequent proposals were directed
+to the purification of the House of Commons, and to the strengthening of
+its independence. It is remarkable that of these the two which related
+to a subject of which the Commons are usually most especially and most
+rightly jealous, the interference of peers in elections, had the worst
+fortune. In 1780 complaints were made and substantiated that the Duke of
+Bolton and the Duke of Chandos (who was also Lord-lieutenant of the
+county) had exerted themselves actively in the last election for
+Hampshire. And, in support of motions that these peers "had been guilty
+of a breach of the privileges of the House, and an infringement of the
+liberties and privileges of the Commons of Great Britain," a case was
+adduced in which Queen Anne had dismissed the Bishop of Worcester from
+the office of Almoner for similar interference. Nor did Lord Nugent, a
+relative of the Duke of Chandos, deny the facts alleged; on the
+contrary, he avowed them, and adopted a line of defence which many must
+have thought an aggravation of the charge, since it asserted that to
+prevent such interference was impossible, and therefore the House would
+but waste its time in trying. However, on this occasion the House took
+the view which he thus suggested to it, postponing all farther
+consideration of the matter for four months; and the charge the Duke of
+Bolton was shelved in a somewhat similar manner.
+
+Even had these peers and such practices been censured with the very
+greatest severity, the censures could have had but a very limited
+effect. But it was on measures of a wider scope, embracing what began to
+be called a Reform of Parliament, that the more zealous members of the
+Opposition placed their chief reliance. As far as our records of the
+debates can be trusted, Lord Chatham, ten years before, had given the
+first hint of the desirableness of some alteration of the existing
+system. On one occasion he denounced the small boroughs as "the rotten
+part of the constitution," thus originating the epithet by which they in
+time came to be generally described; but more usually he disavowed all
+idea of disfranchising them, propounding rather a scheme for diminishing
+their importance by a large addition to the county members. However, he
+never took any steps to carry out his views, thinking, perhaps, that it
+was not in the Upper House that such a subject should be first broached.
+But he had not been long in the grave, when a formal motion for a reform
+of a different kind was brought forward by one of the members for the
+City of London, Alderman Sawbridge,[59] who, in May, 1780, applied for
+leave to bring in "a bill for shortening the duration of Parliaments."
+His own preference he avowed to be for annual Parliaments; but his
+suspicion that the House would think such a measure too sweeping had
+induced him to resolve to content himself with aiming at triennial
+Parliaments. As leave was refused, the bill proposed to be introduced
+may, perhaps, be thought disentitled to mention here, were it not that
+the circumstance that proposals for shortening the duration of
+Parliaments are still occasionally brought forward seems to warrant an
+account of a few of the arguments by which those who took the leading
+parts in the debate which ensued resisted it. The minister, Lord North,
+declared that the Alderman had misunderstood the views of our ancestors
+on the subject; as their desire had been, not that Parliament should be
+elected annually, but that it should sit every year, an end which had
+now been attained. Fox, on the other hand, while avowing that hitherto
+he had always opposed similar motions, declared his wish now to see not
+only triennial but annual Parliaments, as the sole means of lessening
+the influence of the crown. "If any of his constituents were to ask him
+to what our present misfortunes were ascribable, he should say the first
+cause was the influence of the crown; the second, the influence of the
+crown; and the third, the influence of the crown." But it was replied by
+Burke, who usually exhausted every question he took in hand, that such a
+bill would rather tend to augment that influence, since "the crown, by
+its constant stated power, influence, and revenue, would be able to wear
+out all opposition at elections; that it would not abate the interest or
+inclination of ministers to apply that interest to the electors; on the
+contrary, it would render it more necessary to them, if they desired to
+have a majority in Parliament, to increase the means of that influence,
+to redouble their diligence, and to sharpen dexterity in the
+application. The whole effect of the bill would, therefore, be to remove
+the application of some part of that influence from the elected to the
+electors, and farther to strengthen and extend a court interest already
+great and powerful in boroughs. It must greatly increase the cost of a
+seat in Parliament; and, if contests were frequent, to many they would
+become a matter of expense totally ruinous, which no fortunes could
+bear. The expense of the last general election was estimated at
+L1,500,000; and he remembered well that several agents for boroughs said
+to candidates, 'Sir, your election will cost you L3000 if you are
+independent; but, if the ministry supports you, it may be done for
+L2000, and even less.'" And he adduced the case of Ireland, where
+formerly, when "a Parliament sat for the King's life, the ordinary
+charge for a seat was L1500; but now, when it sat for eight years, four
+sessions, the charge was L2500 and upward." Such a change as was
+proposed would cause "triennial corruption, triennial drunkenness,
+triennial idleness, etc., and invigorate personal hatreds that would
+never be allowed to soften. It would even make the member himself more
+corrupt, by increasing his dependence on those who could best support
+him at elections. It would wreck the fortunes of those who stood on
+their own private means. It would make the electors more venal, and
+injure the whole body of the people who, whether they have votes or not,
+are concerned in elections." Finally, it would greatly impair the proper
+authority of the House itself. "It would deprive it of all power and
+dignity; and a House of Commons without power and without dignity,
+either in itself or its members, is no House of Commons for this
+constitution."
+
+The applicability of some of his arguments--those founded on the
+disorders at times of election--has been greatly diminished, if not
+destroyed, at the present day, by the limitation of the polling to a
+single day. The disfranchisement of the smaller boroughs has neutralized
+others; but the expense of a general election is not believed to have
+diminished, and that alone seems a strong objection to a system which
+would render them more frequent than they are at present. Mr. Sawbridge
+could not obtain the support of a third of his hearers.[60] But his
+notions had partisans in the other House who were not discouraged by
+such a division; and three weeks later the Duke of Richmond brought
+forward a Reform Bill on so large a scale that, as the "Parliamentary
+History" records, "it took him an hour and a half to read it," and which
+contained provisions for annual Parliaments and universal suffrage. But
+he met with even less favor than the Alderman, and his bill was rejected
+without a division.
+
+Still the subject was not allowed to rest. Even after Lord North had
+been replaced by Lord Rockingham, the demand for Parliamentary Reform
+was continued; the young Mr. Pitt making himself the mouth-piece of the
+Reformers, and founding a motion which he made in May, 1782, on "the
+corrupt influence of the crown; an influence which has been pointed at
+in every period as the fertile source of all our miseries; an influence
+which has been substituted in the room of wisdom, of activity, of
+exertion, and of success; an influence which has grown up with our
+growth and strengthened with our strength, but which, unhappily, has not
+diminished with our diminution, nor decayed with our decay." He brought
+forward no specific plan, but denounced the close boroughs, and asked
+emphatically whether it were "representation" for "some decayed
+villages, almost destitute of population, to send members to Parliament
+under the control of the Treasury, or at the bidding of some great lord
+or commoner." He, however, was defeated, though by the small majority of
+twenty. And it is remarkable that when, the next year, he revived the
+subject, developing a more precise scheme--akin to that which his father
+had suggested, of increasing the number of county members, and including
+provisions for the disfranchisement of boroughs which had been convicted
+of systematic corruption--he was beaten by a far larger majority,[61]
+the distinctness of his plan only serving to increase the numbers of his
+adversaries. A kinsman of Pitt's, Lord Mahon, made an equally futile
+attempt to diminish the expenses of elections, partly by inflicting very
+heavy penalties on parties guilty of either giving or receiving
+bribes,[62] and partly by prohibiting candidates from providing
+conveyances for electors; and more than one bill for disfranchising
+revenue-officers, as being specially liable to pressure from the
+government, and to prevent contractors from sitting in Parliament, was
+brought forward, but was lost, the smallness of the divisions in their
+favor being not the least remarkable circumstance in the early history
+of Reform. It was made still more evident that as yet the zeal for
+Reform was confined to a few, when, two years afterward, Pitt, though
+now invested with all the power of a Prime-minister, was as unable as
+when in opposition to carry a Reform Bill, which in more than one point
+foreshadowed the measure of 1832; proposing, as it did, the
+disfranchisement of thirty-six small boroughs, which were to be
+purchased of their proprietors nearly on the principle adopted in the
+Irish Union Act, and on the other hand the enfranchisement of
+copyholders; but it differed from Lord Grey's act in that it distributed
+all the seats thus to be obtained among the counties, with the exception
+of a small addition to the representatives of London and Westminster.
+However, his supporters very little exceeded the number who had divided
+with him in 1783, and Lord North, who led the Opposition in a speech
+denouncing any change, had a majority of seventy-four. After this second
+defeat, Pitt abandoned the question, at all events for the time; being
+convinced, to quote Earl Stanhope's description of his opinion on the
+subject, "that nothing but the pressure of the strongest popular
+feeling, such as did not then exist, could induce many members to vote
+against their own tenure of Parliament, or in fact against
+themselves."[63] What, perhaps, weighed with him more, on deciding to
+acquiesce in this vote as final, was the perception that as yet the
+question excited no strong interest out-of-doors; and when, a few years
+later, some who sought to become leaders of the people endeavored to
+raise an agitation on the subject, their teachings were too deeply
+infected with the contagion of the French Revolution to allow a wise
+ruler to think it consistent with his duty to meet them with anything
+but the most resolute discouragement.
+
+But, concurrently with the first of these motions for Parliamentary
+Reform, two more direct attacks on the royal influence, and on what was
+alleged to be the undue exertion of it, were made in the session of
+1780. The first was made by Burke, who brought forward a measure of
+economical reform, demonstrating, in a speech of extraordinary power, a
+vast mass of abuses, arising from corrupt waste in almost every
+department of the state, and in every department of the royal household,
+without exception, and proposing a most extensive plan of reform, which
+dealt with royal dignities, such as the Duchy of Lancaster and the other
+principalities annexed to the crown; with the crown-lands, a great
+portion of which he proposed to sell; with the offices of the royal
+household, a sufficient specimen of the abuses on which was furnished by
+the statement, that the turnspit in the King's kitchen was a member of
+Parliament; and with many departments of state, such as the Board of
+Works and the Pay-office, etc. He was studiously cautious in his
+language, urging, indeed, that his scheme of reform would "extinguish
+secret corruption almost to the possibility of its existence, and would
+destroy direct and visible influence equal to the offices of at least
+fifty members of Parliament," but carefully guarding against any
+expressions imputing this secret corruption, this influence which it was
+so desirable to destroy, to the crown. But his supporters were less
+moderate; and Mr. Thomas Townsend declared that facts which he mentioned
+"contained the most unquestionable presumptive evidence of the influence
+of the crown; he meant the diverting of its revenues to purposes which
+dared not be avowed, in corrupting and influencing the members of both
+Houses of Parliament;" and he asserted that "the principle and objects
+of the bill were the reduction of the influence of the crown." The bill
+was not opposed by the ministers on its principle; but Lord North, even
+while consenting to its introduction, "did not pledge himself not to
+oppose it in some or other of its subsequent stages;" and, in fact, his
+supporters resisted it in almost every detail, some of them utterly
+denying the right of the House to interfere at all with the expenditure
+of the civil list; others contesting the propriety of alienating the
+crown-lands; and a still greater number objecting to the abolition of
+some of the offices which it was proposed to sweep away, such as that of
+the "third Secretary of State, or Secretary for the Colonies," that of
+"Treasurer of the Chamber," and others of a similar character. And, as
+the minister succeeded in defeating him on several, though by no means
+all, of these points, Burke at last gave up the bill, Fox warning the
+House at the same time that it should be renewed session after session,
+and boasting that even the scanty success which it had met with had been
+worth the struggle.
+
+The other direct attack was made by Mr. Dunning, who, perhaps, did not
+then foresee that he himself was destined soon to fill one of the
+offices which had come under the lash of Burke's sarcasm, and who a few
+days afterward, in moving that it was necessary to declare "that the
+influence of the crown had increased, was increasing, and ought to be
+diminished" rested no small portion of his argument on the treatment
+that Burke's bill had received. He affirmed that, though Lord North had
+declared that "the influence of the crown was not too great," the
+divisions on that bill, and on many other measures which had been under
+discussion, were irrefragable proofs of the contrary. He quoted Hume and
+Judge Blackstone as testifying to the existence and steady increase of
+that influence, and "could affirm of his own knowledge, and pledge his
+honor to the truth of the assertion, that he knew upward of fifty
+members in that House who always voted in the train of the noble lord in
+the blue ribbon,[64] but who reprobated and condemned, out of the House,
+the measures they had supported and voted for in it." Mr. T. Pitt even
+instanced "the present possession of office by Lord North as an
+indubitable proof of the enormous influence of the crown."
+
+It was not strange that Lord North opposed a resolution supported by
+such arguments with all the power of the government, basing his own
+opposition chiefly on the wisdom "of maintaining the rule long since
+established by Parliament, never to vote abstract propositions." But he
+presently saw that he was in a minority, and was forced to be content
+with adopting and carrying an amendment of Mr. Dundas, one of the
+members for Edinburgh, who flattered himself that by the insertion of
+_now_ he converted a general assertion into a temporary declaration,
+which might at a future time be disavowed as no longer applicable. A
+majority of eighteen[65] affirmed the resolution; and when the mover
+followed it up by a second, declaring that "it is competent to this
+House to examine into and to correct abuses in the expenditure of the
+civil list revenues, as well as in every other branch of the public
+revenue, whenever it shall seem expedient to the wisdom of this House to
+do so," though the minister, with what was almost an appeal _ad
+misericordiam_, "implored the House not to proceed," he did not venture
+to take a division, and that resolution also, with one or two others
+designed to give instant effect to them, were adopted and reported by
+the committee to the House in a single evening.[66] The first resolution
+did, in fact, embody a complaint, or at least an assertion, which the
+Rockingham party had constantly made ever since the close of the
+Marquis's first administration. In a speech which he had made only a few
+weeks before,[67] Lord Rockingham himself had declared that "it was
+early in the present reign promulgated as a court axiom that the power
+and influence of the crown alone was sufficient to support any set of
+men his Majesty might think proper to call to his councils." And Burke,
+in his "short account" of his administration of 1765, had not only
+imputed both its formation and its dismissal to the "express request"
+and "express command of their royal master," but in the sentence, "they
+discountenanced and, it is to be hoped, forever abolished, the dangerous
+and unconstitutional practice of removing military officers for their
+votes in Parliament," condemned with unmistakable plainness some acts of
+the preceding ministry which were universally understood to have been
+forced upon it by the King himself. General Conway had been deprived of
+the colonelcy of his regiment; Lord Rockingham himself, with several
+other peers, had been dismissed from Lord-lieutenancies, as a punishment
+for voting against the ministry; such dismissals being a flagrant
+attempt to put down all freedom of debate in Parliament, which of all
+its privileges is the one most essential to its usefulness, if not to
+its very existence. But, as Burke said, the practice had been abandoned,
+and the first resolution, therefore, as Lord North said, involved no
+practical result. It is the second resolution that confers a
+constitutional character and importance on this debate. And it is not
+too much to say that no vote of greater value had been come to for many
+years. It might have been considered almost as the assertion of a truism
+included in the power of granting supplies, to declare that the
+Parliament has the right and authority to examine into and correct
+abuses in the expenditure, if it had not been denied by more than one
+speaker on the ministerial side, though not by the Prime-minister
+himself. But that denial made the assertion of the right an imperative
+duty; for certainly the exclusive right of authorizing a levy of money
+would lose half its value, if unaccompanied by the other right of
+preventing the waste of the revenue thus raised.
+
+It may likewise be said that another principle of the parliamentary
+constitution is, by implication, contained in Mr. Dunning's second
+resolution, and that the words, "it is competent to this House to
+examine into and to correct abuses in the expenditure," were meant to
+imply a denial of the competency of the other House to institute, or
+even to share in, such an examination. Even if that were the object of
+its framer, it only coincided with the view of the peers themselves, a
+very considerable majority[68] of whom had, a few weeks before, rejected
+a motion made by Lord Shelburne for the appointment of "a committee of
+members of both Houses to examine without delay into the public
+expenditure," principally on the ground urged by the Secretary of State,
+Lord Stormont, and by several other peers, that "to inquire into,
+reform, and control the public expenditure" would be an improper
+interference with the privileges of the Commons; the Chief-justice, Lord
+Mansfield, even going the length of warning his brother peers that such
+interference might probably lead the Commons "to dispute in their turn
+the power of judicature in the last resort exercised by the peers." Lord
+Camden, on the contrary, affirmed, as a proposition which "no noble lord
+present would deny, that that House had a right to inquire so far as the
+disposal of public moneys came under their cognizance as a deliberative
+body." And in the Lower House itself, Burke, in his speech in favor of
+his Bill for Economical Reform, went even farther than Lord Camden, and
+blamed the House of Lords for rejecting Lord Shelburne's motion on such
+a ground. "They had gone," he said, "farther in self-denial than the
+utmost jealousy of the Commons could have required. A power of examining
+accounts, of censuring, correcting, and punishing the Commons had never,
+that he knew of, thought of denying to the Lords. It was something more
+than a century ago that the Commons had voted the Lords a useless body.
+They had now voted themselves so." And it would seem that the Lords
+themselves, to a certain extent, retracted this, their self-denying
+vote, when, before the end of the same session, they discussed Burke's
+Bill for Economical Reform, and passed it, though it was a money-bill,
+"containing extraneous enactments," and as such contravened one of their
+own standing orders which had been passed in the beginning of Queen
+Anne's reign, when the system of "tacking," as it was called, had
+excited great discontent, which was not confined to themselves. The
+propriety of rejecting the bill on that ground was vigorously urged by
+the only two lawyers who took part in the debate, the Chancellor, Lord
+Thurlow, and Lord Loughborough, whose object was avowedly thus to give a
+practical proof that the Lords "had not voted themselves useless." But
+even those who disregarded their advice fully asserted the right of the
+peers "to exercise their discretion as legislators." We have noticed
+this matter on a previous occasion. The privilege claimed by the
+Commons, both as to its origin and its principle, has been carefully
+examined by Hallam, who has pointed out that in its full exclusiveness
+it is not older than Charles II., since the Convention Parliament of
+1660 "made several alterations in undoubted money-bills, to which the
+Commons did not object."[69] And, though his attachment to Whig
+principles might have inclined him to take their part in any dispute on
+the subject, he nevertheless thinks that they have strained both
+"precedent and constitutional analogy" in their assertion of this
+privilege, which is "an anomaly that can hardly rest on any other ground
+of defence than such a series of precedents as establish a
+constitutional usage." The usage which for two centuries was established
+in this case by the good-sense of both parties clearly was, that the
+Lords could never originate a money-bill, nor insert any clause in one
+increasing or even altering the burden laid by one on the people, but
+that they were within their right in absolutely rejecting one. But such
+a right has a tendency to lapse through defect of exercise; and we shall
+hereafter see that "the disposition to make encroachments," which in
+this matter Hallam imputes to the Commons, has led them in the present
+reign to carry their pretensions to a height which at a former period
+had been practically ignored by the one House, and formally disclaimed
+by the other.
+
+It may be remarked that Mr. Dunning's success in carrying his first
+resolution did in itself, to a certain extent, disprove the truth of
+that resolution, since, if the influence of the crown had been such as
+he represented it, it must have been sufficient to insure its rejection.
+But that resolution, and a new statute, of which in a previous session
+he had been one of the principal promoters, are reckoned by Lord
+Stanhope as among the chief causes of the disgraceful riots of 1780. In
+the summer of 1778 he had seconded and supported with great eloquence
+the repeal of some of the penal statutes against the Roman Catholics
+which had been passed in the reign of William III. It was the first blow
+at that system of religious intolerance which for nearly a century had
+been one of the leading principles, as it had been also the chief
+disgrace, of the constitution; and it was passed with scarcely any
+opposition by both Houses. As, however, the statute which it repealed
+had been enacted before the Scotch Union, the repeal did not extend to
+Scotland, and it was necessary, therefore, to bring in a separate
+measure for that kingdom. But the intelligence that such a proceeding
+was in contemplation excited great wrath among the Scotch Presbyterians,
+who, in the hope of defeating it, established a Protestant Association
+for the defence of what they called the Protestant interest, and elected
+as its president Lord George Gordon, a young nobleman whose acts on more
+than one occasion gave reason to doubt the soundness of his intellect.
+Against any relaxation whatever of the restrictions on the Roman
+Catholics the Association sent up petitions to the House and to the
+King, couched in language the wildness of which was hardly consistent
+with the respect due to Parliament or to the sovereign. Apparently in
+the hope of mitigating its opposition, the Houses the next year passed
+an act, similar in principle, to relax some of the restrictions still
+imposed on Protestant dissenting ministers by some of the subscriptions
+which were required of them. But, as in the reign of Charles II., the
+Presbyterian hatred of the Roman Catholics was too uncompromising to be
+appeased in such a manner. And when Lord George found the House of
+Commons itself acknowledging the danger with which the constitution was
+threatened by the influence of the crown, he saw in their vote a
+justification for all his alarms, since he had adopted as one of his
+most settled opinions the belief that George III. was himself a Papist
+at heart; and, under the influence of this strange idea, he drew up a
+petition to Parliament which he invited all the members of the
+Association to accompany him to present. His summons was received with
+enthusiasm by his followers. The number who, in obedience to it,
+mustered in St. George's Fields, which he had appointed as the place of
+rendezvous, was not reckoned by any one at less than fifty thousand, and
+some calculations even doubled that estimate. Whatever the number may
+originally have been, it was speedily swelled by the junction of large
+bands of the worst characters in the metropolis, who soon began to
+display their strength by every kind of outrage. They commenced by
+attacking some of the Roman Catholic chapels, which they burnt; and,
+their audacity increasing at the sight of their exploits, they proceeded
+to assault the houses of different members of Parliament who had voted
+for the measures which had offended them. Because the Chief-justice,
+Lord Mansfield, had lately presided at a trial where a Roman Catholic
+had been acquitted, they sacked and burnt his house, and tried to murder
+himself. The magistrates, afraid of exposing themselves to the fury of
+such a mob, kept for the most part out of the way; and though the troops
+had been put under arms, and several regiments from the rural districts
+had been brought up to London in haste, the military officers were
+afraid to act without orders. Left to work their pleasure almost without
+resistance, the rioters attacked the different prisons, burnt Newgate
+and released all the prisoners, and made more than one attack on the
+Bank of England, where, however, fortunately the guard was strong enough
+to repel them. But still no active measures were taken to crush the
+riot. The belief was general that the soldiers might not act at all, or,
+at all events, not fire on rioters, till an hour after the Riot Act had
+been read and the mob had been warned to disperse; and no magistrate
+could be found to brave its fury by reading it. There seemed no obstacle
+to prevent the rioters from making themselves masters of the whole
+capital, had it not been for the firmness of the King himself, who, when
+all the proper authorities failed, showed himself in fact as well as in
+name the Chief Magistrate of the kingdom.[70] He summoned a Privy
+Council, and urged the members to adopt instant measures of repression;
+and, when some of the ministers seemed to waver, he put the question
+himself to the Attorney-general whether the interpretation put on the
+Riot Act, which seemed to him inconsistent with common-sense, were
+justified by the law. Wedderburn unhesitatingly replied that it was not;
+that "if a mob were committing a felony, as by burning dwelling-houses,
+and could not be prevented by other means, the military, according to
+the law of England, might and ought to be immediately ordered to fire
+upon them, the reading of the Riot Act being wholly unnecessary under
+such circumstances."[71] The King insisted on this opinion being
+instantly acted on; a proclamation was issued, and orders were sent from
+the Adjutant-general's office that the soldiers were to act at once
+without waiting for directions from the civil magistrates. A few hours
+now sufficed to restore tranquillity. The Chief-justice, in his place in
+the House of Lords, subsequently declared Wedderburn's opinion, and the
+orders given in reliance upon it, to be in strict conformity with the
+common law, laying down, as the principle on which such an
+interpretation of the law rested, the doctrine that in such a case the
+military were acting, "not as soldiers, but as citizens; no matter
+whether their coats were red or brown, they were legally employed in
+preserving the laws and the constitution;"[72] and Wedderburn, who
+before the end of the year became Chief-justice of the Common Pleas,
+repeated the doctrine more elaborately in a charge from the Bench. It
+was a lesson of value to the whole community. It was quite true that the
+constitution placed the army in a state of dependence on the civil
+power. But, when that doctrine was so misunderstood as to be supposed to
+give temporary immunity to outrage, it was most important that such a
+misconstruction should be corrected, and that it should be universally
+known that military discipline does not require the soldier to abstain
+from the performance of the duty incumbent on every citizen, the
+prevention of crime.
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 33: It is worth while to preserve the amount, if for no other
+reason, for the contrast that the expenditure and resources of the
+kingdom a hundred years ago present to those of the present day. The
+supply required in 1764 was in round numbers L7,712,000; in 1755, before
+the war broke out, L4,073,000, and even that included a million for the
+augmentation of the army and navy. In 1761, when the war was at its
+height, the sum voted was L19,616,000.]
+
+[Footnote 34: The report in the "Parliamentary History," xvi., 37, says:
+"This act (the Stamp Act) passed the Commons almost without debate; two
+or three members spoke against it, but without force or apparent
+interest, except a vehement harangue from Colonel Barre (date, March 6,
+1765)."]
+
+[Footnote 35: Lord Stanhope ("History of England," v., 131) quotes a
+letter of Dr. Franklin to one of his friends in America, in which, after
+deploring the impossibility of preventing the act from being passed, he
+expresses a hope that "frugality and industry will go a great way toward
+indemnifying us." And he complied with Mr. Grenville's request to select
+a person to act as Distributor of Stamps in Pennsylvania whom he thought
+likely to be generally acceptable.]
+
+[Footnote 36: These statements and arguments of Franklin are taken from
+different parts of his examination before the House of Commons, as
+preserved in the "Parliamentary History," xvi., 137-160.]
+
+[Footnote 37: In the Assembly of Virginia, one of the members--Patrick
+Henry--after declaiming with bitterness against the supposed arbitrary
+measures of the present reign, exclaimed, "Caesar had his Brutus,
+Charles I. his Oliver Cromwell, and George III.--" A cry of "Treason!"
+was uttered. The Speaker called Mr. Henry to order, and declared he
+would quit the chair unless he were supported by the House in
+restraining such intemperate speeches.--Adolphus, _History of England_,
+i., 188.]
+
+[Footnote 38: On this point the law has been affirmed by a judge of high
+reputation to be still what Lord Rockingham and his colleagues asserted.
+In 1868, on the trial of Governor Eyre for an indictment arising out of
+disturbances in Jamaica, Judge Blackburne laid it down "that, although
+the general rule is that the Legislative Assembly has the sole right of
+imposing taxes in the colony, yet, when the Imperial Legislature chooses
+to impose taxes, according to the rule of English law they have a
+_right_ to do it."]
+
+[Footnote 39: See his speech on American taxation in April, 1774.]
+
+[Footnote 40: The chief divisions were: in the Commons, 275 to 167; in
+the Lords, 105 to 71.]
+
+[Footnote 41: "History of England," vol. v., c. xlv., p. 218, ed. 1862.]
+
+[Footnote 42: "Lives of the Chancellors," c. cxliii., life of Lord
+Camden.]
+
+[Footnote 43: Every political student will recollect Burke's description
+of it as "a cabinet so variously inlaid, such a piece of diversified
+mosaic, such a tessellated pavement without cement--here a bit of black
+stone, there a bit of white--patriots and courtiers, King's friends and
+republicans, Whigs and Tories, treacherous friends and open enemies,"
+etc.--_Speech on American Taxation_.]
+
+[Footnote 44: In a debate in the year 1776, on some measures adopted for
+the conduct of the war, the Duke of Grafton said: "In that year (1767),
+when the extraordinary expenses incurred on account of America were laid
+before the House of Commons, the House rose as one man and insisted that
+that country should contribute to the burdens brought on by the military
+establishment there, and a motion was made for bringing in a bill for
+that purpose. I strenuously opposed the measure, as big with the
+consequences it has since, unfortunately, produced. I spoke to my
+friends upon the occasion, but they all united in the opinion that the
+tide was too strong to expect either to stem or turn it, so as to
+prevent whatever might be offered in that shape from passing into a law.
+Finding that all my efforts would be vain, I was compelled to submit,
+but was resolved, as far as lay in my power, to prevent the effect; and,
+while I gave way, to do it in such a manner as would cause the least
+harm. I accordingly proposed the tea-duty as the most palatable;
+because, though it answered the main purpose of those with whom taxation
+was a favorite measure, it was doing America an immediate benefit, for I
+procured the shilling a pound duty to be taken off, and threepence to be
+laid on in lieu thereof; so that, in fact, it was ninepence a pound
+saved to America. However, the attempt was received in America as I
+expected it would be--it immediately caused disturbances and universal
+dissatisfaction."--_Parliamentary History_, xviii., 134.]
+
+[Footnote 45: This unpopularity had been aggravated by another measure
+which was among the last acts of Mr. Grenville's ministry. The Mutiny
+Act in the Colonies was renewed for two years at a time, and, at its
+renewal in the spring of 1765, a clause was added which required the
+Colonists to furnish the troops with "fire, candles, vinegar, salt,
+bedding, utensils for cooking, and liquors, such as beer, cider, and
+rum." The Assemblies of several States passed resolutions strongly
+condemning this new imposition; but, as the dissatisfaction did not lead
+to any overt acts of disturbance, it seems to have been unnoticed in
+England at the time, or the clause would probably have been repealed by
+Lord Rockingham; and eventually the Assembly of New York seems to have
+withdrawn its objections to it, presenting an address to Sir H. Moore,
+the Governor, in which "they declared their intention of making the
+required provision for the troops."--Lord E. Fitzmaurice, _Life of Lord
+Shelburne_, ii., 61.]
+
+[Footnote 46: The "Memoirs of Judge Livingstone" record his expression
+of opinion as early as 1773, that "it was intolerable that a continent
+like America should be governed by a little island three thousand miles
+distant." "America," said he, "must and will be independent." And in the
+"Memoirs of General Lee" we find him speaking to Mr. Patrick Henry, who
+in 1766 had been one of the most violent of all the denouncers of the
+English policy (see _ante_, p. 63), of "independence" as "a golden
+castle in the air which he had long dreamed of."]
+
+[Footnote 47: See the whole speech, "Parliamentary History," xvi., 853.
+Many of the taxes he denounced as so injurious to the British
+manufacturers, "that it must astonish any reasonable man to think how so
+preposterous a law could originally obtain existence from a British
+Legislature."]
+
+[Footnote 48: The division was: for the amendment, 142; against it,
+204.]
+
+[Footnote 49: The words of the "preamble," on which Burke dwelt in 1774,
+were: "Whereas it is expedient that a revenue should be raised in your
+Majesty's dominions in America for making a more certain and adequate
+provision for defraying the charge of the administration of justice and
+support of civil government in such provinces where it shall be found
+necessary, and toward farther defraying the expenses of defending,
+protecting, and securing: the said dominions, be it enacted," etc.]
+
+[Footnote 50: "Memoirs and Correspondence of Jefferson." Quoted by Lord
+Stanhope, "History of England," vi., 14.]
+
+[Footnote 51: At Lexington, April 19, 1775.]
+
+[Footnote 52: Lord Stanhope, however, has reason on his side when he
+calls the words of this petition "vague and general," though "kindly and
+respectful;" and when he points to the language of extreme bitterness
+against England indulged in by Franklin at the very time that this
+petition was voted. He, however, expresses a belief that even then "the
+progress of civil war might have been arrested," which seems doubtful.
+But it is impossible not to agree with his lordship in condemning the
+refusal by the ministry to take any notice of the petition, on the
+ground that the Congress was a self-constituted body, with no claim to
+authority or recognition, and one which had already sanctioned the
+taking up arms against the King.--_History of England_, vi., 93, 95,
+105.]
+
+[Footnote 53: It is probable, however, that the greater part of the
+Hanoverian soldiers were Protestants.]
+
+[Footnote 54: Lord Campbell, who, in his "Life of Lord Bathurst,"
+asserts that the legality of the measure turns upon the just
+construction of the Act of Settlement, adduces Thurlow's language on
+this subject as "a proof that he considered that he had the privilege
+which has been practised by other Attorney-generals and Chancellors too,
+in debate, of laying down for law what best suited his purpose at the
+moment." It does not seem quite certain that the noble and learned
+biographer has not more than once in these biographies allowed himself a
+similar license in the description of questions of party politics.]
+
+[Footnote 55: In the debates on the subject it was stated that the
+number of Hanoverians quartered in the two fortresses was nineteen
+hundred, and the number of British troops left in them was two thousand.
+Moreover, as has been already remarked, though Lord Shelburne spoke of
+arming Roman Catholics, it is probable that the Hanoverians were mostly
+Protestants.]
+
+[Footnote 56: The Preliminary or Provisional Articles, as they were
+called, of which the Definitive Treaty was but a copy, were signed at
+Paris, November 30, 1782, during Lord Shelburne's administration. But
+the Definitive Treaty was not signed till the 3d of September of the
+following year, under the Coalition Ministry, which was turned out a few
+weeks afterward.]
+
+[Footnote 57: We shall see in a subsequent chapter that even in this
+reign of George III. Pitt laid down the true principles of our
+legislation for the colonies in his bill for the better government of
+Canada.]
+
+[Footnote 58: An admirably reasoned passage on the influence of the
+crown, especially in the reigns of the two first Hanoverian Kings, will
+be found in Hallam, "Constitutional History," c. xvi., vol. iii., p.
+392, ed. 1832.]
+
+[Footnote 59: The "Parliamentary History" shows that he had brought
+forward the same motion before 1780; since Lord Nugent, who replied to
+him, said "the same motion had been made for some years past, and had
+been silently decided on." From which it seems that it was never
+discussed at any length till May 8, 1780.]
+
+[Footnote 60: On the division the numbers were: for the motion, 90;
+against it, 182.]
+
+[Footnote 61: The division in 1782 was: 161 to 141; in 1783, 293 to
+149.]
+
+[Footnote 62: How systematic and open bribery was at this time is shown
+by an account of Sheridan's expenses at Stafford in 1784, of which the
+first item is--248 burgesses, paid L5 5s. each, L1302.--Moore's _Life of
+Sheridan_, i., 405.]
+
+[Footnote 63: "Life of Pitt," i., 359.]
+
+[Footnote 64: Lord North was a Knight of the Garter, the only commoner,
+except Sir R. Walpole, who received that distinction in the last
+century, and the latest, with the exception of Lord Castlereagh. on whom
+it has been conferred.]
+
+[Footnote 65: 233 to 315.]
+
+[Footnote 66: It is perhaps worth pointing out, as a specimen of the
+practical manner in which parliamentary business was transacted at that
+time, that this great debate--in which (the House being in committee)
+Mr. Dunning himself spoke three times, and Lord North, Mr. T. Pitt, Mr.
+Fox, the Speaker (Sir F. Norton), the Attorney-general, General Conway,
+Governor Pownall, the Lord-advocate, and several other members took
+part--was concluded by twelve o'clock.]
+
+[Footnote 67: February 8, 1780, on Lord Shelburne's motion for an
+inquiry into the public expenditure.--_Parliamentary History_, xx.,
+1346.]
+
+[Footnote 68: 101 to 55.]
+
+[Footnote 69: "Constitutional History," iii., 43.]
+
+[Footnote 70: His language is said to have been that "there was at all
+events one Magistrate in the kingdom who would do his duty."--Lord
+Stanhope, _History of England_, vii., 48.]
+
+[Footnote 71: "Lives of the Lord Chancellors," c. clxvii.]
+
+[Footnote 72: Lord Stanhope's "History of England," vii, 56.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+
+Changes of Administration.--The Coalition Ministry.--The Establishment
+of the Prince of Wales.--Fox's India Bill.--The King Defeats it by the
+Agency of Lord Temple.--The Ministry is Dismissed, and Succeeded by Mr.
+Pitt's Administration.--Opposition to the New Ministry in the House of
+Commons.--Merits of the Contest between the Old and the New
+Ministry.--Power of Pitt.--Pitt's India Bill.--Bill for the Government
+of Canada.--The Marriage of the Prince of Wales to Mrs.
+Fitzherbert.--The King becomes Deranged.--Proposal of a
+Regency.--Opinions of Various Writers on the Course adopted.--Spread of
+Revolutionary Societies and Opinions.--Bills for the Repression of
+Sedition and Treason.--The Alien Act.--The Traitorous Correspondence
+Act.--Treason and Sedition Bills.--Failure of some Prosecutions under
+them.
+
+
+The occurrences of the next year brought the question of the influence
+of the crown into greater prominence. Lord Rockingham's administration,
+unfortunately, came to a premature termination by his death at the
+beginning of July. With a strange arrogance, Fox claimed the right of
+dictating the choice of his successor to the King, making his
+pretensions the more unwarrantable by the character of the person whom
+he desired to nominate, the Duke of Portland, who, though a man of vast
+property and considerable borough influence, was destitute of ability of
+any kind, and had not even any of that official experience which in some
+situations may at times compensate or conceal the want of talent.[73]
+The King preferred Lord Shelburne, a statesman whose capacity was
+confessedly of a very high order, who had more than once been Secretary
+of State,[74] and who had been recognized as the leader of what was
+sometimes called the Chatham section of the Whigs, ever since the death
+of the great Earl. Indeed, if George III. had been guided by his own
+wishes and judgment alone, he would have placed him at the Treasury, in
+preference to Lord Rockingham, three months before. But, during the last
+three months, jealousies had arisen between him and Fox, his colleague
+in office, who charged him with concealing from him the knowledge of
+various circumstances, the communication of which he had a right to
+require. It was more certain that on one or two points connected with
+the negotiations with the United States there had been divisions between
+them, and that the majority of the cabinet had agreed with Lord
+Shelburne. Lord Shelburne, therefore, became Prime-minister,[75] and
+Fox, with some of his friends, resigned; Fox indemnifying himself by a
+violent philippic against "those men who were now to direct the counsels
+of the country," and whom he proceeded to describe as "men whom neither
+promises could bind nor principles of honor could secure; who would
+abandon fifty principles for the sake of power, and forget fifty
+promises when they were no longer necessary to their ends; who, he had
+no doubt, to secure themselves in the power which they had by the labor
+of others obtained, would strive to strengthen it by any means which
+corruption could procure."[76]
+
+Fox at once went into what even those most disposed to cherish his
+memory admit to have been a factious opposition. He caballed with the
+very men to whom he had hitherto been most vehemently opposed for the
+sole object of expelling Lord Shelburne from office. And when, at the
+beginning of the session of 1783, the merits of the preliminary articles
+of peace which had been provisionally concluded with the United States
+came under discussion, though the peers approved of them, in the House
+of Commons he defeated the ministers in two separate divisions,[77] and
+thus rendered their retention of office impossible. He had gained this
+victory by uniting with Lord North and a portion of the Tory party whom,
+ever since his dismissal from office in 1774, he had been unwearied in
+denouncing, threatening Lord North himself with impeachment. And he now
+used it to compel the King to intrust the chief office in the government
+to the very man whom his Majesty had refused to employ in such an office
+six months before.
+
+The transactions of the next twelve months exhibit in a striking light
+more than one part of the practical working of our monarchical and
+parliamentary constitution, not only in its correspondence with, but,
+what is more important to notice, in its occasional partial deviations
+from, strict theory. The theory has sometimes been expressed in the
+formula, "The King reigns, but does not govern." But, like many another
+terse apophthegm, it conveys an idea which requires some modification
+before it can be regarded as an entirely correct representation of the
+fact; and the King himself, especially if endowed with fair capacity and
+force of character, imbued with earnest convictions, and animated by a
+genuine zeal for the honor and welfare of his kingdom, will be likely to
+dwell more on the possible modifications than on the rigid theory. Even
+those who insist most on the letter of the theory will not deny that, if
+the King has not actual power, he has at least great influence; and the
+line between authority and influence is hard to draw. One of George the
+Third's earliest ministers had explained to his Majesty that the
+principle of the constitution was, "that the crown had an undoubted
+right to choose its ministers, and that it was the duty of subjects to
+support them, unless there were some very strong and urgent reasons to
+the contrary."[78] And such a doctrine was too much in harmony with the
+feelings of George III. himself not to be cordially accepted. For George
+III. was by no means inclined to be a _Roi faineant_. No sovereign was
+ever penetrated with a more conscientious desire to do his duty to his
+people. Conscious, perhaps, that his capacity was rather solid than
+brilliant, he gave unremitting attention to the affairs of the nation in
+every department of the government; and, perhaps not very unnaturally,
+conceived that his doing so justified him, as far as he might be able,
+in putting a constraint on his ministers to carry out his views. Thus,
+he had notoriously induced Lord North to persevere in the late civil war
+in America long after that minister had seen the hopelessness of the
+contest; and it was, probably, only the knowledge of the strength of his
+feelings on that subject, and of his warm attachment to that minister,
+that caused the Parliament so long to withstand all the eloquence of the
+advocates of peace, and the still stronger arguments of circumstances.
+He might fairly think that he had now greater reason to adhere to his
+own judgment; for Fox's recommendation of the Duke of Portland in
+preference to Lord Shelburne was an act not only of unwarrantable
+presumption, but of inconceivable folly, since there was no comparison
+between the qualifications of the two men; and the coalition by which,
+six months afterward, he had, as it were, revenged himself for the
+rebuff, and had driven Lord Shelburne from office, was, as the King well
+knew, and as even Fox's own friends did not conceal from themselves,
+almost universally condemned out-of-doors.[79] To this combination,
+therefore, his Majesty tried every expedient to escape from yielding.
+And when Pitt's well-considered and judicious refusal of the government
+left him no alternative but that of submission to Fox's dictation, it
+would hardly have been very unnatural if his disposition and attitude
+toward a ministry which had thus forced itself upon him had been those
+attributed to him by Lord John Russell, of "an enemy constantly on the
+watch against it."[80] But for some time that was not the impression of
+the ministers themselves. In July, when they had been in office more
+than three months, Fox admitted that he had never behaved toward them as
+if he were displeased with them, and that he had no project of
+substituting any other administration for the present one.[81] And his
+temperate treatment of them was the more remarkable, because a flagrant
+blunder of Burke (who filled the post of Paymaster), in reinstating some
+clerks who had been dismissed by his predecessor for dishonesty, had
+manifestly weakened the ministry in the House of Commons;[82] while in
+another case, in which the King had clearly in no slight degree a
+personal right to have his opinion consulted and his wishes accepted by
+them as the guide for their conduct, the establishment to be arranged
+for the Prince of Wales, whose twenty-first birthday was approaching,
+Fox persuaded the Parliament to settle on the young Prince an allowance
+of so large an amount that some even of his own colleagues disliked it
+as extravagant;[83] while the King himself reasonably disapproved both
+of the amount and of the mode of giving it, the amount being large
+beyond all precedent, and the fact of its being given by Parliament
+rendering the Prince entirely independent of his parental control, of
+which his conduct had given abundant proof that he stood greatly in
+need.
+
+That he presently changed his line of behavior toward them was caused by
+their introduction of a bill which he regarded as aimed in no small
+degree at his own prerogative and independence--the celebrated India
+Bill, by which, in the November session, Fox proposed to abrogate all
+the charters which different sovereigns had granted to the East India
+Company, to abolish all vested rights of either the Company or
+individuals, and to confer on a board of seven persons, to be named by
+Parliament, the entire administration of all the territories in any way
+occupied by the Company. It was at once objected to by the Opposition in
+the House of Commons, now led by Mr. Pitt, as a measure thoroughly
+unconstitutional, on the twofold ground that such an abrogation of
+formally granted charters, and such an extinction of vested rights, was
+absolutely without precedent; and also that one real, if concealed,
+object of the bill was to confer on the ministers who had framed and
+introduced it so vast an amount of patronage as would render them
+absolute masters of the House of Commons, and indirectly, therefore, of
+the King himself, who would be practically disabled from ever dismissing
+them. That such a revocation of ancient charters, and such an immovable
+establishment of an administration, were inconsistent with the
+principles of the constitution, was not a position taken up by Pitt in
+the heat of debate, but was his deliberate opinion, as may be fairly
+inferred from his assertion of it in a private letter[84] to his friend
+the Duke of Rutland. It may, however, be doubted whether the epithet
+"unconstitutional" could be properly applied to the bill on either
+ground. There is, indeed, a certain vagueness in the meaning, or at all
+events in the frequent use of this adjective. Sometimes it is used to
+imply a violation of the provisions of the Great Charter, or of its
+later development, the Bill of Rights; sometimes to impute some imagined
+departure from the principles which guided the framers of those
+enactments. But in neither sense does it seem applicable to this bill.
+To designate the infringement or revocation of a charter by such a
+description would be to affirm the existence of a right in the sovereign
+to invest a charter, from whatever motive it may originally have been
+granted, with such a character of inviolability or perpetuity that no
+Parliament should, on ever such strong grounds of public good, have the
+power of interfering with it. And to attribute such a power to the crown
+appears less consistent with the limitations affixed to the royal
+prerogative by the constitution, than to regard all trusts created by
+the crown as subject to parliamentary revision in the interests of the
+entire nation. On the second ground the description seems even less
+applicable. An arrangement of patronage is a mere matter of detail, not
+of principle. For the minister to propose such an arrangement as should
+secure for himself and his party a perpetual monopoly of power and
+office might be grasping and arrogant; for Parliament (and Parliament
+consists of the sovereign and the peers, as well as of the House of
+Commons) to assent to such an arrangement might be short-sighted and
+impolitic; but it is not clear that either the minister in proposing
+such an enactment, or the Parliament in adopting it, would be violating
+either the letter or the spirit of the constitution. Every member of the
+Governing Board was to be appointed by the Parliament itself; and,
+though unquestionably Fox would have the nomination, and though he could
+reckon on the support of the majority in the House of Commons for those
+whom he might select, still it was a strictly constitutional machinery
+that he was putting in motion.
+
+A measure, however, may be very objectionable without being
+unconstitutional, and such a view of the India Bill the progress of the
+debates in the House of Commons disposed the King to take of it. In the
+House of Peers Lord Thurlow described the bill as one to take the crown
+off his head and place it on that of Mr. Fox; and, even without adopting
+that description to its full extent, the King might easily regard the
+bill as a very unscrupulous attempt to curtail his legitimate authority
+and influence. He became most anxious to prevent the bill from being
+presented to him for his royal assent. And it was presently represented
+to him that the knowledge of his desire would probably induce the Lords
+to reject it. Among the peers who had attacked the bill on its first
+introduction into their House was Earl Temple, whose father had taken so
+prominent a part in the negotiations for the formation of a new ministry
+in 1765, and who had himself been Lord-lieutenant of Ireland under Lord
+Shelburne's administration. But he had not thought it prudent to divide
+the House against its first reading, and felt great doubts as to his
+success in a division on the second, unless he could fortify his
+opposition by some arguments as yet untried. He had no difficulty in
+finding a willing and effective coadjutor. Since the retirement of Lord
+Bute from court, no peer had made himself so personally acceptable to
+the King as Lord Thurlow, who had been Lord Chancellor during the last
+four years of Lord North's administration, and, in consequence, as it
+was generally understood, of the earnest request of George III., had
+been allowed to retain the seals by Lord Rockingham, and afterward by
+Lord Shelburne. What special attraction drew the King toward him, unless
+it were some idea of his honesty and attachment to the King himself--on
+both of which points subsequent events proved his Majesty to be wholly
+mistaken--it is not very easy to divine; but his interest with the King
+at this time was notorious, and equally notorious was the deep
+resentment which he cherished against Fox and Lord North, of whom, as he
+alleged, the former had proscribed and the latter had betrayed him. To
+him, therefore, Lord Temple now applied for advice as to the best mode
+of working on the King's mind, and, with his assistance, drew up a
+memorial on the character of the India Bill, on its inevitable fruits if
+it should pass (which it described as an extinction of "more than half
+of the royal power, and a consequent disabling of his Majesty for the
+rest of his reign"), and on the most effectual plan for defeating it;
+for which end it was suggested that his Majesty should authorize some
+one to make some of the Lords "acquainted with his wishes" that the bill
+should be rejected.[85]
+
+George III. eagerly adopted the suggestion, and drew up a brief note,
+which he intrusted to Lord Temple himself, and which stated that "his
+Majesty allowed Earl Temple to say that whoever voted for the India Bill
+was not only not his friend, but would be considered by him as his
+enemy. And, if these words were not strong enough, Earl Temple might
+whatever words he might deem stronger and more to the purpose."[86]
+
+Lord Temple lost no time in availing himself of the permission thus
+granted him; and, as it was by no means his object to keep the
+transaction secret, his conduct was made the subject of severe comment
+by the Prime-minister himself the next time that the bill was mentioned
+in the Upper House. The Duke of Portland, indeed, professed to have
+learned it only from common report, and to hope that the report was
+unfounded, since, were it true, "he should be wanting in the duty he
+owed to the public as a minister if he did not take the opportunity of
+proposing a measure upon it to their lordships that would prove that
+they felt the same jealousy, the same detestation, the same desire to
+mark and stigmatize every attempt to violate the constitution as he
+did." Lord Temple, in reply, abstained from introducing any mention of
+the King's opinions or wishes, but avowed plainly that he had used his
+privilege as a peer to solicit an interview with his Majesty, and that
+at that interview "he had given his advice. What that advice had been he
+would not then say; it was lodged in the breast of his Majesty, nor
+would he declare the purport of it without the royal consent, or till he
+saw a proper occasion. But, though he would not declare affirmatively
+what his advice to his sovereign was, he would tell their lordships
+negatively what it was not. It was not friendly to the principle and
+objects of the bill."[87] The debate lasted till near midnight. Of the
+speakers, a great majority declared against the bill; and, on the
+division, it was rejected by a majority of nineteen.[88] This took place
+on the 15th of December. On the 18th, as the ministers had not
+resigned--not regarding a single defeat in the Upper House as a
+necessary cause for such a step--the King sent messengers to them to
+demand their resignation, and the next day it was publicly announced in
+the House of Commons that Pitt had accepted the office of
+Prime-minister.
+
+But Fox, who had anticipated the dismissal of himself and his
+colleagues, was by no means inclined to acquiesce in it, or to yield
+without a struggle; and on the 17th one of his partisans in the House of
+Commons, Mr. Baker, one of the members for Hertfordshire, brought
+forward some resolutions on the subject of the late division in the
+House of Lords. He professed to rest them solely on rumors, but he urged
+that "it was the duty of that House to express its abhorrence even of
+that rumor," since by such an action as was alleged "that responsibility
+of ministers which was the life of the constitution would be taken away,
+and with it the principal check that the public had upon the crown." And
+he urged "the members of that House, as the guardians of the
+constitution, to stand forward and preserve it from ruin, to maintain
+that equilibrium between the three branches of the Legislature, and that
+independence without which the constitution could no longer exist," and
+with this view to resolve "that to report any opinion, or pretended
+opinion, of his Majesty upon any bill or other proceeding depending in
+either House of Parliament, with a view to influence the votes of the
+members, is a high crime and misdemeanor, derogatory to the honor of the
+crown, a breach of the fundamental privileges of Parliament, and
+subversive of the constitution of the country." It was opposed by Pitt,
+chiefly on the ground that Mr. Baker only based the necessity for such a
+resolution on common report, which he, fairly enough, denied to be a
+sufficient justification of it; and partly on the undoubted and
+"inalienable right of peers, either individually or collectively, to
+advise his Majesty, whenever they thought the situation of public
+affairs made such a step an essential part of their duty." But it was
+supported by Lord North as "necessary on constitutional principles,"
+since the acts so generally reported and believed "affected the freedom
+of debate;" and by Fox, who declared that the action which was reported,
+if true, "struck at the great bulwark of our liberties, and went to the
+absolute annihilation, not of our chartered rights only, but of those
+radical and fundamental ones which are paramount to all charters, which
+were consigned to our care by the sovereign disposition of Nature, which
+we cannot relinquish without violating the most sacred of all
+obligations, to which we are entitled, not as members of society, but as
+individuals and as men; the right of adhering steadily and uniformly to
+the great and supreme laws of conscience and duty; of preferring, at all
+hazards and without equivocation, those general and substantial
+interests which members have sworn to prefer; of acquitting themselves
+honorably to their constituents, to their friends, to their own minds,
+and to that public whose trustees they were, and for whom they acted."
+He avowed his conviction that rumor in this instance spoke truth, and,
+affirming that "the responsibility of ministers is the only pledge and
+security the people of England possesses against the infinite abuses so
+natural to the exercise of royal powers," argued that, if "this great
+bulwark of the constitution were once removed, the people would become
+in every respect the slaves and property of despotism. This must be the
+necessary consequence of secret influence." He argued that the sole
+distinction between an absolute and a limited monarchy was that the
+sovereign in one is a despot, and may do as he pleases, but that in the
+other he is himself subjected to the laws, and consequently is not at
+liberty to advise with any one in public affairs who is not responsible
+for that advice, and that the constitution has clearly directed his
+negative to operate under the same wise restrictions. Mr. Baker's
+resolution was carried by a large majority; but, as we have seen, did
+not deter the King from dismissing the ministry.
+
+The conduct of George III. in this transaction has been discussed by
+writers of both parties with such candor that the Tory historian, Lord
+Stanhope, while evidently desirous to defend it by implication, passes a
+slight censure on it in the phrase that "the course pursued by the King
+was most unusual, and most extreme, and most undesirable to establish as
+a precedent;"[89] while, on the other hand, so rigid a Whig as Lord
+Campbell urges in his favor "that if it be ever excusable in a King of
+England to cabal against his ministers, George III. may well be defended
+for the course he now took, for they had been forced upon him by a
+factious intrigue, and public opinion was decidedly in his favor."[90]
+But to those who regard not the excuse which previous provocation may be
+conceived in some degree to furnish to human infirmity, but only the
+strict theory and principle of the constitution on which the doctrine of
+the responsibility of the ministers and the consequent irresponsibility
+of the sovereign rests, Lord Campbell's conditional justification for
+the communication made through Lord Temple will hardly appear
+admissible. We cannot be sure how far Mr. Grenville's "Diary" is to be
+trusted for transactions in which he was not personally concerned, or
+for conversations at which he was not present; but in giving an
+account[91] of some of the occurrences of the spring of 1766, while Lord
+Rockingham was Prime-minister, we find him relating a conversation
+between the King and Lord Mansfield on the ministerial measure for
+conciliating the American Colonies by the repeal of the Stamp Act,
+combined, however, with an assertion of the _right_ to tax. "He (Lord
+Mansfield) took notice of the King's name having been bandied about in a
+very improper manner; to which the King assented, saying he had been
+very much displeased at it, as thinking it unconstitutional to have his
+name mentioned as a means to sway any man's opinion in any business
+which was before Parliament; and that all those who approached him knew
+that to be his sentiment. Lord Mansfield said he differed from his
+Majesty in that opinion, for that, though it would be unconstitutional
+to endeavor by his Majesty's name to carry questions in Parliament, yet
+where the lawful rights of the King and Parliament were to be asserted
+and maintained, he thought the making his Majesty's opinion in support
+of those rights to be known was very fit and becoming." The line here
+alleged to have been drawn by the great Chief-justice, between
+proclaiming the King's opinion in support of rights, but withholding it
+in the case of measures, is, perhaps, too fine to be perceptible by
+ordinary intellects. But however the King may have understood the judge,
+it is clear that the doctrine thus asserted does not justify, but
+condemns, such an act as the communication of the King's opinion and
+wishes in the case under consideration. If it "would be unconstitutional
+to endeavor by his Majesty's name to carry questions in Parliament," it
+must be at least equally so to use his name to defeat them. And the case
+is infinitely stronger, if the measure to be defeated be one which has
+been introduced by his ministers. For there can be no doubt whatever
+that, so long as they are his ministers, they are entitled to his full
+and complete support on every question; alike in their general policy
+and on each separate measure. When he can no longer give them that
+support, which the very act of conferring their offices on them promised
+them, his only legitimate and becoming course is to dismiss them from
+their offices, and to abide the judgment of Parliament and the nation on
+that act. Thus William IV. acted in the autumn of 1834; and thus George
+III. himself acted at the end of the month of which we are speaking. But
+to retain them in their offices, and to employ an unofficial declaration
+of his dissent from them to defeat their policy, is neither consistent
+with the straightforward conduct due from one gentleman to another, nor
+with the principle on which the system of administration, such as
+prevails in this country, is founded.
+
+As has been already mentioned, the King at once dismissed the Coalition
+Ministry. Mr. Pitt accepted the conduct of affairs, and by so doing
+accepted the responsibility for all the acts of the King which had
+conduced to his appointment. Lord John Russell, who in his "Memorials
+and Correspondence of Fox" has related and examined the whole
+transaction at considerable though not superfluous length, while blaming
+the prudence, and in some points the propriety, of Fox's conduct, at the
+same time severely censures Pitt as "committing a great fault in
+accepting office as the price of an unworthy intrigue," and affirms that
+"he and his colleagues who accepted office upon the success of this
+intrigue placed themselves in an unconstitutional position."[92] This
+seems to be a charge which can hardly be borne out. In dismissing his
+former ministry, the King was clearly acting within his right; and, if
+so, Pitt was equally within his in undertaking the government. The truer
+doctrine would seem to be, that, in so undertaking it, he assumed the
+entire responsibility for the dismissal of his predecessors,[93] and
+left it to the people at large, by the votes of their representatives,
+to decide whether that dismissal were justified, and whether, as its
+inevitable consequence, his acceptance of office were also justified or
+not. The entire series of transactions, from the meeting of Parliament
+in November, 1783, to its dissolution in the following March, may be
+constitutionally regarded as an appeal by the King from the existing
+House of Commons to the entire nation, as represented by the
+constituencies; and their verdict, as is well known, ratified in the
+most emphatic manner all that had been done. And we may assert this
+without implying that, if the single act of empowering Lord Temple to
+influence the peers by the declaration of the King's private feeling had
+been submitted by itself to the electors, they would have justified
+that. The stirring excitement of the three months' contest between the
+great rivals led them to pronounce upon the transaction as a whole, and
+to leave unnoticed what seemed for the moment to be the minor
+issues--the moves, if we may borrow a metaphor from the chess-table,
+which opened the game; and it may be observed that, though, on the 17th
+of December, Pitt resisted Mr. Baker's resolution with his utmost
+energy, in the numerous debates which ensued he carefully avoided all
+allusion to Lord Temple's conduct, or to the measure which had led to
+the dismissal of his predecessors, farther than was necessary for the
+explanation of the principles of his own India Bill. It may even be
+surmised that, if he had been inclined to recognize Lord Temple's
+interference as warrantable, the breach between that peer and himself,
+which occurred before the end of the week, would not have taken place,
+since it seems nearly certain that the cause of that breach was a
+refusal on the part of Pitt to recommend his cousin for promotion in the
+peerage, a step which, at such a moment, would have had the appearance
+of an approval of his most recent deed,[94] but which he could hardly
+have refused, if it had been done with his privity. The battle, as need
+hardly be told, was first fought among the representatives of the people
+in the House of Commons; for there was only one occasion on which the
+opinion of the Lords was invited, when they declared in favor of Pitt by
+a decisive majority.[95] But in the Lower House the contest was carried
+on for more than two months with extraordinary activity and ability, by
+a series of resolutions and motions brought forward by the partisans of
+the coalition, and contested by the youthful minister. In one respect
+the war was waged on very unequal terms, Pitt, who had been but three
+years in Parliament, and whose official experience could as yet only be
+counted by months, having to contend almost single-handed against the
+combined experience and eloquence of Lord North, Fox, and Burke.
+Fortunately, however, for him, their own mismanagement soon turned the
+advantage to his side. They were too angry and too confident to be
+skilful, or even ordinarily cautious. The leaders on both sides made
+professions in one respect similar; they both alike denied that a desire
+of office influenced either their conduct or their language (a denial
+for which Pitt's refusal of the Treasury, a year before, gained him more
+credit than could be expected by Fox after his coalition with Lord
+North), and both alike professed to be struggling for the constitution
+alone, for some fundamental principle which each charged his antagonist
+with violating; Fox on one occasion even going so far as, in some
+degree, to involve the King himself in his censures, declaring not only
+that "the struggle was, in fact, one between Pitt himself and the
+constitution," but that it was also one "between liberty and the
+influence of the crown," and "between prerogative and the constitution;"
+and that "Pitt had been brought into power by means absolutely
+subversive of the constitution."[96] But no act of which he thus accused
+the minister or the King showed such a disregard of the fundamental
+principle of the constitution of Parliament as was exhibited by Fox
+himself when, in the very first debate after the Christmas recess, he
+called in question that most undoubted prerogative of the crown to
+dissolve the Parliament, and, drawing a distinction which had certainly
+never been heard of before, declared that, though the King had an
+incontestable right to dissolve the Parliament after the close of a
+session, "many great lawyers" doubted whether he had such a right in the
+middle of a session, a dissolution at such a period being "a penal" one.
+Professing to believe that an immediate dissolution was intended, he
+even threatened to propose to the House of Commons "measures to guard
+against a step so inimical to the true interests of the country," and
+made a more direct attack than ever on the King himself, by the
+assertion of a probability that, even if Pitt did not contemplate a
+dissolution, his royal master might employ "secret influence" to
+overrule him, and might dissolve in spite of him,[97] an imputation
+which Lord North, with a strange departure from his customary
+good-humor, condescended to endorse.[98] There could be no doubt that
+both the doubt and the menace were of themselves distinct attacks on the
+constitution; and they were, moreover, singularly impolitic and
+inconsistent with others of the speaker's arguments, since, if the
+nation at large approved of his views and conduct, a dissolution--which
+would have placed the decision in its hands--would have been the very
+thing he should most have desired. On another evening, though he
+admitted as a principle that the sovereign had the prerogative of
+choosing his ministers, he not only sought to narrow the effect of that
+admission by the assertion that "to exercise that prerogative in
+opposition to the House of Commons would be a measure as unsafe as
+unjustifiable,"[99] but to confine the right of deciding the title of
+the ministers to confidence to the existing House of Commons. He accused
+Pitt of "courting the affection of the people, and on this foundation
+wishing to support himself in opposition to the repeated resolutions of
+the House passed in the last three weeks." Had he confined himself to
+urging the necessity of the ministers and the House of Commons being in
+harmony, even though such a mention of the House of Commons by itself
+were to a certain extent an ignoring of the weight of the other branches
+of the Legislature, he would have only been advancing a doctrine which
+is practically established at the present day, since there has been
+certainly more than one instance in which a ministry has retired which
+enjoyed the confidence of both the sovereign and the House of Lords,
+because it was not supported by a majority in the House of Commons. But
+when he proceeded to make it a charge against the minister that he
+trusted to the good-will of the people to enable him to disregard the
+verdict of the House of Commons, he forgot that it was only as
+representing the people that the House had any right to pronounce a
+verdict; and that, if it were true that the judgment of the people was
+more favorable to the minister than that of the House of Commons, the
+difference which thus existed was a condemnation of the existing House,
+and an irresistible reason for calling on the constituencies to elect
+another.
+
+Pitt, therefore, had no slight advantage in defending himself against so
+rash an assailant. "He did not shrink," he said, "from avowing himself
+the friend of the King's just prerogative," and in doing so he
+maintained that he had a title to be regarded as the champion of the
+people not less than of the crown. "Prerogative had been justly called a
+part of the rights of the people, and he was sure it was a part of their
+rights which they were never more inclined to defend, of which they were
+never more jealous, than at that hour."[100] And he contended that Fox's
+objections to a dissolution betrayed a consciousness that he had not the
+confidence of the nation. At last, when the contest had lasted nearly
+two months, Fox took the matter into his own hands, and, no longer
+putting his partisans in the front of the battle, on the 1st of March he
+himself moved for an address to the King, the most essential clause of
+which "submitted to his Majesty's royal consideration that the
+continuance of an administration which did not possess the confidence of
+the representatives of the people must be injurious to the public
+service." ... And, therefore, that "his Majesty's faithful Commons did
+find themselves obliged again to beseech his Majesty that he would be
+graciously pleased to lay the foundation of a strong and stable
+government by the previous removal of his present ministers." In the
+speech with which he introduced this address he put himself forward as
+especially the champion of the House of Commons. He charged the
+Prime-minister with an express design "to reduce the House to
+insignificance, to render it a mere appendage to the court, an
+appurtenance to the administration." He asserted the existence of a
+systematic "design to degrade the House, after which there was not
+another step necessary to complete the catastrophe of the constitution."
+And on this occasion he distinguished the feelings of the King from
+those which influenced the minister, affirming his confidence "that the
+King's heart had no share in the present business."[101]
+
+Pitt, on the other hand, in reply, affirmed that he was called on by
+duty "to defend the rights of the other branches of the Legislature; the
+just and constitutional prerogative of the sovereign," upon which the
+Opposition was seeking to encroach, without even having shown a single
+reason to justify such invasion. He freely admitted that, if the House
+of Commons or either of the other branches of the Legislature
+"disapproved of an administration on proper grounds, it would not be
+well for that administration to retain office." But in the present
+instance he contended that "no ground for disapprobation had been
+shown." The existing administration "had, in fact, by an unaccountable
+obstinacy and untowardness of circumstances, been deprived of all
+opportunity" of showing its capacity or its intentions. "If any
+accusations should be made and proved against it, if any charges should
+be substantiated, it would, indeed be proper for the ministers to
+resign; and if, in such a case he were afterward to continue in office,
+he would suffer himself to be stigmatized as the champion of
+prerogative, and the unconstitutional supporter of the usurpation of the
+crown. But till this period arrived, he should reckon it his duty to
+adhere to the principles of the constitution, as delivered to us by our
+ancestors; to defend them against innovation and encroachment, and to
+maintain them with firmness." "The constitution of this country," he
+presently added, "is its glory; but in what a nice adjustment does its
+excellence consist! Equally free from the distractions of democracy and
+the tyranny of monarchy, its happiness is to be found in its mixture of
+parts. It was this mixed government which the prudence of our ancestors
+devised, and which it will be our wisdom to support. They experienced
+all the vicissitudes and distractions of a republic; they felt all the
+vassalage and despotism of a simple monarchy. They abandoned both; and,
+by blending each together, extracted a system which has been the envy
+and admiration of the world. This system it is the object of the present
+address to defeat and destroy. It is the intention of this address to
+arrogate a power which does not belong to the House of Commons; to place
+a negative on the exercise of the prerogative, and to destroy the
+balance of power in the government as it was settled at the Revolution."
+
+Fox had urged that our history afforded no example of a ministry
+retaining office after the House of Commons had passed a resolution
+condemning it. Pitt, in reply, urged that our history equally failed to
+furnish any instance of a ministry having been called on to retire
+without any misconduct being alleged against them. And the result of the
+division showed that his arguments and his firmness were producing an
+impression on the House, for, though he was again defeated, the majority
+against him (only twelve) was far smaller than on any previous
+division.[102] A week later, this feeling in his favor was shown still
+more decidedly, when Fox, on moving for a fresh address, or, as he
+termed it, a representation to the King that the House had received his
+Majesty's reply to their address "with surprise and affliction," he
+could only carry it by a single vote.[103] And this division closed the
+struggle. Fox made no farther effort. Before the end of the month the
+Parliament was dissolved, and the general election which ensued sent to
+the House a majority to support the ministers which Pitt was fairly
+warranted in claiming as the full justification of the course which he
+had pursued.
+
+On a review of the whole of this extraordinary transaction, or series of
+transactions, it is impossible to avoid regarding the issue of the
+struggle as an all-important element in the case, and a test almost
+decisive of the correctness of conduct of the rival leaders. We may
+leave out of the question the action of the King in his communication to
+Lord Temple, which, although sanctioned by the great legal authority of
+Lord Thurlow, we are, for reasons already given, compelled to regard as
+unconstitutional, but for which Mr. Pitt was only technically
+responsible; having, indeed, made himself so by his subsequent
+acceptance of office, but having had no previous suspicion of the royal
+intentions. Similarly, we may dismiss from our consideration the merits
+or demerits of Fox's India Bill, the designs which were imputed to its
+framers, or the consequences which, whether intended or not by them,
+were predicted as certain to flow from it. And we may confine ourselves
+to the question whether, in the great Parliamentary struggle which
+ensued, and which lasted for more than three months,[104] the doctrines
+advanced by Mr. Fox, and the conduct pursued by him, were more or less
+in accordance with the admitted rules and principles of the
+constitution.
+
+These doctrines may be reduced to two: the first a declaration that no
+minister is justified in retaining office any longer than he is
+sustained in it by the favorable judgment of the representatives of the
+people. Taken by itself, this, but for one consideration, might be
+pronounced the superfluous assertion of a truism; superfluous, because
+it is obvious that a House of Commons hostile to a minister can compel
+his resignation by obstructing all his measures. And Pitt himself
+recognized this as fully as Fox, though we may hardly agree with him
+that the Opposition was bound to allow him time to develop his policy,
+and to bring forward his various measures, before it pronounced an
+opinion adverse to them. In 1835, when Sir R. Peel first met Parliament
+after his acceptance of office, consequent on the King's dismissal of
+Lord Melbourne's ministry, the Opposition encountered and defeated him
+twice in the first week of the session--on the choice of a Speaker, and
+on the address, though the latter had been framed with the most skilful
+care to avoid any necessity for objection; but no attempt was made by
+him to call in question the perfect right of Lord J. Russell and his
+followers in the House to choose their own time and field of battle. But
+there is one farther consideration, that the authority belonging to the
+judgment of the House of Commons depends on that judgment being not
+solely its own, but the judgment also of the constituencies which have
+returned it, and whose mouth-piece it is; and also that the House is not
+immortal, but is liable to be sent back to those constituencies, to see
+whether they will ratify the judgment which their representatives have
+expressed; whether, in other words, their judgment be the judgment of
+the nation also. This farther consideration was, in fact, Pitt's plea
+for resisting the majorities which, through January and February, so
+repeatedly pronounced against him. And in determining to appeal to the
+constituencies, as the court of ultimate resort, he was clearly within
+the lines of the constitution.
+
+It follows that Fox, in protesting against a dissolution, in threatening
+even to take steps to prevent it, was acting in self-evident violation
+of all constitutional principle and precedent. He was denying one of the
+most universally acknowledged of the royal prerogatives. The distinction
+which he endeavored to draw between a dissolution at the close of a
+session and one in the middle of it, had manifestly no validity in law
+or in common-sense. The minister had a clear right to appeal from the
+House of Commons to the people, and one equally clear to choose his own
+time for making that appeal. The appeal was made, the judgment of the
+nation was pronounced, and its pronouncement may be, and indeed must be,
+accepted as a sufficient justification, in a constitutional point of
+view, of Pitt's conduct both in accepting and retaining office. If he
+retained it for three months, in opposition to the voice of the existing
+House of Commons, he could certainly allege that he was retaining it in
+accordance with the deliberate judgment of the nation.
+
+And this is the verdict of a modern statesman, a very careful student of
+the theory of our Parliamentary constitution, and one whom party
+connection would notoriously have inclined to defend the line taken by
+Mr. Fox, had it been possible to do so. Indeed, he may be said to show
+his bias in that statesman's favor when he affirms that he would have
+been right in moving a resolution of censure on Pitt for "his acceptance
+of office," which he presently calls the result of "the success of a
+court intrigue,"[105] and, without a particle of evidence to justify the
+imputation, affirms to "have been prepared beforehand with much art and
+combination." But _amicus Fox, sed magis arnica veritas_; and though he
+thus passes censure on Pitt, where the facts on which he bases it are at
+least unproved, on those points as to which the facts are clear and
+certain he condemns Fox altogether, affirming that his "attempt to show
+that the crown had not the prerogative of dissolving Parliament in the
+middle of a session had neither law nor precedent in its support."[106]
+And he proceeds to lay down, with great clearness and accuracy, "the
+practice as well as the theory of our mixed government," which is, that
+"when two of the powers of the state cannot" agree, and the business of
+the state is stopped, the only appeal is to the people at large. Thus,
+when in the reign of Queen Anne the House of Lords and the House of
+Commons fulminated resolutions at each other, a dissolution cleared the
+air and restored serenity. If no case had occurred since the Revolution
+of a quarrel between the crown and the House of Commons, the cause is to
+be sought in the prudence with which every sovereign who had reigned
+since that event had wielded his constitutional authority. If George
+III. had been wanting in that prudence, it did not follow that he was
+debarred from the right of appealing to the people. Any other doctrine
+would invest the House of Commons, elected for the ordinary business of
+the state, with a supreme power over every branch of it. This supreme
+power must rest somewhere; according to our constitution it rests in the
+common assent of the realm, signified by the persons duly qualified to
+elect the members of the House of Commons; and Lord Russell, in thus
+expounding his ideas on this subject, was undoubtedly expressing the
+view that ever since the transactions of which we have been speaking has
+been taken of the point chiefly in dispute. Since that day there has
+been more than one instance of Parliament being dissolved in the middle
+of a session; but, though the prudence of the different ministers who
+advised such dissolutions may, perhaps, have been questioned--nay,
+though in one memorable instance it was undoubtedly a penal dissolution
+in the fullest sense of the word[107]--no one has ever accused the
+sovereign's advisers of seducing him into an unconstitutional exercise
+of his prerogative.
+
+Pitt was now Prime-minister, with a degree of power in Parliament and of
+popularity out-of-doors that no former minister, not even his own
+father, had ever enjoyed. As such, by the confession of one who was
+certainly no friendly critic,[108] "he became the greatest master of
+Parliamentary government that has ever existed." His administration may
+be regarded as a fresh starting-point in the history of the country, as
+the inauguration of the principle of steady amendment, improvement, and
+progress, in place of the maxims which had guided all his predecessors
+since the Revolution, of regarding every thing as permanently settled by
+the arrangements made at that time, and their own duty, consequently, as
+binding them to keep everything in its existing condition. But, of all
+the ministers recorded in our annals, there is not one so greatly in
+advance of his time as Pitt; and from the very outset of his ministerial
+career he applied himself, not only to the removal or correction of
+admitted abuses or defects, but, in cases where the fault, being in our
+general system of policy, had been less conspicuous, to the
+establishment of new principles of action which have been the rules of
+all succeeding statesmen. He was not, indeed, the first raiser of the
+question of Parliamentary Reform, but he was the first to produce an
+elaborate scheme with that object, parts of which, such as the
+suppression of the smaller boroughs and the enfranchisement of places
+which had gradually become more important, have been leading features of
+every subsequent bill on the subject. He was the first to propose the
+removal of those political disabilities under which the Roman Catholics
+labored, which no one before him had regarded as consistent with the
+safety of the state, and to which he sacrificed office. He was the first
+to conceive the idea of developing our national industries and resources
+by commercial treaties with other nations, even choosing for his
+essay-piece a treaty with a country with which our relations for nearly
+five hundred years had been almost uninterruptedly hostile, and which
+Fox, in the heat of his opposition, objected even to consider in any
+other light than that of an enemy. He laid the foundation for all
+subsequent legislation connected with our colonies in his Bill for the
+Government of Canada; and he established a system for the government of
+our Indian dependencies on so statesman-like a principle, that all
+subsequent administrations concurred in upholding it, till subsequent
+events compelled the abolition of all the share in the government of the
+country previously possessed by the Company.
+
+A great writer of the past generation,[109] who in some respects has
+done full justice to his genius and political virtue, has, however
+(partly, it can hardly be doubted, from regarding himself as a follower
+of his great rival, Fox), contrasted his capacity as a War-minister with
+that of his father, drawing a comparison on this point very
+disadvantageous to the son. We need not stop to examine how far the
+praises which he bestows on Lord Chatham's talents as a planner of
+military operations are deserved; but it may very fairly be contended
+that the disparaging views of Pitt's military policy which he has
+advanced are founded solely on what is in this as well as in many other
+instances a most delusive criterion, success. It is true,
+unquestionably, that in the campaigns of 1793-4-5 against the French
+revolutionists, while he took upon this country the entire burden of the
+naval war, on land he contented himself with playing a secondary part,
+and employing a comparatively small force (which, however, doubled that
+which his father had sent to Minden),[110] for the success of the
+military operations trusting chiefly to the far stronger Austrian and
+Prussian divisions, under the command of Prince Coburg and the Duke of
+Brunswick, to which the British regiments were but auxiliaries. It is
+true, also, that the result of their operations was unfortunate, and
+that the German generals proved wholly unable to contend with the fiery
+and more skilful impetuosity of Jourdan and Pichegru. But the question
+is not whether Pitt's confidence in the prowess of his allies was
+misplaced, but whether he had not abundant reason to justify him in
+entertaining it. And, to judge fairly on this point, we must recollect
+the reputation which for the last forty years the Austrian and Prussian
+armies had enjoyed. The result of the seven years' war had established
+the renown of the Prussians, and the Duke of Brunswick was understood to
+be a favorite pupil of the Great Frederic. The same war had shown that
+the Austrians were not very unequal to the Prussians; while the
+reputation of the French troops had fallen to the lowest ebb, the most
+memorable event in their annals during the same war being the rout of
+Rosbach, when 60,000 of them fled before Frederic and 22,000. At the
+breaking out of the Revolution, it might be said that De Bouille was the
+only French general of the slightest reputation, and since the sad
+journey to Varennes he had been an exile from his country. And, though
+again in 1803 Pitt once more trusted for success on land to Continental
+alliances, not only does he deserve admiration for the diplomatic talent
+with which he united Austria, Prussia, and Russia against France, but it
+can hardly be doubted that confederacy would have been triumphant, had
+not the incompetent vanity of Alexander ruined all its prospects by his
+rash disregard at Austerlitz of the experienced warnings of his own
+staff.[111]
+
+The new form of government which he established for India, and to which
+allusion has been made, has lost the greater part of its importance in
+the eyes of the present generation, from the more-recent abolition of
+the political authority of the East India Company, though of some of the
+principles which he avowed he had taken for his guides it is worth while
+to preserve the record; with such clearness, as well as statesman-like
+wisdom, do they affirm the objects which every one should keep in view
+who applies himself to legislation for distant dependencies where the
+privileges and interests of foreign fellow-subjects are to be regarded
+with as jealous a solicitude as those of our own countrymen. These
+objects may be briefly described as being the reconciling the vested and
+chartered interests of the Company with the legitimate authority of the
+King's government; for, though Pitt admitted that "state necessity"
+might occasionally be allowed as a valid reason for the abrogation of a
+charter, he affirmed that nothing short of such absolute necessity could
+excuse such a measure, and he relied on the previous history of the
+Company to prove the fallacy of an observation that had sometimes been
+made, that commercial companies could not govern empires. There were
+three interests to be considered: that of the native Indians, that of
+the Company, and that of this country; and the problem to be solved was,
+"how to do the most good to India and to the East India Company with the
+least injury to our constitution." Some of his remarks contained
+unavoidable allusions to Fox's bill of the previous year, since some of
+the provisions of his bill were entirely opposite to those which Fox had
+framed, the most material point of difference being the character of the
+Board of Control which he proposed to establish. Fox, as has been seen,
+had proposed to make the commissioners to be appointed under his bill
+irremovable for several years, whatever changes might take place in the
+home government; an arrangement which the opposers of the bill suspected
+of being designed to prevent any change in the home government from
+taking place. Pitt, on the other hand, laid down as one of his leading
+principles that "the board could not be permanent, that it must be
+subordinate to the administration of the day, and that permanency would
+be in itself a deviation from the principles of the constitution, and
+would involve the board in contradictions to the executive government
+that could not fail to be attended with great public inconvenience. An
+institution to control the government of India must be either totally
+independent of the government of this country or subordinate to it."
+"The board was to consist of none but privy councillors," and instead of
+the vast amount of patronage which was to have been created by the bill
+of 1783, this board was "to create no increase of officers nor to impose
+any new burdens." ... "The first and leading ideas would be, to limit
+the subsisting patronage;" ... and so little was Pitt covetous to
+engross that which did and must continue to subsist, that he left even
+"the officers of the government of Bengal to the nomination of the Court
+of Directors, subject only to the negative of the crown; and the Court
+of Directors was also to have the nomination of the officers of all the
+subordinate governments, except only of the commander-in-chief, who, for
+various reasons, must remain to be appointed by the crown." Another very
+important part of the arrangement was, that "gradation and succession
+were to be the general rule of promotion," a regulation which of itself
+would be "a forcible check upon patronage, and tend greatly to its
+reduction." The governor of Bengal was to be the governor-general of the
+whole country, the governors of Madras and Bombay being subordinate to
+him; and each governor was to be assisted by a council of three members,
+of whom the commander of the forces was to be one.
+
+The spirit in which a law or a government is administered is commonly of
+greater practical importance than the words in which the regulation or
+the system is framed or defined; and Pitt, therefore, concluded his
+speech by laying down a few "clear and simple principles as those from
+which alone a good government could arise. The first and principal
+object would be to take care to prevent the government from being
+ambitious and bent on conquest. Commerce was our object, and, with a
+view to its extension, a pacific system should prevail, and a system of
+defence and conciliation. The government there ought, therefore, in an
+especial manner, to avoid wars, or entering into alliances likely to
+create wars." It was not to forget "to pay a due regard to self-defence,
+or to guard against sudden hostilities from neighboring powers, and,
+whenever there was reason to apprehend attack, to be in a state of
+preparation. This was indispensably necessary; but whenever such
+circumstances occurred, the executive government in India was not to
+content itself with acting there as the circumstances of the case might
+require; it was also to send immediate advice home of what had happened,
+of what measures had been taken in consequence, and what farther
+measures were intended to be pursued; and a tribunal was to be
+established to take cognizance of such matters." The system of taking
+presents from the natives was to be absolutely prohibited, a regulation
+which he hoped would "tend effectually to check private corruption;"
+and, lastly, it was proposed to establish a court of criminal judicature
+for the trial in England of certain classes of delinquents after their
+return from India. The Judges of the court were to be men of the highest
+character; they were to be chosen by ballot, some being taken from the
+bench of judges, some from each House of Parliament. And they were "not
+to be tied down to strict rules of evidence, but to be upon their oaths
+to give their judgments conscientiously, and to pronounce such judgment
+as the common law would warrant." Such a tribunal he admitted to be an
+innovation; but, "unless some new process were instituted, offences
+shocking to humanity, opposite to justice, and contrary to every
+principle of religion and morality, must continue to prevail, unchecked,
+uncontrolled, and unrestrained, and the necessity of the case outweighed
+the risk and the hazard of the innovation."
+
+These were the general outlines of the constitution which in 1784 the
+Parliament established for India, and the skill with which it was
+adapted to the very peculiar character of the settlements to be governed
+is sufficiently proved by the fact that it was maintained with very
+little alteration equally by Whig and Tory administrations for
+three-quarters of a century, till the great convulsion of the Mutiny
+compelled an entire alteration in the system, and the abolition of the
+governing powers of the Company, as we shall have occasion to relate in
+a subsequent chapter. The principles which Pitt had laid down as the
+guiding maxims for the governors; the avoidance of ambitious views of
+conquest, the preservation of peace, and the limitation of the aims of
+the government to the encouragement and extension of commerce, were not
+equally adhered to. Undoubtedly, in some instances, the wars in which,
+even during Pitt's too short lifetime, the Indian government was
+engaged, came under his description of wars which were justifiable on
+the ground of self-defence--wars undertaken for the preservation of what
+had been previously won or purchased, rather than for the acquisition of
+new territories at the expense of chiefs who had given us no
+provocation. But for others, though professedly undertaken with a view
+only of anticipating hostile intentions, the development of which might
+possibly be reserved for a distant future, it is not easy to find a
+similar justification; and it may be feared that in more than one case
+governors-general, conscious of great abilities, have been too much
+inclined to adopt the pernicious maxim of Louis XIV., that the
+aggrandizement and extension of his dominions is the noblest object
+which a ruler of nations can have in view. Yet, though unable on
+strictly moral grounds to justify all the warlike enterprises which make
+up so large a part of our subsequent Indian history, it is impossible,
+probably, for even the most rigid moralist to avoid some feelings of
+national pride in the genius of our countrymen, who in the short space
+of a single century have built up an empire of a magnitude unequalled
+even by the Caesars, and have governed and still are governing it in so
+wise and beneficent a spirit, and with such a display of administrative
+capacity, that our rule is recognized as a blessing by the great
+majority of the nations themselves, as a protection from ceaseless
+intestine war, from rapine, and that worst of tyrannies, anarchy, which
+was their normal condition before Clive established our supremacy at
+Plassy, and into which they would surely and speedily fall back, if our
+controlling authority were to be withdrawn.
+
+India was not the only British settlement for which the growth of our
+empire compelled Pitt to devise a constitution. The year which saw his
+birth had also seen the conquest of Canada from the French; and in 1774
+a system of government for the new province had been established which
+it is sufficient here to describe as one, which differed but little from
+a pure despotism, the administration being vested in a governor and
+Legislative Council, every member of which was to be nominated by the
+crown. But the working of this act had from the first proved very
+unsatisfactory, and had become more so as the population increased by
+the influx of fresh settlers from Great Britain, and also from the
+United States, here many of those who in the recent civil war had
+adhered the connection with the mother country had been exposed to
+constant malice and ill-treatment, and had preferred crossing the border
+and obtaining lands in Canada to returning to England. Pitt recognized
+the evil, and undertook to remedy it and in 1791 he introduced a bill to
+establish a constitution for Canada, which a recent historian describes
+as "remarkable, as recognizing for the first time the wise and generous
+principle of independent colonial institutions, which has since been
+fully developed in every dependency of the British crown capable of
+local self-government."[112] One peculiar difficulty in framing such a
+constitution arose from the circumstance of the old French colonists,
+who greatly outnumbered the settlers of British blood, being attached to
+the Roman Catholic religion; while the British settlers were nearly, or
+perhaps all, Protestant, though of different denominations. The
+difficulty was, indeed, lessened by the circumstance that the French
+dwelt in Quebec and the district between that city and the mouth of the
+St. Lawrence, and that the English had for the most part betaken
+themselves to the more inland region. And this local separation of the
+two races the minister now took for his guide in the arrangement which
+he devised. The most important feature in it was the division of the
+province into two parts, as Upper and Lower Canada, and the
+establishment of a distinct local Legislature for each division, a House
+of Assembly being created in each, and a Council, so as, in Pitt's
+words, "to give both divisions the full advantages of the British
+constitution." The Assemblies were to have the power of taxation (so
+that there was no room left for such perverse legislation by a British
+Parliament as had lately cost its sovereign the United States). The act
+of _habeas corpus_ was extended to the province (a privilege which no
+one of French blood had ever enjoyed before); the tenure of land was to
+be the socage[113] tenure so long and happily established in England.
+Complete religious toleration was established, and a certain proportion
+of land was allotted in Upper Canada, as a provision for a Protestant
+clergy, and the foundation of an ecclesiastical establishment. So great
+was Pitt's desire to complete the resemblance between the colony and
+Great Britain, that he even contemplated the creation of an aristocracy,
+by the introduction of a provision enabling the King to grant hereditary
+colonial titles, the possession of which should include hereditary seats
+in the provincial Council. The two latter clauses were opposed by Fox,
+and the latter of them, though sanctioned by Parliament, was never
+carried out in practice. But Fox, bitter as he was at this time in his
+general opposition to the government, agreed cordially in the general
+principles of the bill, avowing his conviction that "the only method of
+retaining distant colonies with advantage is to enable them to govern
+themselves," so that each party in the British Parliament is entitled to
+a share of the credit for this pattern of all subsequent colonial
+constitutions--Pitt for the original genius for organization which his
+contrivance of all the complicated details of the measure displayed, and
+Fox for his frank adoption of the general principle inculcated by his
+rival, even while differing as to some of the minor details of the
+measure. During these years the country was increasing in prosperity,
+and the minister was daily rising in credit; more powerful and more
+popular than the most successful or the most brilliant of his
+predecessors. But during these same years two great constitutional
+difficulties had arisen, one of which, indeed, the deep sense which both
+parties felt of the danger of investigating it shelved almost as soon as
+it was seen; but the other of which, besides the importance which it
+derived from the degree in which it involved the principle of the
+supreme authority of Parliament, and brought under discussion even that
+which regulates the succession to the crown, imperilled the existence of
+the ministry, and threatened a total change in both the domestic and
+foreign policy of the nation.
+
+The Prince of Wales, who had come of age in the summer of 1783, had at
+once begun to make himself notorious for the violence of his opposition
+to his father's ministers, carrying the openness of his hostility so far
+as, during the Westminster election to drive about the streets with a
+carriage and all his servants profusely decorated with Fox's colors;
+and, still more discreditably, by most unmeasured profligacy of all
+kinds. The consequence was that he soon became deeply involved in debt,
+so deeply that, in 1787, a member of Fox's party gave notice of his
+intention to move that the Parliament should pay his debts and increase
+his income. Pitt, without specifying his reasons, avowed that he should
+feel it his duty to oppose any grant of such a character; but another
+member of Parliament, Mr. Rolle, one of the members for Devonshire,
+being trammelled by no such feeling of responsibility, expressed a
+similar resolution in language which contained an allusion perfectly
+understood on both sides of the House. He said that "the question thus
+proposed to be brought forward went immediately to affect our
+constitution in Church and State." And every one knew that he was
+referring to a report which had recently become general, that the Prince
+was married to a Roman Catholic lady of the name of Fitzherbert. No
+direct notice was taken of this allusion at the moment, Fox himself, who
+had the chief share of the Prince's confidence, being accidentally
+absent; but a day or two afterward he referred to Rolle's speech with
+great indignation, declaring that it referred to a "low, malicious
+calumny" which had no foundation whatever, and "was only fit to impose
+on the lowest order of persons." Being pressed as to the precise force
+of his assertion, and being asked whether it meant more than that under
+the existing laws, such as the Royal Marriage Act, there had been no
+marriage, because there could have been no _legal_ marriage, he declared
+that he meant no such evasion, but that no marriage ceremony, legal or
+illegal, had ever taken place; and farther, that in saying this he was
+speaking on the direct authority of the Prince himself. No more
+degrading act stains the annals of British royalty. For the fact was
+true--the very next evening Fox learned the deceit which the Prince had
+practised on him from a gentleman who had been one of the witnesses to
+the marriage, which had been solemnized by a Protestant clergyman
+fifteen months before.[114] And his indignation was such that for some
+time afterward he abstained from all interference in the Prince's
+affairs; while the language held by the Prince's other confidant, Mr.
+Sheridan, was so evasive as to betray a consciousness that whatever had
+occurred would not bear the light of day; so that there were very few to
+whom the truth or falsehood of the report was a subject of interest who
+felt any uncertainty on the subject.
+
+It may, probably, be regarded as fortunate for the peace of the kingdom
+that the Prince, who eventually became King George IV., left behind him
+no issue from his marriage with the Princess, the failure of heirs of
+his body thus removing any temptation to raise the question whether he
+had not himself forfeited all right to succeed to the throne by his
+previous marriage to a Roman Catholic. A clause of the Bill of Rights
+provides that any member of the royal family who should marry a Roman
+Catholic (with the exception of the issue of princesses who may be the
+wives of foreign princes) shall by that marriage be rendered incapable
+of inheriting the crown of England. And though the Royal Marriage Act
+(which, as we have seen, had been recently passed) had enacted that no
+marriage of any member of the royal family contracted without the
+consent of the reigning sovereign should be valid, it by no means
+follows that an invalidity so created would exempt the contractor of a
+marriage with a Roman Catholic, which as an honorable man he must be
+supposed to have intended to make valid, from the penalties enacted by
+the Bill of Rights. It is a point on which the most eminent lawyers of
+the present day are by no means agreed. The spirit of the clause in that
+bill undoubtedly was, that no apparent or presumptive heirs to the crown
+should form a matrimonial connection with any one who should own
+allegiance to a foreign power, and that spirit was manifestly
+disregarded if a prince married a Roman Catholic lady, even though a
+subsequent law had enacted a conditional invalidity of such a marriage.
+We may find an analogy to such a case in instances where a man has
+abducted a minor, and induced her to contract a marriage with himself.
+The lady may not have been reluctant; but the marriage has been
+annulled, and the husband has been criminally prosecuted, the nullity of
+the marriage not availing to save him from conviction and punishment. A
+bigamous marriage is invalid, but the bigamist is punished. And, apart
+from any purely legal consideration, it may be thought that public
+policy forbids such a construction of law as would make the illegality
+or invalidity of an act (and all illegal acts must be more or less
+invalid) such a protection to the wrong-doer as would screen him from
+punishment.
+
+Whatever may be the judgment formed on the legal aspect and merits of
+the case, the conduct of the Prince could not fail to give the great
+body of the people, justly jealous at all times of their national
+adherence to truthfulness and honesty, a most unfavorable impression of
+his character. As has been already mentioned, Fox was so indignant at
+having been made the instrument to assure the Parliament and the nation
+of a falsehood, that he for a time broke off all communication with
+him.[115] Yet a singular caprice of fortune, or, it would be more proper
+to say, a melancholy visitation of Providence, before the end of the
+following year led Fox to carry his championship of the same Prince who
+had so abused his confidence to the length of pronouncing the most
+extravagant eulogies on his principles, and on his right to the
+confidence and respect of the nation at large. In the autumn of 1788 the
+King fell into a state of bad health, which in no long time affected his
+mind, and, by the middle of November, had so deranged his faculties as
+to render him incapable of attending to his royal duties, or, in fact,
+transacting any business whatever. Parliament was not sitting, but its
+re-assembling had been fixed for the 4th of December, and before that
+day arrived the King's illness had assumed so alarming a character, and
+it appeared so unsafe to calculate on his immediate recovery, that the
+minister summoned a Privy Council, the summons being addressed to the
+members of the Opposition as well as to his own followers, to receive
+the opinions of the physicians in attendance on his Majesty, as a
+necessary foundation for the measures which he conceived it to be his
+duty to propose to Parliament. Those opinions were, that it was almost
+certain that the disease would not be permanent, though no one could
+undertake to fix its duration with the least appearance of probability.
+And, as the royal authority could not be left in abeyance, as it were,
+for an uncertain period, it was indispensable to appoint a Regent to
+conduct the affairs of the kingdom till the King should, happily, be
+once more in a condition to resume his functions.
+
+In considering the line of conduct adopted in this emergency by Pitt and
+his great rival Fox, Pitt has one manifest advantage on his side, that
+it is impossible to attribute the course which he took to any personal
+motive, or any desire for the retention of official power; while it is
+equally impossible to doubt that Fox was in no slight degree,[116] and
+that Lord Loughborough, the prince's chief adviser on points of law, was
+wholly influenced by the hope of supplanting the ministry. Pitt had
+never the least doubt that on the establishment of the Regency he should
+be dismissed, and was prepared to return to the Bar. But his knowledge
+of the preference which the Prince entertained for his rival did not
+lead him to hesitate for a single moment as to the propriety of placing
+him in a situation to exercise that preference. On the reassembling of
+Parliament, he at once took what he conceived to be the proper
+parliamentary course of proceeding; at his suggestion committees in both
+Houses were appointed to take a formal examination of the royal
+physicians; and, when those committees had reported that the King was
+for the present incapable of discharging his royal functions, though
+likely at some future period to be able to resume them, he moved the
+House of Commons to appoint another committee, to search for "precedents
+of such proceedings as might have been taken in the case of the personal
+exercise of the royal authority being prevented or interrupted by
+infancy, sickness, or infirmity, with a view to provide for the same."
+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. He
+instantly replied that to assert an inherent indefeasible right in the
+Prince of Wales, or any one else, independently of the decision of the
+two Houses, fell little short of treason to the constitution; but, at
+the same time, to prevent any one pretending to misconceive his
+intentions, he allowed it to be seen with sufficient plainness that,
+when once the right of Parliament to appoint the Regent had been
+established, he should agree in the propriety of conferring that office
+on the Prince of Wales. The committee was appointed; but, even before it
+could report the result of its investigations, the doctrine advanced by
+Fox had been the subject of discussion in the House of Lords, where Lord
+Camden, who had presided over the meeting of the Privy Council a few
+days before, on moving for the appointment of a similar committee of
+peers, had taken occasion to declare that, if Fox had made such an
+assertion as rumor imputed to him, it was one which had no foundation in
+"the common law of the kingdom." He had never read nor heard of such a
+doctrine. Its assertors might raise expectations not easily laid, and
+might involve the country in confusion. And he contended, as Pitt had
+done in the Commons, that its assertion was a strong argument in favor
+of the appointment of a committee, that it might be at once seen whether
+it were warranted by any precedent whatever. The reports of the two
+committees bore out Fox's statement, that no precedent entirely
+applicable to the case before them had ever occurred. But by this time
+Fox had learned that the argument which he had founded on it was in the
+highest degree unpalatable both to Parliament and to the nation; and for
+a moment he sought to modify it by an explanation that, though he had
+claimed for the Prince "the naked right, he had not by that expression
+intended to maintain that that right could be reduced into possession
+without the consent of Parliament;" an explanation not very reconcilable
+to common sense, since, if a right were inherent and indefeasible,
+Parliament could not, without absolute tyranny, refuse to sanction its
+exercise; and, in fact, his coadjutor, Sheridan, on the very same
+evening, re-asserted his original doctrine in, if possible, still more
+explicit terms, warning the minister "of the danger of provoking the
+Prince to assert his right," while a still greater man (Burke) declared
+that "the minister had taken up an attitude on the question tantamount
+to that of setting himself up as a competitor to the Prince." Such
+inconsiderate violence gave a great advantage to Pitt, one of whose most
+useful characteristics as a debater was a readiness and presence of mind
+that nothing could discompose. He repelled such menaces and imputations
+with an equally lofty scorn, and, after a few necessary preliminaries,
+brought forward a series of resolutions, one of which declared the fact
+of the sovereign's illness, and consequent incapacity; a second affirmed
+it to be the right and duty of the two Houses of Parliament to provide
+the means for supplying the defect in the royal authority; and a third
+imposed on the Houses the task of deciding on the mode in which the
+royal assent necessary to give their resolutions the authority of law
+should be signified. It was impossible to object to the first; but the
+second was stubbornly contested by the Opposition, the chiefs of the
+Coalition Ministry once more fighting side by side; though Lord North
+contented himself with arguing that the affirmation of the right and
+duty of Parliament was a needless raising of a disputable point, and
+moving, therefore, that the committee should report progress, as the
+recognized mode of shelving it. Fox, however, carried away by the heat
+of debate, returned to the assertion of the doctrine of absolute right,
+overlooking his subsequent modification of it, and again gave Pitt the
+advantage, by condescending to impugn his motives for proposing the
+resolution, as being inspired, not by a zeal for the constitution, but
+by a consciousness that he did not deserve the confidence of the Prince,
+and, therefore, anticipated his instant dismissal by the Regent. The
+re-affirmation of the Prince's inherent right was, indeed, necessary to
+Fox as the foundation for the objections which he took to other parts of
+Pitt's scheme. For the minister, while admitting to its full extent the
+irresistible claim which the Prince of Wales possessed to the preference
+of Parliament for the Regency, proposed at the same time to impose
+certain limitations on his exercise of the authority, so long as there
+was a reasonable hope of his royal father's recovery. He was not to have
+the power to create peerages, nor to alienate the property of the crown,
+nor to grant offices in reversion; and, as the Queen was to have the
+care of his Majesty's person, she also was to have the appointment of
+all the offices in the royal household. Fox, on the other hand, objected
+with extreme earnestness to the impropriety of imposing any limitations
+whatever on the power of the Regent; and then the question whether the
+Prince was to derive his right to the Regency from the authority of
+Parliament, or from his natural position and inalienable preceding right
+as his father's heir, became one of practical importance. If the
+Parliament had the right to confer authority, it had clearly the right
+to limit the authority it conferred. If the Prince had an indefeasible
+right to the Regency, independently of the will of Parliament, then
+Parliament could have no pretence to limit or restrain the exercise of
+an authority which in no degree flowed from itself. Fox, indeed, took
+another objection to the imposing of limitations to the authority to be
+intrusted to the Regent, contending that this would be to create a power
+unknown to the constitution--a person in the situation of King without
+regal power. But, not to mention precedents drawn from the reigns of
+Edward III., Richard II., and Henry VI., in the twenty-fourth year of
+the very last reign, George II., on the death of his son, the father of
+the present King, had enjoined the Parliament to provide for the
+government, in the case of his own death, while the heir was still a
+minor, recommending to them the appointment of the Princess Dowager of
+Wales as Regent, "with such powers and limitations as might appear
+expedient." And, in conformity with his desire, the Parliament had
+appointed the Princess Regent, with a Council of Regency to assist her;
+and had enacted that "several portions of the regal power" should be
+withheld from the Regent, if she could not obtain the consent of the
+Council thus appointed.[118]
+
+This part of the case was so plain, that when, after the different
+resolutions proposed by Pitt had been adopted in both Houses, Fox
+insisted that, instead of proceeding by a bill to create a Regency, and
+to appoint the Prince of Wales Regent, the only course which could be
+adopted with propriety would be to present an address to the Prince, to
+entreat him to assume the government, he failed to induce the House to
+agree with him; and finally, as if he were determined to find a
+battle-field in every clause, he made a vigorous resistance to the
+expedient by which Pitt proposed that the formal royal assent which was
+necessary to make the bill law should be given. Fox, on one occasion,
+had gone the length of denying that the two Houses had any right to be
+regarded as a Parliament while the King, an essential part of
+Parliament, was incapacitated. But such an objection could have had no
+force, even in the mind of him who raised it, since the proceedings of
+the two Convention Parliaments of 1660 and 1689 labored under a similar
+defect; and yet their acts had been recognized as valid, and ratified by
+subsequent Parliaments. And now, in reference to the expedient proposed
+by the minister, that the two Houses should empower and authorize the
+Lord Chancellor to affix the Great Seal to the bill, Burke, with great,
+but for him not unusual, violence, denounced both the proposal and the
+Chancellor, declaring that such a step would be the setting up of a
+phantom of sovereignty, a puppet, an idol, an idiot, to which he
+disclaimed all allegiance. A more perilous amendment was one proposed to
+another clause by Mr. Rolle, enacting that if the Regent should marry a
+Roman Catholic his authority should cease. Since the Bill of Rights, as
+we have seen, forbade a sovereign to marry a Roman Catholic without
+incurring the forfeiture of his crown, it was evidently reasonable that
+the same restriction should be imposed on every Regent; but it was hard
+at the moment altogether to dissociate such a clause from the
+discussions of the preceding year; and Mr. Rolle endeavored to give the
+clause a more pointed meaning by an amendment to enact that the
+forfeiture should be incurred by the mere celebration of any marriage
+ceremony, whether the marriage thus performed were legal and valid or
+not. His amendment, however, was unanimously rejected. The bill was
+passed without alteration by the House of Commons; the Prince, while
+protesting in an elaborate and most able letter, drawn up for him by
+Burke, against the restrictions imposed by the bill, nevertheless
+consented to sacrifice his own judgment to the general good of the
+kingdom, and to accept the authority, limited as it was. And by the
+middle of February the bill was sent up to the House of Lords. There
+Lord Camden had charge of it, and his position as a former Chancellor
+gave irresistible weight to his opinion that the mode proposed to give
+the final sanction to the bill was strictly in accordance with the
+spirit and practice of the constitution. The point with which he dealt
+was the previous one, how Parliament, which was to pass the bill, was to
+be opened, for, "circumstanced as it was, Parliament could not at
+present take a single step." The law, as he put it, declared that the
+King must be present, either in person or by a representative. When he
+could not attend personally, the legal and constitutional process was to
+issue letters-patent under the Great Seal. In the present dilemma,
+therefore, he recommended that the two Houses should direct
+letters-patent to be issued under the Great Seal, authorizing
+commissioners to open Parliament in the name of his Majesty. He "must
+use the liberty to say that those who treated this proposal with
+ridicule were ignorant of the laws of their country. A fiction it might
+be termed, but it was a fiction admirably calculated to preserve the
+constitution, and, by adopting its forms, to preserve its substance."
+The authority of the Great Seal he explained to be such that, "even if
+the Lord Chancellor, by caprice, put it to any commission, it could not
+afterward be questioned;" and he adduced a precedent of a very similar
+character to the course now proposed, which occurred "at the
+commencement of the reign of Henry VI., when, the sovereign being an
+infant of nine months old, the Great Seal was placed in his hand, and it
+was supposed to be given to him by the Master of the Rolls, whereupon
+many commissions were sealed by it, and the government was carried on
+under its authority." That precedent, he reminded the peers, had been
+followed as recently as the year 1754, when, during an illness of George
+II., Lord Chancellor Hardwicke affixed the Great Seal to a commission
+for opening a session of Parliament. And, finally, he concluded by
+moving, "That it is expedient and necessary that letters-patent for
+opening the Parliament should pass under the Great Seal."[119] The
+motion was carried, and Parliament was opened in accordance with it;
+and, if it had been necessary, the same expedient would have sufficed to
+give the requisite assent to the Regency Bill, a necessity which was
+escaped by the fortunate recovery of the royal patient, which was
+announced by his medical advisers a day or two before that fixed for the
+third reading of the bill in the House of Lords.
+
+Though the question was thus left undetermined for the moment, it was
+revived twenty-two years afterward, when the same sovereign was attacked
+by a recurrence of the same disease, and the existing ministry, then
+presided over by Mr. Perceval, brought forward a Regency Bill almost
+identical with that which on this occasion had been framed by Mr. Pitt;
+and the Opposition, led by Lord Grey and Sir Samuel Romilly, raised as
+nearly as possible the same objections to it which were now urged by Fox
+and his adherents. The ministerial measure was, however, again supported
+by considerable majorities; so that the course proposed by Mr. Pitt on
+this occasion may be said to have received the sanction of two
+Parliaments assembled and sitting under widely different circumstances;
+and may, therefore, be taken as having established the rule which will
+be adopted if such an emergency should, unfortunately, arise hereafter.
+And indeed, though the propriety of Pitt's proposals has, as was
+natural, been discussed by every historical and political writer who has
+dealt with the history of that time, there has been a general
+concurrence of opinion in favor of that statesman's measure. Lord John
+Russell, while giving a document, entitled "Materials for a Pamphlet,"
+in which he recognizes the handwriting of Lord Loughborough, and which
+"contains the grounds of the opinion advanced by him, and adopted by Mr.
+Fox, that, from the moment the two Houses of Parliament declared the
+King unable to exercise his royal authority, a right to exercise that
+authority attached to the Prince of Wales," does not suppress his own
+opinion of the "erroneousness of this or any other doctrine that
+attributes to any individual or any constituted authority existing in
+the state a strict or legal right to claim or to dispose of the royal
+authority while the King is alive, but incapable of exercising it."[120]
+
+The only writer, as far as I am aware, who advocates the opposite view
+is Lord Campbell, who, after quoting the speech of Lord Camden, from
+which extracts have been made, comments on it, and on the whole
+transaction, in the following terms: "From the course then adopted and
+carried through, I presume it is now to be considered part of our
+constitution that if ever, during the natural life of the sovereign, he
+is unable by mental disease personally to exercise the royal functions,
+the deficiency is to be supplied by the two Houses of Parliament, who,
+in their _discretion_, will probably elect the heir-apparent Regent,
+under such restrictions as they may please to propose, but who may
+prefer the head of the ruling faction, and at once vest in him all the
+prerogatives of the crown. On the two occasions referred to in the reign
+of George III., the next heir being at enmity with the King and his
+ministers, this was considered the loyal and courtly doctrine; and, from
+its apparent advancement of the rights of Parliament, there was no
+difficulty in casting odium on those who opposed it. But I must avow
+that my deliberate opinion coincides with that of Burke, Fox, and
+Erskine, who pronounced it to be unsupported by any precedent, and to be
+in accordance with the principles of the Polish, not the English,
+monarchy. The two Houses of Parliament would be the proper tribunal to
+pronounce that the sovereign is unable to act; but then, as if he were
+naturally as well as civilly dead, the next heir ought of right to
+assume the government as Regent, ever ready to lay it down on the
+sovereign's restoration to reason, in the same way as our Lady Victoria
+would have returned to a private station if, after her accession, there
+had appeared posthumous issue of William IV. by his queen. It is easy to
+point out possible abuses by the next heir as Regent, to the prejudice
+of the living sovereign; but there may be greater abuses of the power of
+election imputed to the two Houses, whereby a change of dynasty might be
+effected. I conceive, therefore, that the Irish Parliament[121] in 1789
+acted more constitutionally in acknowledging the _right_ of the next
+heir, in scouting the fiction of a commission or royal assent from the
+insane sovereign, and in addressing the Prince of Wales to take on
+himself the government as Regent."
+
+Though the sneers at the possibility of Parliament preferring "the head
+of the ruling faction" to the heir-apparent be hardly consistent with
+the impartial candor which is one of the most imperative duties of an
+historical critic, and though the allusion to the principles of the
+Polish monarchy be not very intelligible, yet no one will refuse to
+attach due weight to the deliberate opinion of one who won for himself
+so high a professional reputation as Lord Campbell. But, with all
+respect to his legal rank, we may venture to doubt whether he has not
+laid down as law, speaking as a literary man and an historian, a
+doctrine which he would not have entertained as a judge. For, if we
+consider the common law of the kingdom, it is certain that, in the case
+of subjects, if a man becomes deranged, his next heir does not at once
+enter on his property "as if he were naturally as well as civilly dead."
+And if, as in such cases is notoriously the practice, the Court of
+Chancery appoints a guardian of the lunatic's property, analogy would
+seem to require that the Houses of Parliament, as the only body which
+can possibly claim authority in such a matter, should exercise a similar
+power in providing for the proper management of the government to that
+which the law court would exercise in providing for the proper
+management of an estate; and that, therefore, the principles of
+constitutional[122] statesmanship, which is deeply interested in
+upholding the predominant authority of Parliament, must justify the
+assertion of the ministers that the two Houses had the entire and sole
+right to make regulations for the government of the kingdom during the
+incapacity of the sovereign; and that the next heir, even when a son of
+full age, can have no more right to succeed to his father's royal
+authority in his lifetime than, if that father were a subject, he would
+have to succeed to his estate.
+
+The opposite doctrine would seem to impugn the legality of the whole
+series of transactions which placed William and Mary on the throne. The
+admission of an indefeasible right of the heir-apparent would have borne
+a perilous resemblance to a recognition of that divine right, every
+pretension to which the Revolution of 1688 had extinguished. If, again,
+as Fox and his followers at one time endeavored to argue, the Houses in
+1789 had no right to the name or power of a Parliament, because the King
+had no part in their meetings, the convention that sat a century before
+(as, indeed, was admitted) was certainly far less entitled to that name
+or power, for it had not only never been called into existence by a
+King, but was assembled in direct defiance of the King. Similarly, it is
+admitted that the body which invited Charles II. to return and resume
+his authority was equally destitute of the validity which could only be
+given by a royal summons. Yet both these bodies had performed actions of
+greater importance than that which was looked for from this Parliament.
+The one had abolished the existing and usurping government, and restored
+to his kingdom a King who had been long an exile. The other had, as it
+were, passed sentence on the existing sovereign, on grounds which
+confessedly will not bear a strict examination, and had conferred the
+crown on a prince who had no hereditary claim to the title. The
+justification of both acts was necessity. _Salus regni suprema Lex_. And
+the necessity was clearly more urgent in the present case than in either
+of the preceding instances. For, unless the Parliament interfered to
+create an authority, there was absolutely none in existence which was
+capable of acting. It should also be remembered that this Parliament of
+1789, though not opened for the session by the King, had been originally
+elected in obedience to his order, and had been prorogued by his
+proclamation to the day of meeting;[123] and, though the opening of a
+session by a speech from the throne is the usual form for the
+commencement of its proceedings, it may be doubted whether it be so
+indispensable a part of them that none of their acts are valid without
+it.
+
+The breaking out of the French Revolution, and the degree in which, in
+spite of all its atrocities and horrors, the revolutionary spirit for a
+time infected a large party in England, prevented Pitt from reviving the
+plan of Reform which he had framed with such care and genius for
+organization, and in which, though defeated in Parliament, both before
+and after he became minister, he had hitherto continued to cherish the
+hope of eventually succeeding. But when clubs and societies, where the
+most revolutionary and seditious doctrines were openly broached, were
+springing up in London and other large towns, and unscrupulous
+demagogues by speeches and pamphlets were busily disseminating theories
+which tended to the subversion of all legitimate authority, he not
+unnaturally thought it no longer seasonable to invite a discussion of
+schemes which would be supported in many quarters only, to quote his own
+words, "as a stepping-stone to ulterior objects, which they dared not
+avow till their power of carrying them into effect should be by this
+first acquisition secured." But the alarm which the spread of
+revolutionary ideas excited in his mind was displayed, not only
+passively in this abstention from the advocacy of measures the
+expediency of which must at all times in some degree depend on the tone
+of their introduction, but also in active measures of repression, some
+of which were not, indeed, unwarranted by precedent, but others of which
+can hardly be denied to have been serious inroads on the constitution,
+infringements of the freedom of opinion and discussion to which all
+Englishmen are entitled, and one of which was, to say the least, a very
+perilous extension of a law already sufficiently severe, the statute of
+treason. If the French had been content with the overthrow of their own
+government and institutions, much as we should have lamented the
+indiscriminate rashness and abhorred the atrocities with which their
+design was carried out, we should still have adhered to the
+unquestionable maxim, that no nation is justified in interfering in the
+internal affairs of another. But the Jacobin and Girondin demagogues,
+who had now the undisputed sway in Paris, did not limit their views to
+their own country, but openly declared themselves the enemies of all
+established governments in every country; and the Convention passed a
+formal resolution in which they proffered "fraternity and assistance" to
+every people which might be inclined to rise against their governments.
+Their resolutions were officially communicated to the sympathizing
+societies in England, and emissaries were secretly encouraged to cross
+the Channel in the hope of gaining converts. Nor were their exertions
+barren. Two men were convicted in Scotland of a plot to seize Edinburgh
+Castle, to massacre the garrison, to imprison the judges, and to rise in
+arms to compel the government to a change of policy. In London the King
+was fired at on his way to open Parliament, and on his return his
+carriage was attacked by a furious mob, and was only protected from
+serious injury by a troop of the Life Guards. Such outrages proved the
+existence of a new danger, against which no previous government had ever
+been called on to provide, and such as, in the opinion of the cabinet,
+could only be met by novel measures of precaution.
+
+The first was directed against the foreign propagators of revolution.
+The resolutions of the Convention had been promulgated in November,
+1792; and at the meeting of Parliament in December, Lord Grenville, as
+Foreign Secretary of State, introduced in the House of Lords an alien
+bill, to enable the government to deal in a summary manner with any
+foreign visitors whose conduct or character might seem to call for its
+interference. It provided that all foreigners who had arrived in the
+kingdom since the preceding January should give in a statement of their
+names and residences; that any one who should arrive in future should
+furnish an account of his name, his station in life, and his object in
+visiting England; that the King, by proclamation, order in Council, or
+sign-manual, might direct all foreigners to reside in such districts as
+might be thought suitable; that no one might quit the residence in which
+he first settled without a passport; and that the Secretary of State
+might order any suspected foreigner to quit the kingdom instantly.
+
+The act was to be in operation for twelve months, and Lord Grenville, in
+introducing it, though he admitted it to be a measure of "rather a novel
+nature," explained at the same time that it was so far from being new in
+the powers which it gave, that Magna Charta distinctly recognized "the
+power and right of the crown to prevent foreigners from entering or
+residing within the realm." All that was really new was the defining of
+the manner in which that power should be exercised, since it had been so
+rarely needed that doubts might exist as to the proper mode of putting
+it in action. The bill, which was adopted in both Houses by large
+majorities, is remarkable, among other circumstances, from the fact that
+its discussion furnished the first instance of a public display of the
+difference between the two sections of the Opposition, subsequently
+described by Burke in one of his most celebrated pamphlets as the Old
+and New Whigs; those whom he called the Old Whigs (the Duke of Portland,
+Sir Gilbert Elliott, Mr. Windham, not to mention Burke himself)
+earnestly supporting it, while Lord Lansdowne, Mr. Fox, Mr. Sheridan,
+and Mr. Grey resisted it with equal zeal. Lord Lansdowne took the ground
+that it was a suspension of the _Habeas Corpus_ Act; while Fox and Grey
+denounced it, in more general terms, as a measure "utterly
+irreconcilable with the principles of the constitution," Mr. Grey
+apparently referring chiefly to the power given by the bill to the
+Secretary of State to send any foreigners from the country, which he
+described as "making the bill a measure of oppression, giving power for
+the exercise of which no man was responsible." Sir Gilbert Elliott's
+answer was singularly ingenious. He did not deny that the bill conferred
+additional power on the crown, though not more than was justified by
+existing circumstances; but he maintained that the right of giving
+extraordinary powers to the crown on occasions was so far from being
+inconsistent with the principles of the constitution, that to grant
+extraordinary powers in extraordinary emergencies was a part of it
+essential to the character of a free government. If such powers were at
+all times possessed by the crown, its authority would be too great for a
+free government to co-exist with it; but if such could not be at times
+conferred on the crown, its authority would be too small for its own
+safety or that of the people.
+
+The arguments of the ministers were, no doubt, greatly recommended, both
+to the Parliament and the people in general, by the notoriety of the
+fact that foreign agents were in many of our large towns busily, and not
+unsuccessfully, engaged in propagating what were known as Jacobin
+doctrines. But, even without that aid, it was clear that every
+government must, for the common good of all, be at times of
+extraordinary emergency invested with the power of suspending laws made
+for ordinary circumstances. And what would be an intolerable evil, if
+the supreme magistrate took upon himself to exercise it, ceases to be
+one when the right to exercise it is conferred by the nation itself in
+Parliament. If the bill did, as was argued, suspend the _Habeas Corpus_
+Act, that statute had been enacted by Parliament, and therefore for
+Parliament, in a case of necessity, to suspend its operation was clearly
+within the spirit of the constitution.
+
+The bills affecting our own fellow-subjects were still more warmly
+contested. One was known as the Traitorous Correspondence Bill, which,
+according to Lord Campbell, was suggested by Lord Loughborough, who had
+lately become Lord Chancellor. The old law of high-treason, enacted in
+the reign of Edward III., had been in effect greatly mitigated by later
+statutes, which had made acts to which that character was imputed more
+difficult of proof, by a stricter definition of what was admissible
+evidence, and other safeguards; and the practice of the courts had by
+degrees practically reduced the list of treasons enumerated in the old
+law, indictments for many of the offences contained in it forbearing to
+assert that the persons accused had incurred the penalty of
+high-treason. But this new bill greatly enlarged the catalogue. It made
+it high-treason to hold any correspondence with the French, or to enter
+into any agreement to supply them with commodities of any kind, even
+such as were not munitions of war, but articles of ordinary merchandise,
+or to invest any money in the French Funds; and it enacted farther that
+any person who, by "any writing, preaching, or malicious and advised
+speaking," should encourage such designs as the old statute of Edward
+made treasonable, should be liable to the penalties of high-treason.
+
+Another bill was designed to check the growing custom of holding public
+meetings, by providing that no meeting, the object of which was to
+consider any petition to the King or Parliament, or to deliberate on any
+alleged grievance, should be held without those who convened it, and who
+must be householders, giving previous notice of it by public
+advertisement; and empowering any two justices of the peace, at their
+own discretion, to declare any such meeting an unlawful assembly, and to
+disperse it by force, if, from the subjects discussed, the language
+held, or any special circumstances, they should regard it as dangerous.
+
+Fox, and those who still adhered to him, resisted almost every clause of
+these different bills. They maintained that one of the most fundamental
+maxims of law "in every country calling itself free was, that property
+was in the highest degree entitled to the protection of the law; and, if
+so, that the right of disposing of it or investing it in any manner must
+be considered under the same protection;" that any interference "with
+ordinary commercial transactions was equally repugnant to the spirit of
+the constitution;" and, taking a practical view of the question, they
+warned the minister that such rigorous enactments imposing such extreme
+penalties would defeat their own end; for "it was a general and true
+maxim, that excess of punishment for a crime brings impunity along with
+it; and that no jury would ever find a verdict which would doom a
+fellow-creature to death for selling a yard of cloth and sending it to
+France." They protested, too, against inflicting on words, whether
+written or spoken, penalties which had hitherto been confined to overt
+acts. And the clauses conferring power on magistrates to prevent or
+disperse public meetings encountered still more vehement opposition; Fox
+insisting, with great eloquence, that "public meetings for the
+discussion of public subjects were not only lawful, but agreeable to the
+very essence of the constitution; that, indeed, to them, under that
+constitution, most of the liberties which Englishmen now enjoyed were
+particularly owing." The people, he maintained, had a right to discuss
+their grievances. "They had an inalienable right to complain by
+petition, and to remonstrate to either House of Parliament, or to the
+King; and to make two magistrates, who might be strong partisans,
+irresponsible judges whether anything said or done at a meeting had a
+tendency to encourage sedition, was to say that a free constitution was
+no longer suitable to us." Pitt justified these measures, partly on the
+ground of the special and unprecedented danger of the times, as proved
+by the late attempt on the King's life, and partly by the open avowal of
+republican doctrines made at the meetings of different societies;
+partly, also, on the temporary character of the measures, since in each
+bill a period was fixed after which its operation should expire. And he
+argued, farther, that, as many of the actions specified in these bills
+as seditious or treasonable were by many lawyers considered capable of
+being reached by statutes already existing, though not universally
+understood, it was "humane, not cruel, to remove doubts, and to prevent
+men from being ensnared by the ambiguity of old laws."
+
+And in May, 1794, he brought in another bill, founded on the report of a
+secret committee which, in compliance with a royal message, the House of
+Commons had appointed to investigate the proceedings and objects of
+certain societies which were known to exist in different parts of the
+kingdom. In obedience to a Secretary of State's warrant, founded on
+sworn informations, their books and papers had been seized, and, having
+been sealed up, were now laid before the House, with the report of the
+committee that they proved that several of the societies which they
+named had, ever since the end of the year 1791, been uniformly pursuing
+a settled design for the subversion of the constitution; one society, in
+particular, having approved a plan for assembling a Convention, in
+imitation of the French Assembly sitting under that title, in order to
+overturn the established government, and to wrest from the Parliament
+the power which the constitution placed in its hands.
+
+To prevent the dissemination of such principles, and to defeat such
+schemes, Pitt now asked leave to bring in a bill to empower his
+Majesty--acting, of course, through the Secretary of State--to secure
+and detain such persons as he should suspect of conspiring against the
+King's person and government. He admitted that the power which he thus
+proposed to confer amounted to a suspension of the _Habeas Corpus_ Act
+in every part of the United Kingdom; nor did he deny that it was an
+unusually strong measure, but he contended that it was one justified by
+absolute necessity, by the manifest danger of such a conspiracy as the
+committee had affirmed to exist to the tranquillity of the nation and
+the safety of the government.
+
+Fox, it may almost be said as a matter of course, opposed the
+introduction of any such measure; but his opposition was hardly marked
+by his usual force of argument. He was hampered by the impossibility of
+denying either the existence of the societies which the committee and
+the minister had mentioned, or the dangerous character of some of their
+designs; but he objected to the measures of repression which were
+proposed, partly on the absence of all attempts at concealment on the
+part of the promoters of these societies, partly on the contemptible
+character of the Convention which it was designed to summon, and the
+impossibility that such an assembly should have the slightest influence.
+He even made their avowed hostility to the constitution a plea for a
+panegyric on that constitution, and on the loyal attachment to it
+evinced by the vast majority of the people; and from that he proceeded
+to found a fresh argument against the proposed measure, contending that
+it made a fatal inroad on that very constitution which was so highly
+valued by the whole nation. He described it as a measure "of infinitely
+greater mischief than that which it proposed to remedy, since it would
+give the executive authority absolute power over the personal liberty of
+every individual in the kingdom." He did not deny that a similar measure
+had been enacted under William III., again in 1715, and again in 1745;
+but he contended that "the present peril bore no resemblance to the
+dangers of those times. This measure went to overturn the very
+corner-stone of the constitution, and if it passed, there was an end of
+the constitution of England." The bill was passed in both Houses by very
+large majorities.[124] It was originally enacted for six months only,
+but was from time to time renewed till the end of the century.
+
+If we take a general survey of all these measures together, as parts of
+one great defensive scheme for the preservation of the public
+tranquillity and the general safety of the empire, it may, probably, be
+thought that, though undoubtedly suspensions of the constitution, they
+are not open to the charge of being unconstitutional, since they were
+enacted, not only for the welfare of the people, but with their consent
+and concurrence, legitimately signified by their representatives in
+Parliament. It is scarcely consistent with sound reason to contend that
+the _habeas corpus_, which had been enacted by Parliament, could not be
+suspended by the authority which had enacted it; that the constitution,
+which exists for the benefit of the people, could not be suspended by
+the people; or to deny, if it was in appearance transgressed by these
+enactments, that it was yet transgressed by strictly constitutional
+acts, by the decision of the Parliament, to whose power the constitution
+prescribes no limits.
+
+But it is not sufficient that in this point of view these measures may
+have been defensible. In judging of their statesmanship, it is almost
+equally to be considered whether they were expedient and politic,
+whether the emergency or necessity were such as to justify such rigorous
+methods of repression. It was fairly open to doubt whether some of them,
+and especially the Traitorous Correspondence and the Seditious Meetings
+Bills, did not treat as treasonable acts which did not go beyond
+sedition, and whether so to treat them were not to invest them with an
+importance which did not belong to them. And on this part of the
+question the general judgment has, we think, been unfavorable to the
+government; and it has been commonly allowed that the Chancellor, whose
+advice on legal subjects the Prime-minister naturally took for his
+guide, gave him impolitic counsel. In fact, it is well known that these
+two acts, to a great extent, failed in their object through their
+excessive severity, several juries having refused to convict persons who
+were prosecuted for treason, who would certainly not have escaped had
+they only been indicted for sedition; and it is deserving of remark that
+these two bills were not regarded with favor by the King himself, if the
+anecdote--which seems to rest on undeniable authority--be true, that he
+expressed satisfaction at the acquittal of some prisoners, on the ground
+that almost any evil would be more tolerable than that of putting men to
+death "for constructive treason." It must therefore, probably, be
+affirmed that these two acts, the Treason Act and the Seditious Meetings
+Act, went beyond the necessity of the case; that they were not only
+violations of the constitution--which, when the measures are temporary,
+as these were, are not always indefensible--but that they were
+superfluous, unjust, and impolitic; superfluous, when they proposed to
+deal with acts already visitable with punishment by the ancient laws of
+the kingdom; unjust, when they created new classes of offences; and
+impolitic, as exciting that kind of disapproval of the acts of
+government which in many minds has a tendency to excite a spirit of
+discontent with and resistance to legitimate authority. And, indeed, it
+must be inferred that such was the light in which these measures were
+regarded by a statesman who in his general policy was proud to
+acknowledge himself Mr. Pitt's pupil, as he was also the most skilful
+and successful of his more immediate successors. Twenty-five years
+afterward the distress caused by the reaction inevitably consequent on
+the termination of twenty years of war produced a political excitement
+scarcely inferior to that with which Pitt had now to deal, and seditious
+societies and meetings scarcely less formidable; but, as we shall see,
+Lord Liverpool, taking warning, perhaps, from the mistake into which Mr.
+Pitt was led on this occasion, though compelled to bring forward new and
+stern measures of repression, and even to suspend the _Habeas Corpus_
+Act for a time, kept strictly within the lines of constitutional
+precedent, and was careful to avoid confounding sedition with treason.
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 73: He had been Lord-chamberlain in Lord Rockingham's
+administration of 1765. He was now Lord-lieutenant of Ireland.]
+
+[Footnote 74: In Lord Chatham's or the Duke of Grafton's ministry of
+1766, and in the later administration of Lord Rockingham.]
+
+[Footnote 75: It may be convenient to take this opportunity of pointing
+out that, in this administration, Lord Shelburne altered the old, most
+unreasonable, and inconvenient arrangement by which the departments of
+the two Secretaries of State were distinguished by the latitude, and
+called Northern and Southern. By a new division, one took charge of the
+home affairs, the other of the foreign affairs. And in 1794 a third
+Secretary was added for War, who, by a very singular arrangement, which
+continued till very recently, had charge also of the colonies. But, in
+the year 1855, the Colonial-office was intrusted to a separate minister;
+and in 1858 a fifth Secretary of State, that for India, was added, on
+the transfer of the government of that country from the East India
+Company to the Crown. When there were only two Secretaries of State, the
+rule was that one should sit in each House. At present it is not
+_necessary_ that more than one should be a peer, though it is more usual
+for two to be members of the Upper House. And it is usual also for the
+Under-secretaries to be members of the House to which the
+Chief-secretaries do not belong, though this rule is not invariably
+observed.]
+
+[Footnote 76: "Parliamentary History," xxiii., 163.]
+
+[Footnote 77: The divisions were: 224 to 208, and 207 to 190.]
+
+[Footnote 78: Lord Stanhope, quoting from an unpublished "Life of Lord
+Barrington," compiled by the Bishop of Durham (meaning, I suppose,
+Bishop Shute Barrington).--_History of England_, v., 174.]
+
+[Footnote 79: Even with the first flush of triumph, the night after the
+second defeat of Lord Shelburne in the House of Commons, Fox's great
+friend, Mr. Fitzpatrick, writes to his brother, Lord Ossory: "To the
+administration it is _cila mors_, but not _victoria loeta_ to us. The
+apparent juncture with Lord North is universally cried out
+against."--Lord J. Russell's _Memorials and Correspondence of C.J. Fox_,
+ii., 18.]
+
+[Footnote 80: Lord J. Russell's "Memorials and Correspondence of C.J.
+Fox," ii., 90.]
+
+[Footnote 81: _Ibid_., p. 118.]
+
+[Footnote 82: In one division (161 to 137) they had only a majority of
+twenty-four.]
+
+[Footnote 83: In a letter to Lord Northington (Lord-lieutenant of
+Ireland), dated July 17, Fox himself mentions that not one of his
+colleagues, except the Duke of Portland and Lord Keppel (First Lord of
+the Admiralty), approved of it.--_Memoirs of Fox_, ii., 116.]
+
+[Footnote 84: November 22 he writes to the Duke of Rutland: "The bill
+... is, I really think, the boldest and most unconstitutional measure
+ever attempted, transferring at one stroke, in spite of all charters and
+compacts, the immense patronage and influence of the East to Charles
+Fox, in or out of office."--Stanhope's _Life of Pitt_, i., 140.]
+
+[Footnote 85: The whole paper is given by the Duke of Buckingham,
+"Courts and Cabinets of George III," i., 288, and quoted by Lord Russell
+in his "Memorials and Correspondence of C. J. Fox," ii., 251. It is
+endorsed, "Delivered by Lord Thurlow, December 1, 1783. Nugent Temple."]
+
+[Footnote 86: "Life of Pitt," i., 148. Lord Stanhope does not pledge
+himself to these being "the exact words of this commission, but as to
+its purport and meaning there is no doubt." They are, however, the exact
+words quoted by Fox in his speech in support of Mr. Baker's resolutions
+on the 17th.--_Parliamentary History_, xxiv., 207.]
+
+[Footnote 87: "Parliamentary History," xxiv., 151-154.]
+
+[Footnote 88: 95 to 76. "Strange to say, one of the cabinet ministers,
+Lord Stormont, president of the council, formed part of the final
+majority against the bill."--_Life of Pitt_, ii., 154.]
+
+[Footnote 89: "Life of Pitt," i., 155.]
+
+[Footnote 90: "Lives of the Chancellors," c. clix. Lord Thurlow.]
+
+[Footnote 91: "The Grenville Papers," iii., 374. It may, however, be
+remarked, as tending to throw some doubt on Mr. Grenville's statement,
+that Lord Campbell asserts that "Lord Mansfield, without entering into
+systematic opposition, had been much alienated from the court during
+Lord Rockingham's first administration."--_Lives of the Chief-justices_,
+ii., 468.]
+
+[Footnote 92: Vol. ii., pp. 229-232.]
+
+[Footnote 93: It will be seen hereafter that this doctrine was admitted
+in the fullest degree by Sir Robert Peel in the winter of 1884, when he
+admitted that his acceptance of office made him alone responsible for
+the dismissal of Lord Melbourne, though, in fact, he was taken entirely
+by surprise by the King's act, being in Italy at the time.]
+
+[Footnote 94: Lord John Russell, in his "Memorials of Fox" (ii., 253),
+affirms that "Lord Temple's act was probably known to Pitt;" but Lord
+Macaulay, in his "Essay on Pitt" (p. 326), fully acquits Pitt of such
+knowledge, saying that "he could declare, with perfect truth, that, if
+unconstitutional machinations had been employed, he was no party to
+them."]
+
+[Footnote 95: On Lord Effingham's motion, in condemnation of some of the
+proceedings of the Commons, which was carried February 4, 1784, by 100
+to 53.]
+
+[Footnote 96: "Parliamentary History," xxiv., 383-385--debate of January
+20, 1784.]
+
+[Footnote 97: _Ibid_, p. 283--January 12.]
+
+[Footnote 98: _Ibid_., pp. 251-257.]
+
+[Footnote 99: "Parliamentary History," xxiv., 478--February 2.]
+
+[Footnote 100: _Ibid_., p. 663.]
+
+[Footnote 101: "Parliamentary History," xxiv., 687, 695, 699.]
+
+[Footnote 102: The numbers were 201 to 189. The week before, on Mr.
+Powys's motion for a united and efficient administration, the majority
+had been 20--197 to 177. On a motion made by Mr. Coke, February 3, the
+majority had been 24--211 to 187. At the beginning of the struggle the
+majorities had been far larger--232 to 143 on Fox's motion for a
+committee on the state of the nation, January 12.]
+
+[Footnote 103: 191 to 190.]
+
+[Footnote 104: From December 19, when Pitt accepted office, to March 24,
+when the Parliament was dissolved.]
+
+[Footnote 105: "Memorials and Correspondence of C.J. Fox," by Earl
+Russell, ii., 229, 248.]
+
+[Footnote 106: _Ibid_., p. 280.]
+
+[Footnote 107: That of April, 1831, after the defeat of the Government
+on General Gascoyne's amendment]
+
+[Footnote 108: Lord Macaulay, "Miscellaneous Essays," ii., 330.]
+
+[Footnote 109: Lord Macaulay, essay on William Pitt.]
+
+[Footnote 110: Alison ("History of Europe," xiii., 971) states the
+English force in the Netherlands in 1794 at 85,000 men. Lord Stanhope
+calls the English at Minden 10,000 or 12,000.]
+
+[Footnote 111: An eminent living writer (Mr. Leeky, "History of
+England," ii., 474) quotes with apparent approval another comparison
+between the father and son, made by Grattan, in the following words:
+"The father was not, perhaps, so good a debater as his son, but was a
+much better orator, a greater scholar, and a far greater man." The first
+two phrases in this eulogy may, perhaps, balance one another; though,
+when Mr. Lecky admits that "Lord Chatham's taste was far from pure, and
+that there was much in his speeches that was florid and meretricious,
+and not a little that would have appeared absurd bombast but for the
+amazing power of his delivery," he makes a serious deduction from his
+claim to the best style of eloquence which no one ever made from the
+speeches of his son. But Grattan's assertion that the man who, as his
+sister said of him, knew but two books, the "AEneid" and the "Faerie
+Queene," was superior in scholarship to one who, with the exception of
+his rival, Fox, had probably no equal for knowledge of the great authors
+of antiquity in either House of Parliament, is little short of a
+palpable absurdity. We may, however, suspect that Grattan's estimate of
+the two men was in some degree colored by his personal feelings. With
+Lord Chatham he had never been in antagonism. On one great subject, the
+dispute with America, he had been his follower and ally, advocating in
+the Irish House of Commons the same course which Chatham upheld in the
+English House of Peers. But to Pitt he had been almost constantly
+opposed. By Pitt he and his party, whether in the English, or, so long
+as it lasted, in the Irish Parliament, had been repeatedly defeated. The
+Union, of which he had been the indefatigable opponent, and to which he
+was never entirely reconciled, had been carried in his despite; and it
+was hardly unnatural that the recollection of his long and unsuccessful
+warfare should in some degree bias his judgment, and prompt him to an
+undeserved disparagement of the minister by whose wisdom and firmness he
+had been so often overborne.]
+
+[Footnote 112: Massey's "History of England," iii., 447; _confer_ also
+Green's "History of the English People," vol. iv.]
+
+[Footnote 113: Hallam ("Middle Ages," ii., 386, 481), extolling the
+condition of "the free socage tenants, or English yeomanry, as the class
+whose independence has stamped with peculiar features both our
+constitution and our national character," gives two derivations for the
+name; one "the Saxon _soe_, which signifies a franchise, especially one
+of jurisdiction;" and the other, that adopted by Bracton, and which he
+himself prefers, "the French word _soc_, a ploughshare."]
+
+[Footnote 114: Lord Colchester's "Diary," i., 68, mentions that the
+officiating clergyman was Mr. Burt, of Twickenham, who received L500 for
+his services. Lord John Russell ("Memorials and Correspondence of Fox,"
+ii., 284-389) agrees in stating that the marriage was performed in the
+manner prescribed by the Common Prayer-book. Mr. Jesse, in his "Life of
+George III.," ii., 506, gathering, as the present writer can say from
+personal knowledge, his information from some papers left behind him by
+the late J.W. Croker, says: "The ceremony was performed by a Protestant
+clergyman, though in part, apparently, according to the rites of the
+Roman Catholic Church." Lord John Russell avoids discussing the question
+whether the marriage involved the forfeiture of the inheritance of the
+crown, an avoidance which many will interpret as a proof that in his
+opinion it did. Mr. Massey's language ("History of England," iii., 327)
+clearly intimates that he holds the same opinion.]
+
+[Footnote 115: Russell's "Life of Fox," ii., 187.]
+
+[Footnote 116: Fox's private correspondence is full of anticipations
+that the Regent's first act will be to dismiss Pitt, and to make him
+minister. In a letter of December 15 he even fixes a fortnight as the
+time by which he expects to be installed; while Lord Loughborough, who
+was eager to possess himself of the Great Seal--an expectation in which,
+though well-founded, he would, as it proved, have found himself
+disappointed--was led by his hopes to give the Prince counsel of so
+extraordinary a nature that it is said that the ministers, to whose
+knowledge it had come, were prepared, if any attempt had been made to
+act upon it, or even openly to avow it, to send the learned lord to the
+Tower. ("Diary of Lord Colchester," i., 28.) In an elaborate paper which
+he drew up and read to the Prince at Windsor, he assured his Royal
+Highness, speaking as a lawyer, that "the administration of government
+devolved to him of right. He was bound by every duty to assume it, and
+his character would be lessened in the public estimation, if he took it
+on any other ground but right, or on any sort of compromise. The
+authority of Parliament, as the great council of the nation, would be
+interposed, not to confer but to declare the right. The mode of
+proceeding should be that in a short time his Royal Highness should
+signify his intention to act by directing a meeting of the Privy
+Council, when he should declare his intention to take upon himself the
+care of the state, and should at the same time signify his desire to
+have the advice of Parliament, and order it by proclamation to meet
+early for the despatch of business.... It is of vast importance in the
+outset that he should appear to act entirely of himself, and, in the
+conferences he must necessarily have, not to consult, but to listen and
+direct." The entire paper is given by Lord Campbell ("Lives of the
+Chancellors," c. clxx.).]
+
+[Footnote 117: Hume's account of this transaction is, that the Duke
+"desired that it might be recorded in Parliament that this authority was
+conferred on him from their own free motion, without any application on
+his part; ... and he required that all the powers of his office should
+be specified and defined by Parliament."]
+
+[Footnote 118: "Parliamentary History," xxvii., 803--speech of Mr.
+Hardinge, one of the Welsh judges, and M.P. for Old Sarum.]
+
+[Footnote 119: I take this report, or abstract, of Lord Camden's speech
+from the "Lives of the Chancellors," c. cxlvii.]
+
+[Footnote 120: "Memorials of Fox," ii., 292.]
+
+[Footnote 121: The proceedings of the Irish Parliament on this occasion
+will be mentioned in the next chapter.]
+
+[Footnote 122: Mr. Hallam (iii., 144, ed. 1832) gives a definition of
+the term "unconstitutional" which seems rather singular: "By
+unconstitutional, as distinguished from 'illegal,' I mean a novelty of
+much importance, tending to endanger the established laws." May not the
+term rather be regarded as referring to a distinct class of acts--to
+those at variance with the recognized _spirit_ of the constitution or
+principles of government, with the preservation of the liberties of the
+people, as expressed or implied in the various charters, etc., but not
+forbidden by the express terms of any statute?]
+
+[Footnote 123: The entry in the "Parliamentary History," November 20,
+1788, is: "Both Houses met pursuant to the last prorogation. Later
+meetings were in consequence of successive adjournments."]
+
+[Footnote 124: In the Commons by 183 to 33; in the Lords by 119 to 11.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+
+The Affairs of Ireland.--Condition of the Irish Parliament.--The
+Octennial Bill.--The Penal Laws.--Non-residence of the Lord-
+lieutenant.--Influence of the American War on Ireland.--Enrolment of the
+Volunteers.--Concession of all the Demands of Ireland.--Violence of the
+Volunteers.--Their Convention.--Violence of the Opposition in
+Parliament: Mr. Brownlow, Mr. Grattan, Mr. Flood.--Pitt's Propositions
+Fail.--Fitzgibbon's Conspiracy Bill.--Regency Question.--Recovery of the
+King.--Question of a Legislative Union.--Establishment of Maynooth
+College.--Lord Edward Fitzgerald.--Arguments for and against the
+Union.--It passes the Irish Parliament.--Details of the Measure.--
+General Character of the Union.--Circumstances which Prevented
+its Completeness.
+
+
+In describing the condition of Ireland and the feelings of its people,
+in the latter years of the reign of George II., Mr. Hallam has fixed on
+the year 1753 as that in which the Irish Parliament first began to give
+vent to aspirations for equality with the English Parliament in audible
+complaints; and the Irish House of Commons, finding the kingdom in the
+almost unprecedented condition of having "a surplus revenue after the
+payment of all charges," took steps to vindicate that equality by a sort
+of appropriation bill.
+
+There were, however, three fundamental differences between the
+Parliaments of the two countries, which, above all others, stood in the
+way of such equality as the Irish patriots desired: the first, that by a
+law as old as the time of Henry VII., and called sometimes the Statute
+of Drogheda, from the name of the town in which it was first
+promulgated, and sometimes Poynings' Act, from the name of Sir Henry
+Poynings, the Lord-deputy at the time, no bill could be introduced into
+the Irish Parliament till it had received the sanction of the King and
+Privy Council in England; the second, that the Parliament lasted for the
+entire life of the King who had summoned it--a regulation which caused a
+seat in the House of Commons to be regarded almost as a possession for
+life, and consequently enormously increased the influence of the patrons
+of boroughs, some of whom could return a number of members such as the
+mightiest borough monger in England could never aspire to equal.[125]
+The third difference, of scarcely inferior importance, was, that the
+Parliament only sat in alternate years. But, though these arrangements
+suited the patrons and the members of the House of Commons, it was not
+strange that the constituencies, whose power over their representatives
+was almost extinguished by them, regarded them with less complacency,
+and, at the general election which was the consequence of the accession
+of George III., pledges were very generally exacted from the candidates
+that, if elected, they would endeavor to procure the passing of a
+septennial act like that which had been the law in England ever since
+the early years of George I. A bill with that object was introduced in
+1761, and reported on not unfavorably as to its principle by the English
+law advisers to whom the Privy Council referred it. But, as if it had
+been designed to exemplify in the strongest possible manner the national
+propensity for making blunders, it contained one clause which rendered
+it not only impracticable but ridiculous. The clause provided that no
+member should take his seat or vote till his qualification had been
+proved before the Speaker in a full house. But the Speaker could not be
+chosen till the members had established their right of voting, so that
+the whole was brought to a dead-lock, and the bill, if passed, could
+never have been carried out.
+
+In the ministry of 1767, however--that of the Duke of Grafton and Lord
+Chatham--Lord Halifax was replaced at Dublin Castle by Lord Townsend,
+who, among his other good qualities, deserves specially honorable
+mention as the first Lord-lieutenant who made residence in Dublin his
+rule on principle; for till very lately non-residence had been the rule
+and residence the exception, a fact which is of itself a melancholy but
+all-sufficient proof of the absolute indifference to Irish interests
+shown by all classes of English statesmen. And under his government a
+bill for shortening Parliaments was passed, though it fixed the possible
+duration of each Parliament at eight years instead of seven, the
+variation being made to prevent a general election from being held at
+the same time in both countries, but, according to common belief, solely
+in order to keep up a mark of difference between the Irish and English
+Parliaments. And those who entertained this suspicion fancied they saw a
+confirmation of it in the retention of the regulation that the Irish
+Parliament should only sit in alternate years, a practice wholly
+inconsistent with any proper idea of the duties and privileges of a
+Parliament such as prevailed on this side of the Channel; since a
+Parliament whose sessions were thus intermittent could not possibly
+exercise that degree of supervision over the revenue, either in its
+collection or its expenditure, which is among its most important duties.
+And the continued maintenance of this practice must be regarded farther
+as a proof that the English legislators had not yet learned to consider
+Ireland as an integral part of the kingdom, entitled in every particular
+to equal rights with England and Scotland. Indeed, it is impossible for
+any Englishman to contemplate the history of the treatment of Ireland by
+the English legislators, whether Kings, ministers, or Parliaments, for
+more than a century and a half, without equal feelings of shame at the
+injustice and wonder at the folly of their conduct. Not only was Ireland
+denied freedom of trade with England (a denial as inconsistent not only
+with equity but also with common-sense as if Windsor had been refused
+free trade with London),[126] but Irish manufactures were deliberately
+checked and suppressed to gratify the jealous selfishness of the English
+manufacturers. Macaulay, in his zeal for the memory of William III., has
+not scrupled to apologize for, if not to justify, the measures
+deliberately sanctioned by that sovereign for the extinction of the
+Irish woollen manufactures, on the ground that Ireland was not a sister
+kingdom, but a colony; that "the general rule is, that the English
+Parliament is competent to legislate for all colonies planted by English
+subjects, and that no reason existed for considering the case of the
+colony in Ireland as an exception."[127] There is, perhaps, no passage
+in his whole work less to his credit. But, if such was the spirit in
+which an English historian could write of Ireland in the latter half of
+this present century, it may, perhaps, diminish our wonder at the
+conduct of our legislators in an earlier generation.
+
+The penal laws on the subject of religion were also conceived and
+carried out in a spirit of extraordinary rigor and injustice. By far the
+larger portion of the Irish population still adhered to the Roman
+Catholic faith; but, as far as the negative punishment of restrictions
+and disabilities could go, its profession was visited as one of the most
+unpardonable of offences. No Roman Catholic could hold a commission in
+the army, nor be called to the Bar, nor practise as an attorney; and
+when it was found that a desire to devote themselves to the study of the
+law had led many gentlemen to acknowledge a conversion to Protestantism,
+a statute was actually passed to require them to prove their sincerity
+by five years' adherence to their new form of religion before they could
+be regarded as having washed off the defilement of their old heresy
+sufficiently to be thought worthy to wear a gown in the Four Courts. No
+Roman Catholic might keep a school; while a strange refinement of
+intolerance had added a statute prohibiting parents from sending their
+children to Roman Catholic Schools in a foreign country.
+
+And the manner in which the government was carried on was, if possible,
+worse even than the principle. The almost continual absence of the
+Lord-lieutenant inevitably left the chief management of the details in
+the hands of underlings, and the favor of the Castle was only to be
+acquired by the lowest time-serving, of which those who could influence
+elections, wealthy and high-born as they for the most part were, were
+not more innocent than the representatives. No support to government
+could be looked for from either peer or commoner unless it were
+purchased by bribes more or less open, which it was equally
+discreditable to ask and to grant; for one of the worst fruits of the
+system which had so long reigned throughout the island was the general
+demoralization of all classes. Mr. Fronde gives George III. himself the
+credit of being the first person who resolutely desired to see a change
+of the system, and to "try the experiment whether Ireland might not be
+managed by open rectitude and real integrity."[128] But his first
+efforts were baffled by the carelessness or incompetency of the
+Viceroys, since it was difficult to find any man of ability who would
+undertake the office. And for some years things went on with very little
+change, great lords of different ranks having equally no object but that
+of controlling the Castle and engrossing the patronage of the
+government, and in not a few instances of also procuring large grants or
+pensions for themselves, each seeking to build up an individual
+influence which no Viceroy could ever have withstood, had they been
+united instead of being separated by mutual jealousies, which enabled
+him from time to time to play off one against the other.
+
+But the war with the North American Colonies, which broke out in 1774,
+by some of its indirect consequences brought about a great change in the
+affairs of Ireland. The demand for re-enforcements to the armies engaged
+in America could only be met by denuding the British islands themselves
+of their necessary garrisons. No part of them was left so undefended as
+the Irish coast; and, after a time, the captains of some of the American
+privateers, learning how little resistance they had to fear, ventured
+into St. George's Channel, penetrated even into the inland waters, and
+threatened Carrickfergus and Belfast. In matters of domestic policy it
+was possible to procrastinate, to defer deciding on relaxations of the
+penal laws or the removal of trade restrictions, but to delay putting
+the country into a state of defence against an armed enemy for a single
+moment was not to be thought of; yet the government was powerless. Of
+the regular army almost every available man was in, or on his way to,
+America, and the most absolute necessity, therefore, compelled the Irish
+to consider themselves as left to their own resources for defence. It
+was as impossible to levy a force of militia as one of regular troops,
+for the militia could not be embodied without great expense; and the
+finances of the whole kingdom had been so mismanaged that money was as
+hard to procure as men. In this emergency several gentlemen proposed to
+the Lord-lieutenant to raise bodies of volunteers. The government,
+though reluctant to sanction the movement, could see no alternative,
+since the presence of an armed force of some kind was indispensable for
+the safety of the island. The movement grew rapidly; by the summer of
+1779 several thousand men were not only under arms, but were being
+rapidly drilled into a state of efficiency, and had even established
+such a reputation for strength, that, when in the autumn the same
+privateers that had been so bold in Belfast Lough the year before
+reached the Irish coast, in the hope of plundering Limerick or Galway,
+they found the inhabitants of the district well prepared to receive
+them, and did not venture to attempt a descent on any part of the
+island. And, when the Parliament met in October, some of the members,
+who saw in the success that could not be denied to have attended their
+exertions an irresistible means of strengthening the rising pretensions
+of Ireland to an equality of laws and freedom with England, moved votes
+of thanks in both Houses to the whole body of Volunteers. They were
+carried by acclamation, and the Volunteers of the metropolis lined the
+streets between the Parliament House and the Castle when, according to
+custom, the members of the two Houses marched in procession to present
+their addresses to the Lord-lieutenant. Such a recognition of the power
+of this new force stimulated those members who claimed in a special
+degree the title of Friends of Ireland to greater exertion. A wiser
+government than that of Lord North would have avoided giving occasion
+for the existence of a force which the utter absence of any other had
+made masters of the situation. The Volunteers even boasted that they had
+been called into existence by English misgovernment. In the words of one
+of their most eloquent advocates, "England had sown her laws like
+dragons' teeth, and they had sprung up as armed men."
+
+Ireland began to feel that she was strong, and, not unnaturally desired
+to avail herself of that strength, which England now could not question,
+to put forward demands for concessions which in common fairness could
+not well be denied. In 1778, when Lord North, in the hope of recovering
+the allegiance of the North American Colonies, brought forward what he
+termed his conciliatory propositions, the Irish members began to press
+their demand that the advantages thus offered to the Americans should be
+extended to their own countrymen also; that the fact of the Irish not
+having rebelled should not be made a plea for treating them worse than
+those who had; and in the front of all their requests was one for the
+abolition of those unjust and vexatious duties which shackled their
+trade and manufactures. But the jealousy of the English and Scotch
+manufacturers was still as bitter, and, unhappily, still as influential,
+as it had proved in the time of William III. And, to humor the grasping
+selfishness of Manchester and Glasgow, Lord North met the demands of the
+Irish with a refusal of which every word of his speech on the
+propositions to America was the severest condemnation, and which he
+sought to mitigate by some new regulations in favor of the linen trade,
+to which the English and Scotch manufacturers made no objection, since
+they had no linen factories. The Irish, in despair, had recourse to
+non-importation agreements, of which the Americans had set the example,
+binding themselves not to import nor to use any articles of English or
+Scotch manufacture with which they could possibly dispense. And the
+result was, that Lord North yielded to fear what he had refused to
+justice, and the next year brought in bills to grant the Irish the
+commercial equality which they demanded. Some of the most oppressive and
+vexatious of the penal laws were also relaxed; and some restrictions
+which the Navigation Act imposed on commerce with the West Indies were
+repealed. But, strange to say, the English ministers still clung to one
+grievance of monstrous injustice, and steadily refused to allow judicial
+appointments to be placed on the same footing as in England, and to make
+the seat of a judge on the bench depend on his own good conduct, instead
+of on the caprice of a king or a minister.
+
+But the manifest reluctance with which the English government had
+granted this partial relief encouraged the demand for farther
+concessions. The Irish members, rarely deficient in eloquence or
+fertility of resource, had been lately re-enforced by a recruit of
+pre-eminent powers, whom Lord Charlemont had returned for his borough of
+Moy, Henry Grattan; and, led by him, began to insist that the remaining
+grievances, to the removal of which the nation had a right, would never
+be extinguished so long as the supreme power of legislation for the
+country rested with the English and Scotch Parliament; and that the true
+remedy was only to be found in the restoration to the Irish Parliament
+of that independence of which it had been deprived ever since the time
+of Henry VII. They were encouraged by the visibly increasing weakness of
+Lord North's administration. Throughout the year 1781 it was evidently
+tottering to its fall. And on the 22d of February, 1782, Grattan brought
+forward in the Irish House of Commons a resolution, intended, if
+carried, to lay the foundation of a bill, "that a claim of any body of
+men other than the King, Lords, and Commons of Ireland to bind this
+kingdom is unconstitutional, illegal, and a grievance." This resolution
+aimed at the abolition of Poynings' Act. Other resolutions demanded the
+abolition of the "powers exercised by the Privy Council under color of
+Poynings' Act," and a farther relaxation of the penal laws. So helpless
+did the government by this time feel itself, that the Attorney-general,
+who was its spokesman on this occasion, could not venture to resist the
+principle of these resolutions, but was contented to elude them for the
+time by objections taken to some of the details; and Grattan gave notice
+of another motion to bring the question to a more definite decision,
+which he fixed for the 16th of April.
+
+Before that day came Lord North's government had ceased to exist, and
+had been replaced by Lord Rockingham's, one most influential member of
+which was the most distinguished of living Irishmen, Mr. Burke, who,
+while in opposition, had always shown himself a warm supporter of the
+claims of his countrymen, and was not likely to have his ardor in the
+cause damped by being placed in a situation where he could procure a
+friendly hearing to his counsels. Once more they had increased their
+demands, requiring, besides the removal of the purely political
+grievances, a surrender of the right of appeal from the Irish to the
+English courts of law. But their new masters were inclined to grant
+everything which seemed requisite to the establishment of complete
+equality between the two kingdoms; and though the new ministry was
+dissolved in a few months by the premature death of its chief, he lived
+long enough to carry the repeal of Poynings' Act, the retention of which
+was now admitted to be not only senseless but mischievous, since the
+existence of a body invested with nominal dignity, but practically
+powerless, was calculated not only to provoke discontent, but to furnish
+a lever for agitation.
+
+The repeal was, however, nothing less than the establishment of an
+entirely new constitution in Ireland. The Irish Parliament, the meetings
+of which had hitherto been a mere form and farce, was installed in a
+position of absolute independence, to grant money or to make laws,
+subject to no other condition than that their legislation should be of a
+character to entitle it to the royal assent, a condition to which every
+act of the British Parliament was likewise and equally liable.
+"Unhappily, as an Irish patriotic writer exclaims on this occasion, it
+was written in the book of fate that the felicity of Ireland should be
+short-lived."[129] And a similar shortness of existence was to be the
+lot of the separate independence of her Parliament. Even while framing
+instructions for the Lord-lieutenant, in his honest desire to inaugurate
+a system of just government for Ireland, George III. had warned him on
+no account to "summon a Parliament without his special command."[130]
+And, regarded by the light of subsequent events, it can hardly be denied
+that the prohibition displayed an accurate insight into the real
+difficulties of the country, and also into the character of the people
+themselves as the source of at least some of those difficulties. We
+ought not to judge its leaders too severely. A nation which has been
+long kept in bondage, and is suddenly presented with liberty, is hardly
+more able to bear the change than a man immured for years in a dark
+dungeon can at once endure the unveiled light of the sun; and
+independence had been granted to the Irish too suddenly for it to be
+probable that they would at once and in every instance exercise it
+wisely.
+
+All parties were to blame in different degrees. The first danger came
+from the Volunteers, who, flushed with self-importance, from the belief
+that it was the imposing show of their strength which had enabled the
+Parliament to extort Lord Rockingham's concession from the English
+Houses, now claimed to be masters of the Parliament itself. With the
+termination of the American war, and the consequent return of the
+English army to Europe, the reason for their existence had passed away.
+But they refused to be disbanded, and established a convention of armed
+delegates, to sit in Dublin during the session of Parliament, and to
+overawe the Houses into passing a series of measures which they
+prescribed, and which included a Parliamentary Reform Bill of a most
+sweeping character. On this occasion, however, the House of Commons
+acted with laudable firmness. Led by Mr. Fitzgibbon, a man of great
+powers, and above all suspicion of corruptibility, it spurned the
+dictation of an unauthorized body, and rejected the Reform Bill,
+avowedly on the ground of its being presented to it "under the mandate
+of a military congress;" and the Convention, finding itself powerless to
+enforce its mandates, dissolved.
+
+But the difficulties of the government were not over with the
+suppression of the Volunteer Convention. The Lord-lieutenant had a
+harder, because a more enduring, contest to encounter with the
+Parliament and the patrons of the boroughs. A single act of Parliament
+may substitute a new law for an old one; but no one resolution or bill
+has a magical power to extinguish long habits of jobbery and corruption.
+Members and patrons alike seemed to regard the late concessions as
+chiefly valuable on account of the increased value which it enabled them
+to place on their services to the government; and one cannot read
+without a feeling of shame that one or two of the bishops who were wont
+to be regarded as the proprietors of the seats for their diocesan
+cities, were not behind the most nameless lay boroughmongers in the
+resolution they evinced make a market of their support of the
+government. The consequence was that the government was unable to feel
+confident of its power to carry any measure except at a price that it
+was degrading to pay; while of those few members who were above all
+suspicion of personal corruption, many were so utterly wrong-headed, and
+had their minds so filled with unreasonable jealousy for what they
+called the honor and dignity of Ireland, and with a consequent distrust
+of England and of all Englishmen, that their honest folly was even a
+greater obstacle to wise and good government than the mean cunning of
+the others. There can hardly be a more striking proof of the
+difficulties to be overcome by a minister than is furnished by a speech
+made by a gentleman of the highest character, and of deservedly wide
+influence in the Northern counties, Mr. Brownlow, of Lurgan, one of the
+members for Armagh, which is quoted by Mr. Froude.[131]
+
+Pitt was painfully conscious of the commercial injustice with which
+hitherto Ireland had always been treated, and in the very first year of
+his administration he applied himself to the removal of the most
+mischievous of the grievances of which the Irish merchants complained,
+adopting to a great extent a scheme which had been put before him by one
+of the most considerable gentlemen of that body, which was based on the
+principle of equalization of duties in both countries. It is unnecessary
+here to enter into the details of the measure which he introduced into
+the House of Commons. He avowed it to be the commencement of a new
+system of government for Ireland, "a system of a participation and
+community of benefits, a system of equality and fairness, which, without
+tending to aggrandize one portion of the empire or to depress the other,
+should seek the aggregate interest of the whole; it was a substitute for
+the system which had hitherto been adopted of making the smaller country
+completely subordinate to and subservient to the greater, of making the
+smaller and poorer country a mere instrument for the advantage of the
+greater and wealthier one. He, therefore, proposed now to create a
+situation of perfect commercial equality, in which there was to be a
+community of benefits, and also to some extent a community of burdens."
+And he urged the House to "adopt that system of trade with Ireland that
+would tend to enrich one part of the empire without impoverishing the
+other, while it would give strength to both; that, like mercy, the
+favorite attribute of Heaven,
+
+  "'Is twice blessed--
+  It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.'"
+
+It might, he said, be regarded as "a treaty with Ireland by which that
+country would be put on a fair, equal, and impartial footing with Great
+Britain, in point of commerce, with respect to foreign countries and our
+colonies." The community of burdens which his measure would impose on
+Ireland was this: that whenever the gross hereditary revenue of Ireland
+should exceed L650,000 (an amount considerably in excess of anything it
+had ever yet reached), the excess should be applied to the support of
+the fleet of the United Kingdom. It was, in fact, a burden that could
+have no existence at all until the Irish trade had become far more
+flourishing and productive than as yet it had ever been. Yet a measure
+conceived in such a spirit of liberality, and framed with such careful
+attention to the minutest interests of Irish trade, Mr. Brownlow did not
+hesitate to denounce as one "tending to make Ireland a tributary nation
+to Great Britain. The same terms," he declared, "had been held out to
+America, and Ireland had equal spirit with America to reject them." He
+even declared that "it was happy for Mr. Orde" (the Chief Secretary, who
+had introduced the measure into the Irish House of Commons) "that he was
+in a country remarkable for humanity. Had he proposed such a measure in
+a Polish Diet, he would not have lived to carry back an answer to his
+master. If," he concluded, "the gifts of Britain are to be accompanied
+with the slavery of Ireland, I will never be a slave to pay tribute; I
+will hurl back her gifts with scorn." Baffled by such frantic and
+senseless opposition, Pitt condescended to remodel his measure. In its
+new form it was not so greatly for the advantage of Ireland. He had been
+constrained to admit some limitation of his original liberality by the
+opposition which, it had met with in England also where Fox, at all
+times an avowed enemy of freedom of trade, had made himself the
+mouth-piece of the London and Liverpool merchants, who could not see,
+without the most narrow-minded apprehension, the monopoly of the trade
+with India and the West Indies, which they had hitherto enjoyed,
+threatened by the admission of Ireland to its benefits. And now a clause
+in the second bill, binding the Irish Parliament to reenact the
+Navigation Laws existing in England, called up an opposition from
+Grattan[132] as furious as that with which Mr. Brownlow had denounced
+the original measure. To demand the enactment of the English Navigation
+Law, he declared, was "a revocation of the constitution;" and his rival,
+Flood, in his zeal to emulate his popularity with the mob, surpassing
+him in vehemence, inveighed against the clause, as one intended to make
+the Irish Parliament a mere register of the English Parliament, "which
+it should never become". All the arguments brought forward in favor of
+the measure by the supporters of the government--arguments which,
+probably, no one would now be found to deny to have been
+unanswerable--failed to make the slightest impression on a House in
+which the chief object of each opponent of the ministry seemed to be to
+outrun his fellows in violence; and eventually the measure fell to the
+ground, and for fifteen years more Ireland was deprived of the
+advantages which had been intended for her.
+
+And even yet the danger from the Volunteers was not wholly extinguished.
+Though their Convention had been suppressed, its leaders had only
+changed their tactics. Under the guidance of a Dublin ironmonger, named
+Napper Tandy, they now proposed to convene a Congress, to consist, not,
+as before, of delegates from the Volunteer body, but of persons who
+should be representatives of the entire nation; and Tandy had even the
+audacity to issue circulars to the sheriffs of the different counties,
+to require them, in their official capacity, to summon the people to
+return representatives to this Congress. The Sheriff of Dublin, a man of
+the name of O'Reilly, obeyed the requisition; but Fitzgibbon, who,
+luckily, was now Attorney-general, instantly prosecuted him for abuse of
+his office. He was convicted, fined, and imprisoned, and his punishment
+deterred others from following his example. And a rigorous example had
+become indispensable, since it was known to the government that Tandy
+and some of his followers were acting in connection with French
+emissaries, and that their object was the separation of Ireland from
+England, and, in the minds of some of them, certainly the annexation of
+the country to France; indeed, on one occasion Fitzgibbon asserted in
+the House of Commons that he had seen resolutions inviting the French
+into the country. The government would gladly have established a militia
+to supersede the Volunteers, but the temper of the Irish Parliament, in
+its newly-acquired independence, rendered any such attempt hopeless; and
+Mr. Grattan, with a perversity of judgment which his warmest admirers
+must find it difficult to reconcile with statesmanship, if not with
+patriotism, even opposed with extreme bitterness a bill for the
+establishment of a police for Dublin, though he could not deny that
+there existed in the city an organized body of ruffians, who made not
+only the streets but even the dwelling-houses of the more orderly
+citizens unsafe, by outrages of the worst kind, committed on the largest
+scale--assaults, plunderings, ravishments, and murders. In the rural
+districts of the South the disturbances were so criminally violent, and
+so incessant, that the Lord-lieutenant was compelled to request the
+presence of some additional regiments from England, as the sole means of
+preserving any kind of respect for the law; and more than once the mobs
+of rioters showed themselves so bold and formidable, that the soldiers
+were compelled to fire in self-defence, and order was not restored but
+at the cost of many lives.
+
+Presently a Conspiracy Bill was passed, and gradually the firmness of
+the government re-established a certain amount of internal tranquillity.
+But shortly afterward a crisis arose which, more than the debates on the
+commercial propositions, or on the Volunteers, or on the police, showed
+how over-liberal had been the confidence of the English minister who had
+repealed Poynings' Act, and had bestowed independent authority on the
+Irish Parliament before the members had learned how to use it. We have
+seen how keen a contest was excited in the English Parliament by the
+deranged condition of the King's health in 1788, and the necessity which
+consequently arose for the appointment of a Regency. Grattan was in
+London at the time, where he had contracted a personal intimacy with
+Fox, and had been presented by him to the Prince of Wales, whose
+graciousness of manner, and profession of adherence to the Whig system
+of politics, secured his attachment to that party. Grattan was easily
+indoctrinated by Fox with his theory of the indefeasible claim of the
+Prince to the Regency as his birthright, and is understood to have
+promised that the Irish Parliament should adopt that view. The case was
+one which seemed unprovided for. There was no question but that the law
+enacted that the sovereign of England should also be the sovereign of
+Ireland. But no express law of either country contained any such
+stipulation respecting a Regent; and Grattan conceived that, in the
+absence of any pre-existing ordinance, it would be easy to contend that
+the Irish Parliament was the sole judge who the Regent should be, and on
+what terms he should exercise the royal authority.
+
+The Irish Parliament had been prorogued in 1787 to the 5th of February,
+1789, the same day on which, after numerous examinations of the
+physicians in attendance on the royal patient, and after the passing of
+a series of resolutions enunciating the principles on which the
+government was proceeding, Pitt introduced the Regency Bill into the
+English House of Commons, being prepared to conduct it through both
+Houses with all the despatch that might be consistent with a due
+observance of all the forms of deliberation. Grattan's object was to
+anticipate the decision of the English Parliament, so as to avoid every
+appearance that the Irish Parliament was only following it; and he
+therefore proposed that the House of Commons should instantly vote an
+address to the Prince, requesting him to take upon himself the Regency
+of the kingdom of Ireland, by his own natural right as the heir of the
+crown; making sure not only that his advice would be taken by those whom
+he was addressing, but that the House of Lords would not venture to
+dissent from it.
+
+Fitzgibbon, as Attorney-general and spokesman of the government in the
+Commons, as a matter of course opposed such precipitate action, not only
+warning his hearers of the folly and danger of taking a step "which
+might dissolve the single tie which now connected Ireland with Great
+Britain," but explaining also the whole principle of the constitution of
+the two kingdoms, so far as it was a joint constitution, in terms which
+give his speech a permanent value as a summary of its principle and its
+character. He recalled to the recollection of the House the act of
+William and Mary, which declares "the kingdom of Ireland to be annexed
+to the imperial crown of England, and the sovereign of England to be by
+undoubted right sovereign of Ireland also;" and argued from this that
+Mr. Grattan's proposal was contrary to the laws of the realm and
+criminal in the extreme. "The crown of Ireland," as he told his hearers,
+"and the crown of England are inseparably united, and the Irish
+Parliament is totally independent of the British Parliament. The first
+of these positions is your security, the second your freedom, and any
+other language tends to the separation of the crowns or the subjection
+of your Parliament. The only security of your liberty is the connection
+with Great Britain; and gentlemen who risk breaking the connection must
+make up their minds to a union. God forbid I should ever see that day;
+but, if the day comes on which a separation shall be attempted, I shall
+not hesitate to embrace a union rather than a separation."
+
+He proceeded to show that, as the Irish Parliament had itself enacted
+that all bills which passed their two Houses should require the sanction
+of the Great Seal of England, they actually had no legal power to confer
+on the Prince of Wales such authority as Grattan advised his being
+invested with, whatever might be the form of words in which their
+resolution was couched. He pointed out, also, that if the Irish
+Parliament should insist on appointing the Prince of Wales Regent before
+it was known whether he would accept the Regency of England, it was
+manifestly not impossible "that they might be appointing a Regent for
+Ireland being a different person from the Regent of England; and in that
+case the moment a Regent was appointed in Great Britain, he might send a
+commission under the Great Seal appointing a Lord-lieutenant of Ireland,
+and to that commission the Regent of Ireland would be bound to pay
+obedience. Another objection of great force to his mind was, that the
+course recommended by Grattan would be a formal appeal from the
+Parliament of England to that of Ireland. It would sow the seeds of
+dissension between the Parliaments of the two countries. And, indeed,
+those who were professing themselves advocates for the independence of
+the Irish crown were advocates for its separation from England."
+
+But the House was too entirely under the influence of Grattan's
+impassioned eloquence for Fitzgibbon's more sober arguments to be
+listened to. The address proposed by Grattan was carried by acclamation;
+and the peers were scarcely less unanimous in its favor, one of the
+archbishops even dilating on "the duty of availing themselves of the
+opportunity of asserting the total independence of Ireland." Even when,
+on a second discussion as to the mode in which the address was to be
+presented to the Prince, Fitzgibbon reported that he had consulted the
+Chancellor and all the judges, and that they were unanimously of opinion
+that, till the Regency Bill should be passed in England, the address was
+not only improper but treasonable, he found his warning equally
+disregarded. And when the Lord-lieutenant refused to transmit the
+address to England, on the avowed ground of its illegality, Grattan
+proposed and carried three resolutions: the first, that the address was
+not illegal, but that, in addressing the Prince to take on himself the
+Regency, the Parliament of Ireland had exercised an undoubted right; the
+second, that the Lord-lieutenant's refusal to transmit the address to
+his Royal Highness was ill-advised and unconstitutional; the third, that
+a deputation from the two Houses should go to London, to present the
+address to the Prince. Mr. Fronde affirms that the deputation, even when
+preparing to sail for England, was very irresolute and undecided whether
+to present the address or not, from a reasonable fear of incurring the
+penalties of treason, to which the lawyers pronounced those who should
+present it liable. But their courage was not put to the test. As has
+been already seen, before the end of the month the King's recovery was
+announced, and the question of a Regency did not occur again till the
+Irish Parliament had been united to the English.
+
+Since Lord Rockingham's concessions, in 1782, the project of a
+legislative union between the two countries, resembling that which
+united Scotland to England, had more than once been broached. We have
+seen it alluded to by Fitzgibbon in the course of these discussions, and
+it was no new idea. It had been discussed even before the union with
+Scotland was completed, and had then been regarded in Ireland with
+feelings very different from those which prevailed at a later period.
+Ten years after the time of which we are speaking, Grattan denounced the
+scheme with almost frantic violence. Fitzgibbon (though after the
+Rebellion he recommended it as indispensable) as yet regarded it only as
+an alternative which, though he might eventually embrace it, he should
+not accept without extreme reluctance. But at the beginning of the
+century all parties among the Protestant Irish had been eager for it,
+and even the leading Roman Catholics had been not unwilling to acquiesce
+in it. Unluckily, the English ministers were unable to shake off the
+influence of the English manufacturers; and they, in another development
+of the selfish and wicked jealousy which had led them in William's reign
+to require the suppression of the Irish woollen manufacture, now, in
+Anne's, rose against the proposal of a legislative union.[133] In
+blindness which was not only fatal but suicidal also, "they persuaded
+themselves that the union would make Ireland rich, and that England's
+interest was to keep her poor;" as if it had been possible for one
+portion of the kingdom to increase in prosperity without every other
+portion benefiting also by the improvement.
+
+However, in the reign of Anne the union was a question only of
+expediency or of wisdom. The wide divergence of the two Parliaments on
+this question of the Regency transformed it into a question of
+necessity. The King might have a relapse; the Irish Parliament, on a
+recurrence of the crisis, might re-affirm its late resolutions; might
+frame another address to the Prince of Wales; and there might be no
+alternative between seeing two different persons Regents of England and
+Ireland, or, what would be nearly the same thing, seeing the same person
+Regent of the two countries on different grounds, and exercising a
+different authority.
+
+And if these proceedings of the Irish Parliament had wrought in the mind
+of the great English minister a conviction of the absolute necessity of
+preventing a recurrence of such dangers by the only practicable means
+open to him--the fusion of it into one body with the English Parliament
+by a legislative union--the occurrences of the ensuing ten years
+enforced that conviction with a weight still more irresistible. It has
+been seen how stirring an influence the revolutionary fever engendered
+by the overthrow of the French monarchy for a time exerted even over the
+calmer temper of Englishmen. In Ireland, where, ever since Sarsfield and
+his brave garrison enlisted under the banner of Louis XIV., a connection
+more or less intimate with France had been constantly kept up, the
+events in Paris had produced a far deeper and wider effect. More than
+one demagogue among the Volunteers had avowed a desire to see the whole
+country transfer its allegiance from the English to the French
+sovereign; and this preference was more pronounced after the triumph of
+democracy in the French capital. For the leaders of the movement,
+themselves nearly all men of the lowest degree, denounced the Irish
+nobles with almost as much vehemence as the English connection.
+
+Yet Pitt's policy, dictated partly by a spirit of conciliation, and
+still more by feelings of justice, was gradually removing many of the
+grievances of which the Irish had real reason to complain. Next to the
+restrictions on trade, nothing had made such an impression on his mind
+as the iniquity of the penal laws; and those he proceeded to repeal,
+encouraging the introduction of bills to throw open the profession of
+the law to Roman Catholics, to allow them seats on the magistrates'
+bench and commissions in the army, and to grant them the electoral
+franchise, a concession which he himself would willingly have extended
+by admitting them to Parliament itself. But these relaxations of the old
+Penal Code, important as they were, only conciliated the higher classes
+of the Roman Catholics. Most of the Roman Catholic prelates, and most of
+the Roman Catholic lay nobles, proclaimed their satisfaction at what had
+been done, and their good-will toward the minister who had done it; but
+the professional agitators were exasperated rather than conciliated at
+finding so much of the ground on which they had rested cut from beneath
+their feet. So desirous was Pitt to carry conciliation to the greatest
+length that could be consistent with safety, that he held more than one
+conference with Grattan himself; but he found that great orator not very
+manageable, partly, as it may seem from some of Mr. Windham's letters,
+through jealousy of Fitzgibbon, who was now the Irish Chancellor,[134]
+and still more from a desire to propitiate the Roman Catholics, for whom
+he demanded complete and immediate Emancipation; while Pitt, who was,
+probably, already resolved on accomplishing a legislative Union,
+thought, as far as we can judge, that Emancipation should follow, not
+precede, the Union, lest, if it should precede it, it might prove rather
+a stumbling-block in the way than a stepping-stone to the still more
+important measure.
+
+It is not very easy to determine what influence the "Emancipation," as
+it was rather absurdly called,[135] if it had been granted at that time,
+might have had in quieting the prevailing discontent. With one large
+party it would probably have increased it, for there was quite as great
+an inclination to insurrection in Ulster as in Leinster or Munster; and
+with the Northern Presbyterians animosity to Popery was at least as
+powerful a feeling as sympathy with the French Republicans. A subsequent
+chapter, however, will afford a more fitting opportunity for discussing
+the arguments in favor of or against Emancipation. What seems certain
+is, that a large party among the Roman Catholics of the lower class
+valued Emancipation itself principally as a measure to another end--a
+separation from England. Pitt, meanwhile, hopeless of reconciling the
+leaders of the different parties--the impulsive enthusiasm of Grattan
+with the sober, practical wisdom of Fitzgibbon--pursued his own policy
+of conciliation united with vigor; and one of the measures which he now
+carried subsists, unaltered in its principle, to the present day.
+
+There was no part of the penal laws of which the folly and iniquity were
+more intolerable than the restrictions which they imposed on education.
+To a certain extent, they defeated themselves. The clause which
+subjected to severe penalties a Roman Catholic parent who sent his child
+abroad to enjoy the benefits of an education which he was not allowed to
+receive at home, was manifestly almost incapable of enforcement, and the
+youths designed for orders in the Romish Church had been invariably sent
+to foreign colleges--some to Douai or St. Omer, in France; some to the
+renowned Spanish University of Salamanca. But the French colleges had
+been swept away by the Revolution, which also made a passage to Spain
+(the greater expense of which had at all times confined that resource to
+a small number of students) more difficult; and the consequence was,
+that in 1794 the Roman Catholic Primate, Dr. Troy, petitioned the
+government to grant a royal license for the endowment of a college in
+Ireland. Justice and policy were equally in favor of the grant of such a
+request. For the sake of the whole kingdom, and even for that of
+Protestantism itself, it was better that the Roman Catholic priesthood
+should be an educated rather than an ignorant body of men; and, in the
+temper which at that time prevailed over the western countries of the
+Continent, it was at least equally desirable that the rising generation
+should be preserved from the contagion of the revolutionary principles
+which the present rulers of France were so industrious to propagate.
+Pitt at once embraced the idea, and in the spring of the next year a
+bill was introduced into the Irish Parliament by the Chief Secretary,
+authorizing the foundation and endowment of a college at Maynooth, in
+the neighborhood of Dublin, for the education of Roman Catholics
+generally, whether destined for the Church or for lay professions. It is
+a singular circumstance that the only opposition to the measure came
+from Grattan and his party, who urged that, as the Roman Catholics had
+recently been allowed to matriculate and take degrees at Trinity
+College, though not to share in the endowments of that wealthy
+institution, the endowment of another college, to be exclusively
+confined to Roman Catholics, would be a retrograde step, undoing the
+benefits of the recent concession of the authorities of Trinity; would
+be "a revival and re-enactment of the principles of separation and
+exclusion," and an injury to the whole community. For, as he wisely
+contended, nothing was so important to the well-doing of the entire
+people as the extinction of the religious animosities which had hitherto
+embittered the feelings of each Church toward the other, and nothing
+could so surely tend to that extinction as the uniting the members of
+both from their earliest youth, in the pursuit both of knowledge and
+amusement, as school-fellows and playmates. If Mr. Froude's
+interpretation of the motives of those who influenced Grattan on this
+occasion be correct, he was unconsciously made a tool of by those whose
+real object was a separation from England, of the attainment of which
+they despaired, unless they could unite Protestants and Roman Catholics
+in its prosecution. The bill, however, was passed by a very large
+majority, and L9000 a year was appropriated to the endowment of the
+college. Half a century afterward, as will be seen, that endowment was
+enlarged, and placed on a more solid and permanent footing, by one of
+the ablest of Pitt's successors. It was a wise and just measure; and if
+its success has not entirely answered the expectations of the minister
+who granted it, its comparative failure has been owing to circumstances
+which the acutest judgment could not have foreseen.
+
+But it seems certain that neither the concession nor the refusal of any
+demands put forward by any party in Ireland could have prevented the
+insurrection which broke out shortly afterward. There were two parties
+among the disaffected Irish--or it should, perhaps, rather be said that
+two different objects were kept in view by them--one of which, the
+establishment of a republic, was dearer to one section of the
+malcontents; separation from England, with the contingency of annexation
+to France, was the more immediate aim of the other, though the present
+existence of a republican form of government in France to a great extent
+united the two. As has been mentioned before, the original movers in the
+conspiracy were of low extraction, Dublin tradesmen in a small way of
+business. Napper Tandy was an ironmonger, Wolfe Tone was the son of a
+coach-maker. But they had obtained a recruit of a very different class,
+a younger son of the Duke of Leinster, Lord Edward Fitzgerald, a man of
+very slender capacity, who, at his first entrance into Parliament, when
+scarcely more than of age, had made himself remarkable by a furious
+denunciation of Pitt's Irish propositions; had married a natural
+daughter of the Duke of Orleans, a prince, in spite of his royal birth,
+one of the most profligate and ferocious of the French Jacobins; and had
+caught the revolutionary mania to such a degree that he abjured his
+nobility, and substituted for the appellation which marked his rank the
+title of "Citizen Fitzgerald." He had enrolled himself in a society
+known as the United Irishmen, and had gone to France, as its
+plenipotentiary, to arrange with Hoche, one of the most brilliant and
+popular of the French generals, a scheme for the invasion of Ireland, in
+which he promised him that, on his landing, he should be joined by tens
+of thousands of armed Irishmen. Hoche entered warmly into the plan, was
+furnished with a splendid army by the Directors, and in December, 1796,
+set sail for Ireland; but the fleet which carried him was dispersed in a
+storm; many of the ships were wrecked, others were captured by the
+British cruisers, and the remnant of the fleet, sadly crippled, was glad
+to regain its harbors. Two years afterward another invading expedition
+had still worse fortune. General Humbert, who in 1796 had been one of
+Hoche's officers, did succeed in effecting a landing at Killala Bay, in
+Mayo; but he and the whole of his force was speedily surrounded, and
+compelled to surrender; and a month afterward a large squadron, with a
+more powerful division of troops, under General Hardy, on board, found
+itself unable to effect a landing, but fell in with a squadron under Sir
+John Warren, who captured every ship but two; Wolfe Tone, who was on
+board one of them, being taken prisoner, and only escaping the gallows
+by suicide.
+
+This happened in October, 1798. But it is difficult to conceive with
+what object these last expeditions had been despatched from France at
+all; for in the preceding summer the rebellion of the Irish had broken
+out, and had been totally crushed in a few weeks;[136] not without
+terrible loss of life on both sides, nor without the insurgent
+leaders--though many of them were gentlemen of good birth, fortune, and
+education, and still more were clergy--showing a ferocity and ingenuity
+in cruelty which the worst of the French Jacobins had scarcely exceeded;
+one of the saddest circumstances of the whole rebellion being, that the
+insurgents, who had burnt men, women, and children alive, who had
+deliberately hacked others to pieces against whom they did not profess
+to have a single ground of complaint beyond the fact that they were
+English and Protestant, found advocates in both Houses of the English
+Parliament, who declared that the rebellion was owing to the severity of
+the Irish Viceroy and his chief councillors, who denied that the rebels
+had solicited French aid, and who even voted against granting to the
+government the re-enforcements necessary to prevent a revival of the
+treason.
+
+The rebellion was crushed with such celerity as might have convinced the
+most disaffected of the insanity of defying the power of Great Britain;
+but it was certain that the spirit which prompted the rebellion was not
+extinguished, and that, as it had been fed before, so it would continue
+to be fed by the factious spirit of members of the Irish House of
+Commons, and of those who could return members,[137] so long as Ireland
+had a separate Parliament. Not, indeed, that Pitt required the argument
+in favor of a Union which was thus furnished. The course adopted by the
+Irish Parliament on the Regency question was quite sufficient to show
+how great a mistake had been made by the repeal of Poynings' Act. But
+what the rebellion proved was, that the Union would not admit of an
+instant's delay; and Pitt at once applied himself to the task of framing
+a measure which, while it should strengthen England, by the removal of
+the necessity for a constant watchfulness over every transaction and
+movement in Ireland, should at the same time confer on and secure to
+Ireland substantial advantages, such as, without a Union, the English
+Parliament could scarcely be induced to contemplate.
+
+Mr. Hallam, in one of the last chapters of his work,[138] while showing
+by unanswerable arguments the advantages which Scotland has derived from
+her Union with England, has also enumerated some of the causes which
+impeded the minister of the day in his endeavors to render it acceptable
+to the Scotch members to whom it was proposed. The most apparently
+substantial of these was the unprecedented character of the measure. No
+past "experience of history was favorable to the absorption of a lesser
+state, at least where the government partook so much of the republican
+form, in one of superior power and ancient rivalry." But, in the case of
+the present measure, what had thus been a difficulty in the Scotch Union
+might have been expected to be regarded as an argument in its favor,
+since the keenest patriots among the Scotch had long been convinced that
+the Union had brought a vast increase of prosperity and importance to
+their country, and what was now confessed to have proved advantageous to
+Scotland might naturally be expected to be equally beneficial to
+Ireland. Another obstacle had been the fear of the danger to which the
+Presbyterian Church might be "exposed, when brought thus within the
+power of a Legislature so frequently influenced by one which held her,
+not as a sister, but rather a bastard usurper to a sister's
+inheritance." But here again experience might give her testimony in
+favor of an Irish Union, since it was incontestable that those
+apprehensions--which, no doubt, many earnest Scotchmen had sincerely
+entertained--had not been realized, but that since the Union the
+Presbyterian Church had enjoyed as great security, as complete
+independence, and as absolute an authority over its members as in the
+preceding century; that the Parliament had never attempted the slightest
+interference with its exercise of its privileges, and that the Church of
+England had been equally free from the exhibition of any desire to
+stimulate the Parliament to such action; while the Roman Catholic
+Church, which had many more adherents in England than the Presbyterian
+Church had ever had, was quite powerful enough to exact for itself the
+maintenance of its rights, and the minister was quite willing to grant
+equal securities to those which, at the beginning of the century, had
+been thought sufficient for the Church of Scotland. A third reason which
+our great historical critic puts forward for the disfavor with which the
+Union was at the time regarded by many high-minded Scotchmen, he finds
+in "the gross prostitution with which a majority sold themselves to the
+surrender of their own legislative existence." That similar means were
+to some extent employed to win over opponents of the government in
+Ireland cannot, it must be confessed, be denied, though the temptations
+held out to converts oftener took the shape of titles, promotions,
+appointments, and court favors than of actual money. The most recent
+historian of this period--who, to say the least, is not biassed in favor
+of either the English or Irish government of the period--pronounces as
+his opinion, formed after the most careful research, that the bribery
+was on the other side. "Cornwallis and Castlereagh" (the Lord-lieutenant
+and the Chief Secretary) "both declared it to be within their knowledge
+that the Opposition offered four thousand pounds, ready money, for a
+vote. But they name only one man who was purchased, and his vote was
+obtained for four thousand pounds. From the language of Lord Cornwallis,
+it is certain that if money was spent by the government in this way it
+was without his knowledge; but many things may have been done by the
+inferior agents of the government, and possibly by Castlereagh himself,
+which they would not venture to lay before the Lord-lieutenant. It
+appears, however, from the papers which have recently come to light,
+that the prevalent belief of the Union having been mainly effected by a
+lavish expenditure of money is not well-founded; still it is certain
+that some money was expended in this way." Besides actual payment for
+votes, he adds that a very large sum--a hundred thousand pounds--is said
+to have been expended in the purchase of seats, the holders of which
+were, of course, to vote against the measure; and names Lord Downshire
+as subscribing L5000, Lord Lismore and Mr. White L3000 each, while the
+government funds were chiefly expended "in engaging[139] young
+barristers of the Four Courts to write for the Union." But, even if it
+were true that corruption was employed to the very utmost extent that
+was ever alleged by the most vehement opponent of the measure and of the
+government, it may be feared that very few of the last century Irishmen
+would have been so shocked at it as to consider that fact an objection
+to the Union, especially, it is sad and shameful to say, among the upper
+classes. The poorer classes, those who could render no political service
+to a minister, as being consequently beneath official notice, were
+unassailed by his temptations; but the demoralization of the men of rank
+and property was almost universal, and few seats were disposed of, few
+votes were given, except in return for favors granted, or out of
+discontent at favors refused. And it cannot be denied that the tendency
+to political jobbery had not been diminished by the concessions of 1782,
+if, indeed, it may not be said that the increased importance which those
+concessions had given to the Irish Parliament had led the members of
+both Houses to place an increased value on their services. Certainly no
+previous Lord-lieutenant had given such descriptions of the universality
+of the demands made on him as were forwarded to the English government
+by those who held that office in the sixteen years preceding the
+outbreak of the Rebellion.
+
+It is remarkable that the transaction which, as has been said before,
+may be conceived to have first forced on Pitt's mind the conviction of
+the absolute necessity of the Union--namely, the course pursued by the
+Irish Parliament on the Regency Bill--bore a close resemblance to that
+which, above all other considerations, had made the Scotch Union
+indispensable, namely, the Act of Security passed by the Scottish
+Estates in 1703, which actually provided that, on the decease of Queen
+Anne without issue, the Estates "should name her successor, but should
+be debarred from choosing the admitted successor to the crown of
+England, unless such forms of government were settled as should fully
+secure the religion, freedom, and trade of the Scottish nation."[140]
+The Scotch Estates, therefore, had absolutely regarded the possible
+separation of the two kingdoms as a contingency which might become not
+undesirable; and, though it was too ticklish an argument to bring
+forward, it may very possibly have occurred to Pitt that a similar vote
+of the Irish Parliament was not impossible. The claim which Grattan,
+following Fox, had set up on behalf of the Prince of Wales, was one of
+an indefeasible right to the Regency; and, as far as right by
+inheritance went, his claim to the crown, if, or whenever, a vacancy
+should occur, was far less disputable. But, as has been mentioned in the
+last chapter, a question had already been raised whether his Royal
+Highness had not forfeited his right to the succession, and it was quite
+possible that that question might be renewed. The fact of the Prince's
+marriage to a Roman Catholic was by this time generally accepted as
+certain; the birth of the Princess Charlotte gave greater importance to
+the circumstance than it seemed to have while the Prince remained
+childless; and, if the performance of the marriage ceremony should be
+legally proved, and the English law courts should pronounce that the
+legal invalidity of the marriage did not protect the Prince from the
+penalty of forfeiture, it was highly probable that the Irish Parliament
+would take a different view--would refuse, in spite of the Bill of
+Rights, to regard marriage with a Roman Catholic as a disqualification,
+but would recognize the Prince of Wales as King of Ireland.
+
+Several minor considerations, such as the desirableness of uniformity in
+the proceedings of the two countries with respect to Money Bills, the
+Mutiny Act, and other arrangements of parliamentary detail, all pointed
+the same way; and, on the whole, it may be said that scarcely any of the
+opponents of the government measure were found to deny its expediency,
+especially as regarded the interests of Great Britain. The objections
+which were made were urged on different grounds. In the Irish House of
+Commons, a member who, though a young man, had already established a
+very high reputation for professional skill as a barrister, for
+eloquence equally suited to the Bar and to the Senate, and for sincere
+and incorruptible patriotism, Mr. Plunkett, took upon himself to deny
+the competency of the Irish Parliament to pass a bill not only to
+extinguish its own existence, but to prevent the birth of any future
+Parliament, and to declare that the act, if it "should be passed," would
+be a mere nullity, and that no man in "Ireland would be bound to obey
+it." And, in the English House of Commons, Mr. Grey may be thought to
+have adopted something of the same view, when he proposed an amendment
+"to suspend all proceedings on the subject till the sentiments of the
+people of Ireland respecting that measure could be ascertained." He did
+not, of course, deny (he was speaking on the 21st of April, 1800) that
+the bill had been passed by both Houses of the Irish Parliament by
+considerable majorities.[141] But he contended that that Parliament did
+not speak the sentiments of the people; and, that being the case, that
+its voice was of no authority. It is evident that all arguments founded
+on a denial of the omnipotence of a Parliament, whether English or
+Irish, are invalid. The question of that omnipotence, as has been seen
+in a former chapter, had been fully discussed when Mr. Pitt's father
+denied the power of Parliament to tax the American Colonies; and that
+question may fairly be regarded as having been settled at that time. It
+is equally clear that the denial that, on any question whatever, the
+House of Commons must be taken to speak the sentiments of the
+constituencies, whether the proposal of such question had been
+contemplated at the time of their election or not, is the advancement of
+a doctrine wholly inconsistent with our parliamentary constitution, and
+one which would practically be the parent of endless agitation and
+mischief. To expect that the members could pronounce on no new question
+without a fresh reference to their constituents, would be to reduce them
+from the position of representatives to that of delegates; such as that
+of the members of the old States-general, in France, whose early decay
+is attributed by the ablest political writers in no small degree to the
+dependence of the members on their constituents for precise
+instructions. Another argument on which Mr. Grey insisted with great
+earnestness is worth preserving, though subsequent inventions have
+destroyed its force; he contended that the example of the Scotch Union
+did not, when properly considered, afford any argument in favor of an
+Irish Union, from the difference of situation of the two countries.
+Scotland was a part of the same island as England; "there was no
+physical impediment to rapid and constant communication; the relative
+situation of the two countries was such that the King himself could
+administer the executive government in both, and there was no occasion
+for a separate establishment being kept up in each." But the sea lay
+between England and Ireland, and the delays and sometimes difficulties
+which were thus interposed rendered it "necessary that Ireland should
+have a separate government;" and he affirmed that "this was an
+insuperable bar to a beneficial Union," quoting a saying of Lord Somers,
+that "if it were necessary to preserve a separate executive government
+at Edinburgh after the Union, he would abandon the measure." Mr. Grey
+even denied that the prosperity of Scotland since the Union was mainly
+attributable to that measure. "It was not the Union; it was the adoption
+of a liberal policy, the application of a proper remedy to the
+particular evils under which the country labored, that removed the
+causes which had impeded the prosperity of Scotland." But this argument
+was clearly open to the reply that the adoption of that liberal policy
+had been a direct effect of the Union, and would have been impracticable
+without it, and was, therefore, a strong inducement to the adoption of a
+similar Union with Ireland, where the existing evils were at least as
+great as those which, a century before, had kept down Scotland. Another
+of his arguments has been remarkably falsified by the event. With a
+boldness in putting forward what was manifestly, indeed avowedly, a
+party objection, and which, as such, must be looked upon as somewhat
+singular, he found a reason for resisting the addition of a hundred
+Irish members to the British House of Commons in the probability that
+they would, as a general rule, be subservient to the minister. He
+instanced "the uniform support which the members for Scotland had given
+to every act of ministers," and saw in that example "reason to apprehend
+that the Irish members would become a no less regular band of
+ministerial adherents." It would be superfluous to point out how
+entirely contrary the result has been to the prediction.
+
+It is, however, beside the purpose of this work to dwell on the
+arguments by which the minister supported his proposal, or on those with
+which the Opposition resisted it, whether apparently founded on
+practical considerations, such as those brought forward by Mr. Grey, or
+those of a more sentimental character, which rested on the loss of
+national "dignity and honor," which, it was assumed, would be the
+consequence of the measure. It seems desirable rather to explain the
+principal conditions on which the Union was to be effected, as Pitt
+explained it to the House of Commons in April, 1800. In the preceding
+year he had confined himself to moving a series of resolutions in favor
+of the principle, which, though they were adopted by both Houses in
+England, he did not at that time endeavor to carry farther, since in the
+Irish House of Commons the utmost exertions of the government could only
+prevail by a single vote;[142] and he naturally thought such a majority
+far too slender to justify his relying on it so far as to proceed
+farther with a measure of such vast importance. But, during the recess,
+he had introduced some modifications into his original draft of the
+measure, which, though slight, were sufficient to conciliate much
+additional support; and the consequence was, that in February of this
+year both the Irish Houses accepted it by sufficient majorities;[143]
+and, therefore, he now felt able to lay the details of the measure
+before the English Parliament. To take them in the order in which he
+enumerated them, that which had appeared to the Irish Parliament "the
+first and most important, was the share which the Irish constituencies
+ought to have in the representation of the House of Commons." On this
+point, "the Parliament of Ireland was of opinion that the number of
+representatives for Ireland ought to be one hundred." And he was not
+disposed to differ from the conclusion to which it had come. He regarded
+it, indeed, as "a matter of but small importance whether the number of
+representatives from one part of the united empire were greater or less.
+If they were enough to make known the local wants, to state the
+interests and convey the sentiments of the part of the empire they
+represented, it would produce that degree of general security which
+would be wanting in any vain attempt to obtain that degree of
+theoretical perfection about which in modern times they had heard so
+much." He approved of "the principle which had been laid down upon this
+part of the subject in the Parliament of Ireland--a reference to the
+supposed population of the two countries, and to the proposed rate of
+contribution. The proportion of contribution proposed to be established
+was seven and a half for Great Britain, and one for Ireland; while in
+the proportion of population Great Britain was to Ireland as two and a
+half or three to one;[144] so that the result, on a combination of these
+two calculations, would be something more than five to one in favor of
+Great Britain, which was about the proportion which it was proposed to
+establish between the representation of the two countries." The
+principle of selection of the constituencies which had been adopted he
+likewise considered most "equitable and satisfactory for Ireland. The
+plan proposed was, that the members of the counties and the principal
+commercial cities should remain entire.... The remaining members were to
+be selected from those places which were the most considerable in point
+of population and wealth.... This was the only plan which could be
+adopted without trenching on the constitution; it introduced no
+theoretical reforms in the constitution or in the representation of this
+country; it made no distinction between different parliamentary rights,
+nor any alteration, even the slightest, in the internal forms of
+Parliament."
+
+Another consideration which he had kept in mind in framing this measure
+was this: "By the laws of England care had been taken to prevent the
+influence of the crown from becoming too great by too many offices being
+held by members of Parliament." And Pitt had no doubt that there would
+be a general feeling "that some provision ought to be made on this
+subject" in the arrangements for the new Parliament. At present, among
+the representatives of the counties and great commercial towns, whose
+seats were to be preserved in the new united Parliament, there were not
+above five or six who held offices; and, though it was impossible to
+estimate the possible number of place-holders with precision, he thought
+what would he most fair for him to propose would be, that "no more than
+twenty of the Irish members should hold places, and that if it should
+happen that a greater number did hold places during pleasure, then those
+who had last accepted them should vacate their seats."
+
+In the House of Peers he proposed that twenty-eight lords temporal of
+Ireland should have seats in the united Parliament, who should be
+elected for life by the Peers of Ireland--an arrangement which differed
+from that which, at the beginning of the century, had been adopted for
+the representative Peers of Scotland; but he argued, and surely with
+great reason, that "the choice of Peers to represent the Irish nobility
+for life was a mode that was more congenial to the general spirit and
+system of a Peerage than that of their being septennially elected, as
+the nobility of Scotland were." Of the spiritual Peers, four were to sit
+in rotation; to the lay Peers a farther privilege was given, which the
+minister regarded as of considerable, and even constitutional
+importance. By the articles of the Scotch Union, a Peer, if not chosen
+as a representative of the Peerage, was not eligible as a candidate for
+the House of Commons in either England or Scotland. But this bill
+"reserved a right to the Peers of Ireland who should not be elected to
+represent their own Peerage, to be elected members of the House of
+Commons of the united Parliament of Great Britain;" and Pitt urged that
+this was "a far better mode of treatment than had been adopted for the
+nobility of Scotland; so that a nobleman of Ireland, if not representing
+his own order, might be chosen as a legislator by a class of inferior
+rank, which he was so far from regarding as improper, that he deemed it
+in a high degree advantageous to the empire, analogous to the practice
+as well as friendly to the spirit of the British constitution." And he
+enforced his argument by pointing out with honest pride the advantage
+which in that respect the spirit and practice of our constitution gave
+to our nobility over the nobles of other countries. "We know full well,"
+he continued, "the advantage we have experienced from having in this
+House those who, in the course of descent, as well as in hopes of merit,
+have had a prospect of sitting in our House of Peers. Those, therefore,
+who object to this part of the arrangement" (for, as he had previously
+mentioned, it had been made a subject not only of objection, but of
+ridicule) "can only do so from the want of due attention to the true
+character of our constitution, one of the great leading advantages of
+which is, that a person may for a long time be a member of one branch of
+the Legislature, and have it in view to become a member of another
+branch of it. This it is which constitutes the leading difference
+between the nobility of Great Britain and those of other countries. With
+us they are permitted to have legislative power before they arrive at
+their higher stations; and as they are, like all the rest of mankind, to
+be improved by experience in the science of legislation as well as in
+every other science, our constitution affords them that opportunity by
+their being eligible to seats in this House from the time of their
+majority. This is one of those circumstances which arise frequently in
+practice, but the advantages of which do not appear in theory till
+chance happens to cast them before us, and makes them subjects of
+discussion. These are the shades of the British constitution in which
+its latent beauties consist;" and he affirmed his conviction that this
+privilege would prove "an advantage to the nobility of Ireland, and an
+improvement in the system of representation in the House."
+
+It will hardly be denied that the arrangement that the representative
+Peers of Ireland should enjoy their seats for life did make it desirable
+that those who were not so elected to the Upper House should be eligible
+as candidates for a place in the Lower House. Otherwise, those who were
+not chosen as representatives of the peerage would have been placed in
+the anomalous and unfair position of being the only persons in the
+kingdom possessed of the requisite property qualification, and not
+disqualified by sex or profession, who were absolutely excluded from the
+opportunity of distinguishing themselves and serving their country in
+Parliament. How great the practical benefit to the House of Commons and
+the country the clause he was recommending was calculated to confer, was
+shown in a remarkable manner the very year of his death, when an Irish
+Peer was returned to the House of Commons, who, retaining his seat for
+nearly sixty years as the representative of different constituencies,
+the University of Cambridge being among the number, during the course of
+that period rose through a variety of offices to that of Prime-minister,
+and, as is admitted even by those who dissented most widely from some of
+his opinions and actions, earned for himself an honorable reputation, as
+one who had rendered faithful services to the crown, and on more than
+one occasion had conferred substantial benefits on the country.
+
+The arrangements proposed with respect to the Peers were not opposed.
+But Mr. Grey--generally acting as the spokesman of the Opposition on
+this question--raised an objection to making so large an addition as
+that of one hundred new members to the British House of Commons. He
+repeated his prophecy, made on a previous occasion, of the subserviency
+to the minister which the Irish members might be expected to exhibit,
+and therefore moved an amendment to reduce the number of Irish
+representatives to eighty-five; but, to obviate the discontent which
+such a reduction might be expected to excite in Ireland, he proposed to
+diminish the number of English members also, by disfranchising forty "of
+the most decayed boroughs," a step which would leave the number of
+members in the new united Parliament as nearly as possible the same as
+it was before. He found, however, very few to agree with him; his
+amendment was rejected by 176 to 34; and the minister's proposal was
+adopted in all its details.
+
+Mr. Pitt touched lightly on the next article, which limited the royal
+prerogative of creating Peers by a provision that the King should never
+confer any fresh Irish peerage till three peerages should have become
+extinct. This, again, was a point of difference between the conditions
+of the Scotch and Irish Unions; since by the terms of the Scotch Union
+the King was forever debarred from creating any new Scotch peerages. But
+it was pointed out that the greater antiquity of the Scotch peerages,
+and the circumstance that in Scotland the titles descended to collateral
+branches, were calculated to make the extinction of a Scotch peerage an
+event of very rare occurrence; while the comparative newness (with very
+few exceptions) of Irish peerages, and the rule by which they are
+"confined to immediate male descendants," rendered the entire extinction
+of the Irish peerage probable, "if the power of adding to or making up
+the number were not given to the crown."
+
+Recent legislation has given such importance to the next resolution,
+that it will be well to quote his precise words:
+
+"5. That it would be fit to propose, as the fifth article of union, that
+the Churches of that part of Great Britain called England and of Ireland
+shall be united into one Church; and that when his Majesty shall summon
+a Convocation, the archbishops, bishops, and clergy of the several
+provinces in Ireland shall be respectively summoned to and sit in the
+Convocation of the united Church, in the like manner and subject to the
+same regulations as to election and qualification as are at present by
+law established with respect to the like orders of the Church of
+England; and that the doctrine, worship, discipline, and government of
+the said united Church shall be preserved as now by law established for
+the Church of England, saving to the Church of Ireland all the rights,
+privileges, and jurisdictions now thereunto belonging; and that the
+doctrine, worship, discipline, and government of the Church of Scotland
+shall likewise be preserved as now by law, and by the Act of Union
+established for the Church of Scotland; and that the continuance and
+preservation forever of the said united Church, as the Established
+Church, of that part of the said United Kingdom called England and
+Ireland, shall be deemed and taken to be an essential and fundamental
+article and condition of the Union."
+
+Pitt's comment on this article was so brief as to show that he regarded
+its justice as well as its importance too obvious to need any elaborate
+justification. He pointed out that that portion of it which related to
+Convocation had been added by the Irish Parliament, and "would only say
+on so interesting a subject that the prosperity of the Irish Church
+could never be permanent, unless it were a part of the Union, to leave
+as a guard a power to the United Parliament to make some provision in
+this respect as a fence beyond any act of their own that could at
+present be agreed on." But, while he thus showed his conviction that the
+permanent prosperity of the Irish Church was essential to the welfare of
+the kingdom, he was by no means insensible to the claims of the Roman
+Catholic Church (as founded not more in policy than in justice) to be
+placed in some degree on a footing of equality with it; not only by a
+recognition of the dignity of its ministers, but also by an endowment
+which should be proportioned to their requirements, and should place
+them in a position of worldly competence and comfort for which hitherto
+they had been dependent on their flocks.[145] To use the expression of a
+modern statesman, he contemplated "levelling up," not "levelling down."
+Perhaps it may be said that he contemplated levelling up, as the surest
+and most permanent obstacle to any proposal of levelling down.
+
+At the same time it is fair to remark, that the argument which on a
+recent occasion was so strongly pressed by the champions of the Church,
+that it was beyond the power of Parliament to repeal what was here
+declared to be "an essential and fundamental article and condition of
+the Union," is untenable, on every consideration of the power of
+Parliament, and, indeed, of common-sense; since it would be an
+intolerable evil, and one productive of the worst consequences, if the
+doctrine were admitted that any Parliament could make an unchangeable
+law and bind its successors forever; and, moreover, since the very words
+of this article do clearly imply the power of Parliament over the
+Church, the power asserted, to "make some provision for the permanence
+of its prosperity," clearly involving a power to make provisions of an
+opposite character. The expediency or impolicy, the propriety or
+unrighteousness, of a measure must always depend on the merits of the
+question itself at the time, and not on the judgment or intentions of
+legislators of an earlier generation. And advocates weaken instead of
+strengthening their case when they put forward arguments which, however
+plausible or acceptable to their own partisans, are, nevertheless,
+capable of refutation.
+
+The next article related to a question of paramount practical
+importance, and of special interest, since, as has been seen before,
+there was no subject on which the past legislation of the English
+Parliament had been so discreditable. But the jealousy of English
+manufacturers, though it had prevailed over the indifference of William
+III., who reserved all his solicitude for matters of foreign diplomacy,
+could find no echo in the large mind and sound commercial and financial
+knowledge of the modern statesman. He laid it down as the principle of
+his legislation on this subject--a principle which "he was sure that
+every gentleman in the House was ready to admit--that the consequence of
+the Union ought to be a perfect freedom of trade, whether of produce or
+manufacture, without exception, if possible; that a deviation from that
+principle ought to be made only when adhering to it might possibly shake
+some large capital, or materially diminish the effect of the labor of
+the inhabitants, or suddenly and violently shock the received opinion or
+popular prejudices of a large portion of the people; but that, on the
+whole, the communication between the two kingdoms should in spirit be
+free; that no jealousy should be attempted to be created between the
+manufacturers of one place or the other upon the subject of 'raw
+materials' or any other article; for it would surely be considered very
+narrow policy, and as such would be treated with derision, were an
+attempt made to create a jealousy between Devonshire and Cornwall,
+between Lancashire and Durham.... He said, then, that the principle of
+the Union on this head should be liberal and free, and that no departure
+from it should ever take place but upon some point of present
+unavoidable necessity." He was even able to add (and he must have felt
+peculiar satisfaction in making the statement, since the change in the
+feelings of the English manufacturers on the subject must have been
+mainly the fruit of his own teaching, and was a practical recognition of
+the benefits which they had derived from his commercial policy taken as
+a whole), that "the English manufacturers did not wish for any
+protective duties; all they desired was free intercourse with all the
+world; and, though the want of protective duties might occasion them
+partial loss, they thought it amply compensated by the general
+advantage." He even thought the arrangements now to be made "would
+encourage the growth of wool in Ireland, and that England would be able
+to draw supplies of it from thence; and he did not fear that there would
+be trade enough for both countries in the markets of the world, and in
+the market which each country would afford to the other." The English
+manufacturers did not, however, acquiesce very cheerfully in every part
+of his commercial arrangements. On the contrary, against the clause
+which repealed all prohibitions of or bounties on exportation of
+different articles grown or manufactured in either country, they
+petitioned, and even set up a claim, which was granted, to be heard by
+counsel and to produce witnesses. But Pitt steadily refused the least
+modification of this part of his measure, not merely on account of its
+intrinsic reasonableness and justice, but because there was scarcely any
+condition to which the Irish themselves attached greater importance.
+
+An equally important and more difficult matter to adjust to the
+satisfaction of both Parliaments was the apportionment of the financial
+burdens between the two nations. It would be tiresome as well as
+superfluous to enter into minute details; the more so as the arrangement
+proposed was of a temporary character. After a long and minute
+discussion, Pitt's appraisement was admitted to come as near to strict
+fairness and equity as any that could be made; the separate discharge of
+its public debt already incurred was left to each kingdom; and it was
+farther settled that for twenty years fifteen parts of the expense of
+the nation out of seventeen should be borne by Great Britain and two by
+Ireland.
+
+Other articles provided that the laws and courts of both kingdoms, civil
+and ecclesiastical, should remain in their existing condition, subject,
+of course, to such alterations as the united Legislature might hereafter
+deem desirable.
+
+The resolutions, when adopted--as they speedily were--were embodied in a
+bill, which passed through the last stage by receiving the royal assent
+at the beginning of July. The state of public feeling in Ireland was not
+yet sufficiently calmed down after the Rebellion for it to be prudent to
+venture on a general election, and it was, consequently, ordained that
+the members for the Irish counties and for those Irish boroughs which
+had been selected for the retention of representation should take their
+seats in the united Parliament on its next meeting. On the 22d of
+January, 1801, the united, or, to give it its more proper designation,
+the Imperial Parliament held its first meeting, being, although in its
+sixth session, so far regarded as a new Parliament, that the King
+directed a fresh election of a Speaker.
+
+The Union, as thus effected, was so far a vital change in the
+constitution of both Great Britain and Ireland, that it greatly altered
+the situation in which each kingdom had previously stood to the other.
+Till 1782 the position of Ireland toward England had been one of entire
+political subordination; and, though that had in appearance been
+modified by the repeal of Poynings' Act, yet no one doubted or could
+doubt that, whenever the resolutions of the two Parliaments came into
+conflict, the Irish Parliament would find submission unavoidable. But by
+the Union that subordination was terminated forever. The character of
+the Union--of the conditions, that is, on which the two countries were
+united--was one of perfect and complete equality on all important
+points, indeed, in all matters whatever, except one or two of minor
+consequence, where some irremovable difference between them compelled
+some trifling variations. It was not a connection of domination on the
+one side and subordination on the other, where every concomitant
+circumstance might tempt the one to overbearing arrogance, while the
+other could not escape a feeling of humiliation. It was rather--to quote
+the eloquent peroration of Pitt, when, in the preceding year, he first
+introduced the subject to the consideration of the House of Commons--"a
+free and voluntary association of two great countries, joining for their
+common benefit in one empire, where each retained its proportionate
+weight and importance, under the security of equal laws, reciprocal
+affection, and inseparable interests; and which wanted nothing but that
+indissoluble connection to render both invincible."
+
+On that occasion Pitt had argued, from the great subsequent increase in
+the population and wealth of Edinburgh and Glasgow, and in the
+prosperity of the whole country of Scotland, that a similar result might
+be looked for in Ireland. And the general trade of Ireland, and
+especially the linen manufacture, within a very few years began to
+realize his prediction. So that it is strange to find Fox, on the great
+minister's death, five years afterward, reiterating his disapproval of
+the Union as a plea for refusing him the appellation of a great
+statesman.[146] In one point alone the intrigues of a colleague
+prevented Pitt from carrying out to the full his liberal and enlightened
+views, and compelled him to leave the Union incomplete in a matter of
+such pre-eminent importance, that it may be said that all the subsequent
+disquietudes which have prevented Ireland from reaping the full benefit
+he desired from the Union are traceable to his disappointment on that
+subject.[147] We have seen that he contemplated, as a natural and
+necessary consequence or even part of the Union, an extensive reform of
+the laws affecting the Roman Catholics. Indeed, the understanding that
+he was prepared to introduce a measure with that object had no small
+weight in conciliating in some quarters support to the Act of Union.
+Accordingly, when describing the arrangements which he had in view for
+the Church of Ireland, he indicated his intention with sufficient
+plainness by the statement, that "it might be proper to leave to
+Parliament an opportunity of considering what might be fit to be done
+for his Majesty's Catholic subjects;" words which were generally
+understood to express his feeling, that both justice and policy required
+the removal of the restrictions which debarred the Roman Catholics from
+the complete enjoyment of political privileges. But the history and
+different bearings of that question it will be more convenient to
+discuss in a subsequent chapter, when we shall have arrived at the time
+when it was partially dealt with by the ministry of the Duke of
+Wellington.
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 125: Mr. Froude says four great families--the Fitzgeralds of
+Kildare, the Boyles, the Ponsonbys, and the Beresfords--returned a
+majority of the House of Commons ("English in Ireland," ii., 5); and
+besides those peers, the arrangement for the Union proved that the
+influence of the Loftuses and the Hills fell little short of them.]
+
+[Footnote 126: Such a system actually had existed in France, where
+articles of ordinary trade could not be transported from one province to
+another without payment of a heavy duty; but Colbert had abolished that
+system in France above one hundred years before the time of which we are
+speaking.]
+
+[Footnote 127: "History of England," vol. v., c. xxiii., p. 57.]
+
+[Footnote 128: "The English in Ireland," ii., 39.]
+
+[Footnote 129: Fronde's "English in Ireland," ii., 345. He does not name
+the author whom he quotes.]
+
+[Footnote 130: _Ibid_., ii, 42.]
+
+[Footnote 131: See p. 164.]
+
+[Footnote 132: Mr. Froude imputes to Grattan a singularly base object.
+"Far from Grattan was a desire to heal the real sores of the country for
+which he was so zealous. These wild, disordered elements suited better
+for the campaign in which he engaged of renovating an Irish
+nationality."--_English in Ireland_, ii., 448. But, however on many
+points we may see reason to agree with Mr. Froude's estimate of the
+superior wisdom of Fitzgibbon, we conceive that this opinion is quite
+consistent with our acquittal of the other of the meanness of
+deliberately aiming at a continuance of evils, in order to find in them
+food for a continuance of agitation.]
+
+[Footnote 133: Froude, "English in Ireland," i., 304.]
+
+[Footnote 134: See especially a letter of Mr. Windham's. quoted by Lord
+Stanhope ("Life of Pitt," ii., 288).]
+
+[Footnote 135: Mr. Archdall, in his place in Parliament, denounced the
+term as utterly inapplicable. "Emancipation meant that a slave was set
+free. The Catholics were not slaves. Nothing more absurd had ever been
+said since language was first abused for the delusion of mankind."]
+
+[Footnote 136: The first beginning of the insurrection was at
+Prosperous, County Kildare, May 24. General Lake dealt it the final blow
+on Vinegar Hill, June 21.]
+
+[Footnote 137: Mr. Sheridan, Mr. Tierney, and Lord William Russell led
+the denunciations of the government in the English House of Commons. A
+protest against Pitt's refusal to dismiss the Lord-lieutenant, Lord
+Camden, the Chancellor Fitzgibbon, and the Commander-in-chief, Lord
+Carhampton, was signed by the Dukes of Norfolk, Devonshire, and
+Leinster; Lords Fitzwilliam, Moira, and Ponsonby, "two of them Irish
+absentees, who were discharging thus their duties to the poor country
+which supported their idle magnificence."--_The English in Ireland_,
+iii., 454.]
+
+[Footnote 138: "Constitutional History," iii., 451 seq.]
+
+[Footnote 139: Massey's "History of England," iv., 397 (quoting the
+Cornwallis correspondence).]
+
+[Footnote 140: Lord Stanhope's "Reign of Queen Anne," p. 89.]
+
+[Footnote 141: In the House of Commons by 158 to 115; in the House of
+Lords, February 10, by 75 to 26.]
+
+[Footnote 142: An amendment pledging the House to maintain "an
+independent Legislature, as established in 1782," was only defeated by
+106 to 105.]
+
+[Footnote 143: In the House of Commons the majority was 158 to 115; in
+the House of Lords, 75 to 26.]
+
+[Footnote 144: This estimate, which was but a guess, proved very
+inaccurate. The first census for the United Kingdom, which was taken the
+next year (1801), showed that Ireland was considerably more populous
+than its own representatives had imagined. The numbers returned (as
+given by Alison, "History of Europe," ii., 335, c. ix., sec. 8) were:
+
+  England..................................... 8,382,484
+  Wales.......................................   547,346
+  Scotland.................................... 1,599,068
+  Army, Navy, etc.............................   470,586
+                                              ----------
+      Total...................................10,999,434
+  Ireland..................................... 5,396,436
+
+So that the proportion of population in Great Britain, as compared with
+that of Ireland, only exceeded two to one by an insignificant fraction.]
+
+[Footnote 145: See his letter to the King, dated January 31, 1801,
+quoted by Lord Stanhope in the appendix to vol. iii. of his "Life of
+Pitt," p. 25.]
+
+[Footnote 146: Mr. Fox, called on by Mr. Alexander to explain his
+expressions (in the debate relative to Mr. Pitt's funeral), by which he
+had declared his disapprobation of the Union, and his concurrence in
+opinion with Mr. O'Hara that it ought to be rescinded. Mr. Fox repeated
+his disapprobation, but disclaimed ever having expressed an opinion or
+entertained a thought of proposing its repeal, that being now
+impracticable, though he regretted its ever having been
+effected.--_Diary of Lord Colchester_, February 17, 1806, ii., 39.]
+
+[Footnote 147: It may be remarked that in another respect also political
+critics have pronounced the Union defective. Archbishop Whately, whose
+long tenure of office in Ireland, as well as the acuteness and candor
+which he brought to bear on every subject he discussed, entitle his
+opinions to most respectful consideration, held this view very strongly.
+In several conversations which he held with Mr. W.N. Senior, in 1858 and
+1862, he condemned the retention of the Lord-lieutenancy as "a half
+measure," which, however unavoidable at the time when "no ship could be
+certain of getting from Holyhead to Dublin in less than three weeks," he
+pronounced "inconsistent with the fusion of the two peoples, which was
+the object of the Union," and wholly indefeasible "in an age of
+steam-vessels and telegraphs." And, besides its theoretical
+inconsistency, he insisted that it produced many great and practical
+mischiefs, among which he placed in the front "the keeping up in
+people's minds the notion of a separate kingdom; the affording a hotbed
+of faction and intrigue; the presenting an image of Majesty so faint and
+so feeble as to be laughed at and scorned. Disaffection to the English
+Lieutenancy is cheaply shown, and it paves the way toward disaffection
+to the English crown." And he imputed its continued retention to "the
+ignorance which prevails in England of the state of feeling in
+Ireland."--_Journals and Conversations Relating to Ireland_, by W.N.
+Senior, ii., 130, 251, and _passim_. And it is worthy of observation
+that a similar view is expressed by a Scotch writer of great ability,
+who, contrasting the mode in which Scotland is governed with that which
+prevails In Ireland, farther denounces the Viceroyalty "as a distinct
+mark that Ireland is not directly under the sovereignty of Great
+Britain, but rather a dependency, like India or the Isle of
+Man."--_Ireland_, by J.B. Kinnear, quoted in the _Fortnightly Review_,
+April 1, 1881. It is remarkable that in 1850 a bill for the abolition of
+the office was passed in the House of Commons by a large majority (295
+to 70), but was dropped in the House of Lords, chiefly on account of the
+opposition of the Duke of Wellington. But it is, at all events, plain
+that the reasons, arising from the difficulty and uncertainty of
+communication, which made its abolition impossible at the beginning of
+the century, have passed away with the introduction of steam-vessels and
+telegraphs. Communication of London with Dublin is now as rapid as
+communication with Edinburgh, and, that being the case, it is not easy
+to see how an establishment which has never been thought of for Scotland
+can be desirable for Ireland.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+
+A Census is Ordered.--Dissolution of Pitt's Administration.--Impeachment
+of Lord Melville.--Introduction of Lord Ellenborough into the
+Cabinet.--Abolition of the Slave-trade.--Mr. Windham's Compulsory
+Training Bill.--Illness of the King, and Regency.--Recurrence to the
+Precedent of 1788-'89.--Death of Mr. Perceval.--Lord Liverpool becomes
+Prime-minister.--Question of Appointments in the Household.--Appointment
+of a Prime-minister.
+
+
+The Union with Ireland was the last great work of Pitt's first
+administration, and a noble close to the legislation of the eighteenth
+century. But the last months of the year were also signalized by another
+enactment, which, though it cannot be said to have anything of a
+character strictly entitled to the name of constitutional, nevertheless
+established a practice so valuable as the foundation of a great part of
+our domestic legislation, that it will, perhaps, hardly be considered
+foreign to the scope and purpose of this volume to record its
+commencement. In November, 1800, Mr. Abbott, the member for Helstone,
+brought in a bill to take a census of the people of the United Kingdom,
+pointing out not only the general importance of a knowledge of the
+population of a country in its entire amount and its different classes
+to every government, but also its special bearing on agriculture and on
+the means requisite to provide subsistence for the people, on trade and
+manufactures, and on our resources for war. Such a census as he proposed
+had been more than once taken in Holland, Sweden, Spain, and even in the
+United States, young as was their separate national existence; it had
+been taken once--nearly fifty years previous--in Scotland; and something
+like one had been furnished in England in the reign of Edward III. by a
+subsidy roll, and in that of Elizabeth by diocesan returns furnished by
+the Bishops to the Privy Council.[148] He farther argued for the
+necessity of such a proceeding from the different notions entertained by
+men of sanguine or desponding tempers as to the increase or diminution
+of the population. "Some desponding men had asserted that the population
+had decreased by a million and a half between the Revolution and Peace
+of Paris, in 1763; others (of whom the speaker himself was one) believed
+that, on the contrary, it had increased in that interval by two
+millions." His motion was unanimously adopted by both Houses; and when
+the census was taken, its real result furnished as strong a proof of its
+usefulness as any of the mover's arguments, by the extent of the
+prevailing miscalculations which it detected. For Mr. Abbott, who had
+spared no pains to arrive at a correct estimate, while he mentioned that
+some persons reckoned the population of England and Wales at 8,000,000,
+pronounced that, according to other statements, formed on a more
+extensive investigation, and, as it seemed to him, on a more correct
+train of reasoning, the total number could not be less than 11,000,000.
+In point of fact, excluding those employed in the army and navy, who
+were nearly half a million, the number for England and Wales fell short
+of nine millions.[149] It would be quite superfluous to dilate on the
+value of the information thus supplied, without which, indeed, much of
+our subsequent legislation on poor-laws, corn-laws, and all matters
+relating to rating and taxation, would have been impracticable or the
+merest guesswork.
+
+As was mentioned in the preceding chapter, Pitt found himself unable to
+fulfil the hopes which, in his negotiations with different parties in
+Ireland, he had led the Roman Catholics to entertain of the removal of
+their civil and political disabilities. So rigorous were those
+restrictions, both in England and Ireland, that a Roman Catholic could
+not serve even as a private in the militia; and a motion made in 1797 by
+Mr. Wilberforce--a man who could certainly not be suspected of any
+leaning to Roman Catholic doctrine--to render them admissible to that
+service, though it was adopted in the House of Commons, was rejected by
+the House of Lords. But Pitt, who on that occasion had supported
+Wilberforce, did not confine his views to the removal of a single petty
+disability, but proposed to put the whole body of Roman Catholics on a
+footing of perfect equality with Protestants in respect of their
+eligibility to every kind of office, with one or two exceptions. And
+during the autumn of 1800 he was busily engaged in framing the details
+of his measure, in order to submit it to his royal master in its
+entirety, and so to avoid disquieting him with a repetition of
+discussions on the subject, which he knew to be distasteful to him. For,
+five years before, George III. had consulted the Chief-justice, Lord
+Kenyon, and the Attorney-general, Sir John Scott (afterward Lord Eldon),
+on the question whether some proposed concessions to Dissenters,
+Protestant as well as Roman Catholic, did not "militate against the
+coronation oath and many existing statutes;" and had received their
+legal opinion that the tests enacted in the reign of Charles II.,
+"though wise laws, and in policy not to be departed from, might be
+repealed or altered without any breach of the coronation oath or Act of
+Union" (with Scotland).[150] Their opinions on the point were the more
+valuable, since they were notoriously opposed to their political
+convictions, and might be supposed to have carried sufficient conviction
+to the royal mind. But his Majesty's scruples were now, unfortunately,
+revived by the Lord Chancellor, who, strange to say, was himself a
+Presbyterian; and who treacherously availed himself of his knowledge of
+what was in contemplation to anticipate the Prime-minister's intended
+explanations to the King. He fully succeeded in his object of fixing the
+King's resolution to refuse his assent to the contemplated concessions
+(which, by a curious confusion of ideas, his Majesty even characterized
+as "Jacobinical"[151]), though not in the object which he had still more
+at heart, of inducing the King to regard him as the statesman in the
+whole kingdom the most deserving of his confidence. The merits of the
+question will be more appropriately examined hereafter. It is sufficient
+to say here that Pitt, conceiving himself bound by personal honor as
+well as by statesman-like duty to persevere in his intended measure, or
+to retire from an office which no man is justified in holding unless he
+can discharge its functions in accordance with his own judgment of what
+is required by the best interests of the state, resigned his post, and
+was succeeded by Mr. Addington.
+
+Addington's ministry was made memorable by the formation of the Northern
+Confederacy against us, and its immediate and total overthrow by
+Nelson's cannon; and for the Peace of Amiens, severely criticised in
+Parliament, as that of Utrecht and every subsequent treaty with a
+similar object had been, but defensible both on grounds of domestic
+policy, as well as on that of affording us a much-needed respite from
+the strain of war; though it proved to be only a respite, and a feverish
+one, since at the end of two years the war was renewed, to be waged with
+greater fury than ever. But it was too short-lived for any
+constitutional questions to arise in it. And when, in 1804, Pitt resumed
+the government, his attention was too completely engrossed by the
+diplomatic arrangements by which he hoped to unite all the nations east
+of the Rhine in resistance to a power whose ever aggressive ambition was
+a standing menace to every Continental kingdom, for him to be able to
+spare time for the consideration of measures of domestic policy, except
+such as were of a financial character. But, though his premature death
+rendered his second administration shorter than even Addington's, it was
+not wholly unproductive of questions of constitutional interest. It
+witnessed a recurrence to that which cannot but be regarded as among the
+most important privileges of the House of Commons, the right of
+impeaching a minister for maladministration. A report of a commission
+appointed for the investigation of the naval affairs of the kingdom had
+revealed to Parliament a gross misapplication of the public money
+committed by the Paymaster of the Navy. And, as that officer could not
+have offended as he had done without either gross carelessness or
+culpable connivance on the part of the Treasurer of the Navy, Lord
+Melville, who had since been promoted to the post of First Lord of the
+Admiralty, the House of Commons ordered his impeachment at the Bar of
+the House of Lords; the vote being passed in 1805, during Pitt's
+administration, though the trial did not take place till the year
+following. In reality, the charge did not impugn Lord Melville's
+personal honor, on which at first sight it appeared to press hardly, Mr.
+Whitbread himself, the member for Bedford, who was the chief promoter
+and manager of the impeachment, admitting that he never imputed to Lord
+Melville "any participation in the plunder of the public;" and, as Lord
+Melville was acquitted on every one of the charges brought against him,
+the case might have been passed over here with the barest mention of it,
+were it not that Lord Campbell has pointed out the mode of procedure as
+differing from that adopted in the great trial of Warren Hastings,
+twenty years before; and, by reason of that difference, forming a model
+for future proceedings of the same kind, if, unhappily, there should
+ever be occasion given for a similar prosecution. The credit of the
+difference Lord Campbell gives to the Chancellor, Lord Erskine, who,
+"instead of allowing the House of Lords to sit to hear the case a few
+days in a year, and, when sitting, being converted from a court of
+justice into a theatre for rhetorical display, insisted that it should
+sit, like every other criminal tribunal, _de die in diem_, till the
+verdict was delivered. And he enforced both upon the managers of the
+House of Commons and on the counsel for the defendant the wholesome
+rules of procedure established for the detection of crime and the
+protection of innocence."[152] It is well known that on the trial of
+Hastings the managers of that impeachment, and most especially Burke,
+claimed a right of giving evidence such as no court of law would have
+admitted, and set up what they entitled "a usage of Parliament
+independent of and contradistinguished from the common law."[153] But on
+that occasion Lord Thurlow, then Chancellor, utterly denied the
+existence of any such usage--a usage which, "in times of barbarism, when
+to impeach a man was to ruin him by the strong hand of power, was quoted
+in order to justify the most arbitrary proceedings." He instanced the
+trial of Lord Stafford, as one which "was from beginning to end marked
+by violence and injustice," and expressed a "hope that in these
+enlightened days no man would be tried but by the law of the land." We
+may fairly agree with Lord Campbell, that it is to be hoped that the
+course adopted by Lord Erskine in this case has settled the principle
+and mode of procedure for all future time; since certainly the
+importance of an impeachment, both as to the state interests involved in
+it, and the high position and authority of the defendant, ought to be
+considered as reasons for adhering with the greatest closeness to the
+strict rules of law, rather than for relaxing them in any particular.
+
+But, as was natural, the public could spare little attention for
+anything except the war, and the arrangements made by the minister for
+engaging in it with effect; the interest which such a state of things
+always kindles being in this instance greatly inflamed by Napoleon's
+avowal of a design to invade the kingdom, though it is now known that
+the preparations of which he made such a parade were merely a feint to
+throw Austria off her guard.[154] During Addington's administration Pitt
+had spoken warmly in favor of giving every possible encouragement to the
+Volunteer movement, and also in support of a proposal made by an
+independent member, Colonel Crawford, to fortify London; and one of his
+first measures after his resumption of office was a measure, known as
+the Additional Force Bill, to transfer a large portion of the militia to
+the regular army. It was so purely a measure of detail, that it would
+hardly have been necessary to mention it, had it not been for an
+objection made to it by the Prime-minister's former colleague, Lord
+Grenville, and for the reply with which that objection was encountered
+by the Chief-justice, Lord Ellenborough; the former denouncing it as
+unconstitutional, since, he declared, it tended to establish a large
+standing army in time of peace; and Lord Ellenborough, on the other
+hand, declaring the right of the crown to call out the whole population
+in arms for the defence of the realm to be so "radical, essential, and
+hitherto never questioned part of the royal prerogative, that, even in
+such an age of adventurous propositions, he had not expected that any
+lord would have ventured to question it."[155]
+
+Pitt died in the beginning of 1806, and was succeeded by an
+administration of which his great rival, Fox, was the guiding spirit
+while he lived, though Lord Grenville was First Lord of the Treasury,
+and, after Fox's death, which took place in September, the undisputed
+Prime-minister. But the formation of the administration was not
+completed without a step which was at once strongly denounced, not only
+by the regular Opposition, but by several members of political
+moderation, as a violation, if not of the letter, at least of the
+spirit, of the constitution, the introduction of the Lord Chief-justice,
+Lord Ellenborough, into the cabinet. It was notorious that he was
+invited to a seat among that body as the representative of a small
+party, the personal friends of Lord Sidmouth. For the ministry was
+formed in some degree on the principle of a coalition; Lord Grenville
+himself having been a colleague of Pitt throughout the greater part of
+that statesman's first ministry, and as such having been always opposed
+to Fox; while Lord Ellenborough had been Attorney-general in Addington's
+administration, which avowedly only differed from Pitt on the single
+subject of the Catholic question.
+
+The appointment was at once made the subject of motions in both Houses
+of Parliament. In the House of Lords, Lord Bristol, who brought the
+question forward, denounced "this identification of a judge with the
+executive government as injurious to the judicial character, subversive
+of the liberty of the people, and having a direct and alarming tendency
+to blend and amalgamate those great elementary principles of political
+power which it is the very object of a free constitution to keep
+separate and distinct." In the House of Commons, Mr. Canning took a
+similar objection; and, though he admitted that a precedent for the act
+might be found in the case of Lord Mansfield who, while Chief-justice,
+had also been a cabinet minister in the administration of 1757, he
+argued forcibly that that precedent turned against the ministry and the
+present appointment, because Lord Mansfield himself had subsequently
+admitted that "he had infringed the principles of the constitution by
+acting as a cabinet minister and Chief-justice at the same time." Fox,
+in reply, relied principally on two arguments. The first was, that "he
+had never heard of such a thing as the cabinet council becoming the
+subject of a debate in that House. He had never known of the exercise of
+the King's prerogative in the appointment of his ministers being brought
+into question on such grounds as had now been alleged." The second, that
+"in point of fact there is nothing in the constitution that recognizes
+any such institution as a cabinet council; that it is a body unknown to
+the law, and one which has in no instance whatever been recognized by
+Parliament." He farther urged that as Lord Ellenborough was a privy
+councillor, and as the cabinet is only a select committee of the Privy
+Council, he was, "in fact, as liable to be summoned to attend the
+cabinet, as a privy councillor, as he was in his present situation."
+
+The last argument was beneath the speaker to use, since not one of his
+hearers was ignorant that no member of the Privy Council unconnected
+with the government ever is summoned to the deliberations of the
+cabinet; and though, as he correctly stated, "there is no legal record
+of the members comprising any cabinet," it may safely be affirmed that
+since July, 1714, when the Duke of Argyll and the Duke of Somerset
+claimed admission to the deliberations of the ministers, on account of
+the danger in which the Queen lay, though they admitted that they had
+received no summons to attend,[156] there has been no instance of any
+privy councillor attending without a summons; nor, except at the
+accession of a new sovereign, of summonses being sent to any members of
+the council except the actual ministers. The second argument was even
+worse, as being still more sophistical. It might be true that no law nor
+statute recognized the cabinet as a body distinct from the Privy
+Council, but it was at least equally true that there was no one who was
+ignorant of the distinction; that it was, in truth, one without which it
+would be difficult to understand the organization or working of any
+ministry. The indispensable function and privilege of a ministry is, to
+deliberate in concert and in private on the measures to be taken for the
+welfare of the state; but there could be little chance of concert, and
+certainly none of privacy, if every one who has ever been sworn a member
+of the Privy Council had a right to attend all its deliberations. Again,
+to say that the King's prerogative, as exercised in the choice of his
+advisers, is a thing so sacred that no abuse of it, or want of judgment
+shown in its exercise, can warrant a complaint, is inconsistent with
+every principle of constitutional government, and with every conceivable
+idea of the privileges of Parliament. In fact, Parliament has claimed a
+right to interfere in matters apparently touching more nearly the royal
+prerogative, and it is only in the reign preceding the present reign
+that hostile comments have been made in Parliament on the appointment of
+a particular person as ambassador to a foreign power. Yet the post of
+ambassador is one which might have been supposed to have been farther
+removed from the supervision of Parliament than that of a minister, an
+ambassador being in a special degree the personal representative of the
+sovereign, and the sovereign therefore, having, it might be supposed, a
+right to a most unfettered choice in such a matter.
+
+Stripped of all technicalities, and even of all reference to the
+manifest possibility of such a circumstance arising as that the
+Chief-justice, if a member of a cabinet, may have a share in ordering
+the institution of a prosecution which, as a judge, it may be his lot to
+try, one consideration which is undeniable is, that a member of a
+cabinet is of necessity, and by the very nature of his position in it, a
+party man, and that it is of preeminent importance to the impartiality
+of the judicial bench, and to the confidence of the people in the
+purity, integrity, and freedom from political bias of their decisions,
+that the judges should be exempt from all suspicion of party connection.
+Lord Campbell even goes the length of saying, what was not urged on
+either side of either House in these debates, that it was alleged by at
+least one contemporary writer that Lord Mansfield's position in the
+cabinet did perceptibly influence some of his views and measures
+respecting the Press;[157] and, though in both Houses the ministry had a
+majority on the question of the propriety of the appointment, he records
+his own opinion[158] that "the argument was all on the losing side;" and
+that Mr. Fox showed his consciousness that it was so by his "concession
+that the Chief-justice should absent himself from the cabinet when the
+expediency of commencing prosecutions for treason or sedition was to be
+discussed." He adds, also, that "it is said that Lord Ellenborough
+himself ere long changed his opinion, and, to his intimate friends,
+expressed deep regret that he had ever been prevailed upon to enter the
+cabinet."
+
+But, if the composition of the cabinet of 1806 has in this respect been
+generally condemned, on the other hand the annals of that ministry,
+short-lived as it was, are marked by the enactment of one great measure
+which has been stamped with universal approbation. It may, perhaps, be
+said that the existence, promotion, discouragement, or suppression of a
+branch of trade has no title to be regarded as a constitutional
+question. But the course which the British Parliament, after a long
+period of hesitation, has adopted respecting, not only the slave-trade,
+but the employment of slave-labor in any part of the British dominions,
+is so intimately connected with the great constitutional principle, that
+every man, whatever be his race or nation or previous condition, whose
+foot is once planted on British soil, is free from that moment, that it
+cannot be accounted a digression to mention the subject here. To our
+statesmen of Queen Anne's time traffic in slaves was so far from being
+considered discreditable, that the ministry of that reign prided
+themselves greatly on what was called the Assiento Treaty with Spain, by
+which they secured for the British merchants and ship-owners the
+privilege of supplying the West India Islands with several thousand
+slaves a year. In 1748 the ministers of George II were equally jealous
+of the credit of renewing it. It had even on one occasion been decided
+in the Court of Common Pleas that an action of trover could be
+maintained for a negro, "because negroes are heathens;" though
+Chief-justice Holt scouted the idea of being bound by a precedent which
+would put "a human being on the same footing as an ox or an ass," and
+declared that "in England there was no such thing as a slave."
+Subsequent decisions, however, of two Lord Chancellors--Lord Talbot and
+Lord Hardwicke--were not wholly consistent with the doctrine thus laid
+down by Holt; and the question could not be regarded as finally settled
+till 1772, when a slave named Somersett was brought over to England from
+Jamaica by his master, and on his arrival in the Thames claimed his
+freedom, and under a writ of _habeas corpus_ had his claim allowed by
+Lord Mansfield. The master's counsel contended that slavery was not a
+condition unsanctioned by English law, for villeinage was slavery, and
+no statute had ever abolished villeinage. But the Chief-justice, in the
+first place, denied that villeinage had ever been slavery such as
+existed in the West Indies; and, in the second place, he pronounced
+that, whether it had been or not, it had, at all events, long ceased in
+England, and could not be revived. "The air of England has long been too
+pure for a slave, and every man is free who breathes it. Every man who
+comes into England is entitled to the protection of English law."[159]
+But this freedom was as yet held to be only co-extensive with these
+islands. And for sixty years more our West India Islands continued to be
+cultivated by the labor of slaves, some of whom were the offspring of
+slaves previously employed, though by far the greater part were imported
+yearly from the western coast of Africa. The supply from that country
+seemed inexhaustible. The native chiefs in time of war gladly sold their
+prisoners to the captains of British vessels; in time of peace they sold
+them their own subjects; and, if at any time these modes of obtaining
+slaves slackened, the captains would land at night, and, attacking the
+villages on the coast sweep off the inhabitants on board their ships,
+and at once set sail with their booty. The sufferings of these unhappy
+captives in what was called the "middle passage"--the passage between
+their native land and the West India Islands--were for a long time
+unknown or disregarded, till, early in Pitt's first ministry, they
+attracted the notice of some of our naval officers who were stationed in
+the West Indies, and who, on their return to England, related the
+horrors which they had witnessed or heard of--how, between decks too low
+to admit of a full-grown man standing upright, the wretched victims,
+chained to the sides of the ships, lay squeezed together in such
+numbers, though the whole voyage was within the tropics, that, from the
+overpowering heat and scantiness of food, it was estimated that
+two-thirds of each cargo died on the passage. Most fortunately for the
+credit of England, the fearful trade was brought under the notice of a
+young member of Parliament singularly zealous in the cause of humanity
+and religion, endowed with untiring industry and powerful eloquence, and
+connected by the closest ties of personal intimacy with Mr. Pitt. To
+hear of such a system of organized murder, as the British officers
+described the slave-trade to be, was quite sufficient to induce Mr.
+Wilberforce to resolve to devote himself to its suppression. He laid the
+case in all its horrors before his friend the Prime-minister, a man as
+ready as himself to grapple with and extinguish all proved abuses; and
+Pitt at once promised him all the support which he could give. It was no
+easy task that he had taken on himself. A year or two before, Burke had
+applied himself to frame some regulations which he hoped might gradually
+remove the evil; but, little as he was moved by considerations of
+popularity or daunted by difficulty, he had abandoned the attempt, as
+one which would meet with a resistance too powerful to be overcome.
+Wilberforce was not a bolder man than Burke, but he had no other object
+to divide his attention, and, therefore, to this one he devoted all his
+faculties and energies, enlisting supporters in every quarter, seeking
+even the co-operation of the French government, and opening a
+correspondence with the French Secretary of State, M. Montmorin, a
+statesman of great capacity, and, what was far rarer in France, of
+incorruptible honesty. M. Montmorin, however, though alive to the
+cruelty of the traffic, was unable to promise him any aid, alleging the
+fears of the French planters that its abolition "would ruin the French
+islands. He said that it was one of those subjects upon which the
+interests of men and their sentiments were so much at variance, that it
+was difficult to learn what was practicable."[160]
+
+Wilberforce had already found that the English merchants were still less
+manageable. Pitt had entered so fully into his views, that in 1788 he
+himself moved and carried a resolution pledging the House of Commons to
+take the slave-trade into consideration in the next session. And another
+friend of the cause, Sir W. Dobben, brought in a bill to diminish the
+horrors of the middle passage by proportioning the number of slaves who
+might be conveyed in one ship to the tonnage of the vessel. But those
+concerned in the West India trade rose up in arms against even so
+moderate a measure, and one so clearly demanded by the most ordinary
+humanity as this. The Liverpool merchants declared that the absence of
+restrictions on the slave-trade had been the chief cause of the
+prosperity and opulence of their town, and obtained leave to be heard by
+counsel against the bill. But Fox united with Pitt on this subject, and
+the bill was carried. But this was all the practical success which the
+efforts of the "Abolitionists," as they began to be called, achieved for
+many years. And even that was not won without extreme difficulty; Lord
+Chancellor Thurlow opposing it with great vehemence in the House of
+Lords, as the fruit of a "five days' fit of philanthropy which had just
+sprung up," and pointing to the conduct of the French government, which,
+as he asserted, had offered premiums to encourage the trade, as an
+example that we should do well to follow. It was even said that he had
+contrived to incline the King himself to the same view; to have
+persuaded him that the trade was indispensable to the prosperity of our
+manufacturers, and, in the Chancellor's words, "that it was his royal
+duty to show some humanity to the whites as well as to the negroes." And
+more than once, when bills to limit or wholly suppress the trade had
+been passed by the Commons, the same mischievous influence defeated them
+in the Lords. The last years of Pitt's first administration were too
+fully occupied with the affairs of Ireland, negotiations with foreign
+powers, and the great war with France, to enable him to keep pace with
+his friend's zeal on the subject. But in his second administration,
+occupied though he was with a recurrence of the same causes, he found
+time to prepare and issue an Order in Council prohibiting the
+importation of slaves into our fresh colonial acquisitions, and the
+employment of British ships to supply the Dutch, French, and Spanish
+islands.
+
+And this Order in Council paved the way for the total abolition. One of
+the earliest proceedings of the new ministry was the introduction by the
+Attorney-general, Sir Arthur Pigott, of a bill to extend and make it
+perpetual; to forbid "the importation of African negroes by British
+ships into the colonies conquered by or ceded to us in war; or into the
+colonies of any neutral state in the West Indies. For at present every
+state that had colonies in America or the West Indies, and that was not
+actually at war with us, availed itself of the opportunity of British
+shipping to carry on the trade." It was resisted as vehemently as any
+former measure with the same object, and partly on the new ground that
+it would in no degree stop the trade or diminish the sufferings of the
+Africans, but would merely rob our ship-owners of their profits to
+enrich the Americans. Mr. Rose, the member for Christchurch, who
+advanced this argument, had been a friend of Pitt; yet, though he quoted
+an instance of a single vessel having buried one hundred and fifty-two
+slaves on one voyage, he was not ashamed to deprecate the bill, on the
+plea that "the manufacturers of Manchester, Stockport, and Paisley would
+be going about naked and starving, and thus, by attending to a supposed
+claim for relief from a distant quarter, we should give existence to
+much more severe distress at home." The bill, however, was carried in
+both Houses, and received the royal assent. And Fox, who supported it
+warmly in his speech on the third reading (one of the last speeches
+which he ever addressed to the House), invited Wilberforce to regard it
+as a stepping-stone to the total abolition of the trade, and as an
+encouragement to renew his motion for that object; and, though he could
+not promise him the support of the government as a government, he "could
+answer for himself and many of his friends who held the highest and most
+dignified stations in the other House of Parliament. They still felt the
+question of the total abolition as one involving the dearest interests
+of humanity, and as one which, should they be successful in effecting
+it, would entail more true glory upon their administration, and more
+honor upon their country, than any other transaction in which they could
+be engaged."
+
+Mr. Fox did not live to see the opening of another session; but, when
+that time came, the position which he had taken up, that the measure of
+which he had thus promoted the passing was an encouragement to do more,
+was adopted to its full extent by the chief of his colleagues, Lord
+Grenville, who, in February, 1807, himself brought forward a motion for
+the entire abolition of the trade. Though he was Prime-minister, he
+could not introduce it as a government measure, since two of his
+colleagues--Lord Sidmouth, the President of the Council, and Mr.
+Windham, the Secretary of State for the Colonies--opposed it; though the
+former professed a desire to see the trade abolished, but would have
+preferred to attain that end by imposing such a tax on every slave
+imported as should render the trade unprofitable. He had another
+obstacle also to encounter, in the vehement opposition of some of the
+princes of the royal family, the Dukes of Clarence and Sussex more
+especially, who were known to be canvassing against the bill, and were
+generally understood, in so doing, to be acting in accordance with the
+views of their elder brothers. But he was confident that by this time
+the feeling of the whole country was with him on the subject. He was
+resolved to rest his case on its justice, and therefore consented that
+the House should hear counsel on the subject, though he resisted their
+demand to be allowed to call witnesses. Accordingly, counsel were heard
+for the whole body of West India planters, and for those of one or two
+separate islands, such as Jamaica and Trinidad; for the Liverpool
+merchants, and even for the trustees of the Liverpool Docks. But some of
+their reasonings he even turned against themselves, refusing for a
+moment to admit "that the profits obtained by robbery could be urged as
+an argument for the continuance of robbery." He denounced the trade as
+"the most criminal that any country could be engaged in," and as one
+that led to other crimes in the treatment of the slaves after they
+reached the West Indies. He instanced "three most horrible and dreadful
+murders of slaves" that had been committed in Barbadoes, and quoted the
+report of Lord Seaforth, governor of the island, who, on investigation,
+had found that by the law of the colony the punishment affixed to such
+murders was a fine of eleven pounds. He was opposed by the Duke of
+Clarence, who directed his remarks chiefly to a defence of the general
+humanity of the planters; and by Lord Westmoreland, who, in a speech of
+singular intemperance, denounced the principle of the measure, as one
+after the passing of which "no property could be rendered safe which
+could fall within the power of the Legislature." He even made it an
+argument against the bill that its principle, if carried to its
+legitimate logical end, must tend to the abolition of slavery as well as
+of the slave-trade. He objected especially to the assertion in the
+preamble that the trade was "contrary to justice and humanity,"
+declaring that those words were only inserted in the hope that by them
+"foreign powers might be humbugged into a concurrence with the
+abolition," and wound up his harangue by a declaration that, though he
+should "see the Presbyterian and the prelate, the Methodist and
+pew-preacher, the Jacobin and the murderer, unite in support of it, he
+would still raise his voice against it." It must have been more painful
+to the minister to be opposed by so distinguished an officer as Lord St.
+Vincent, who resisted the bill chiefly on the ground that "its effect
+would be to transfer British capital to other countries, which would not
+be disposed to abandon so productive a trade," and declared that he
+could only account for Lord Grenville's advocacy of it "by supposing
+that some Obi man had cast his spell upon him." But the case was too
+strong for any arguments to prevail which were based solely on the
+profits of a trade which no one pretended to justify. The bill passed
+the Lords by a majority of nearly three to one; in the House of Commons,
+where the opposition was much feebler, by one infinitely larger;[161]
+and, by a somewhat remarkable coincidence, it received the royal assent
+on the same day on which Lord Grenville announced to his brother peers
+that his administration was at an end.
+
+Even before the abolition had thus become law, the member for
+Northumberland, Earl Percy, endeavored to give practical effect to Lord
+Westmoreland's view, that emancipation of the slaves was its inevitable
+corollary, by moving for leave to bring in a bill for the gradual
+abolition of slavery in the British settlements of the West Indies. But
+he was opposed by Lord Howick,[162] though he had been among the earnest
+advocates of abolition, partly for the sake of the negroes themselves,
+and partly on the ground that the Legislature had no "right to interfere
+with the property of the colonists;" little foreseeing that the measure
+which he now opposed was reserved for his own administration, and that
+its accomplishment would be one of its chief titles to the respectful
+recollection of posterity. And, as the House was presently counted out,
+the discussion would not have been worth recording, were it not for the
+opportunity which it gave of displaying the practical and moderate
+wisdom of Wilberforce himself, who joined in the opposition to Lord
+Percy's motion. "The enemies of abolition had," he said, "always
+confounded abolition with emancipation. He and his friends had always
+distinguished between them; and not only abstained from proposing
+emancipation, but were ready to reject it when proposed by others. How
+much soever he looked forward with anxious expectation to the period
+when the negroes might with safety be liberated, he knew too well the
+effect which the long continuance of abject slavery produced upon the
+human mind to think of their immediate emancipation, a measure which at
+the present moment would be injurious both to them and to the colonies.
+He and those who acted with him were satisfied with having gained an
+object which was safely attainable."
+
+And they had reason to be satisfied. For the good work thus done was not
+limited by the extent of the British dominions, vast as they are. The
+example of the homage thus paid by the Parliament and the nation to
+justice and humanity was contagious; the principle on which the bill was
+founded and was carried being such that, for mere shame, foreign
+countries could hardly persist in maintaining a traffic which those who
+had derived the greatest profit from it had on such grounds renounced;
+though our ministers did not trust to their spontaneous sympathies, but
+made the abolition of the traffic by our various allies, or those who
+wished to become so, a constant object of diplomatic negotiations, even
+purchasing the co-operation of some by important concessions, in one
+instance by the payment of a large sum of money. The conferences and
+congresses which took place on the re-establishment of peace gave them
+great facilities for pressing their views on the different governments.
+And Lord Liverpool's instructions to Lord Castlereagh and the Duke of
+Wellington, as plenipotentiaries of our government,[163] show the keen
+interest which he took in the matter, and the skilful manner in which he
+sought to avail himself of the predominant influence which the exertions
+and triumphs of this country had given her with every foreign cabinet.
+Though Portugal was an ally to whom we regarded ourselves as bound by
+special ties, as well as by the great benefits we had conferred on her,
+yet, as she clung with the greatest pertinacity to the trade, he did not
+scruple to endeavor to put a constraint upon her which should compel her
+submission, and instructed Lord Castlereagh "to induce the Congress to
+take the best means in their power to enforce it by the adoption of a
+law, on the part of the several states, to exclude the colonial produce
+of those countries who should refuse to comply with this system of
+abolition."
+
+And exertions so resolutely put forward were so successful, that the
+trade was avowedly proscribed by every European nation, though
+unquestionably it was still carried on by stealth by merchants and
+ship-owners of more than one country--not, if the suspicions of our
+statesmen were well founded, without some connivance on the part of
+their governments. Nor were our efforts in the cause the fitful display
+of impulsive excitement. We have continued them and widened their sphere
+as occasions have presented themselves, exerting a successful influence
+even over unchristian and semi-civilized governments, of which an
+instance has very recently been furnished, in the assurances given by
+the Khedive of Egypt to our minister residing at his court, that he is
+taking vigorous measures to suppress the slave-trade, which is still
+carried on in the interior of Africa; and that we may believe his
+promise that he will not relax his exertions till it is extinguished, at
+least in the region on the north of the equator.
+
+Individuals, as a rule, are slow to take warning from the experience of
+others; slower, perhaps, to follow their example in well-doing. Nations
+are slower still. When such an example is followed, still more when it
+is adopted by a general imitation, it will usually be found not only
+that the good is of a very unusual standard of excellence, but that he
+or they who have set the example are endowed with a force of character
+that predisposes others to submit to their influence. And credit of this
+kind England may fairly claim for the general abolition of the
+slave-trade; for the condemnation and abolition of the slave-trade had
+this distinguishing feature, that the idea of such a policy was of
+exclusively British origin. No nation had ever before conceived the
+notion that to make a man a slave was a crime. On the contrary, there
+were not wanting those who, from the recognition of such a condition in
+the Bible, argued that it was a divine institution. And they who
+denounced it, and labored for its suppression, had not only inveterate
+prejudice and long custom to contend with, but found arrayed against
+them many of the strongest passions that animate mankind. The natural
+desire for gain united merchants, ship-owners, and planters in unanimous
+resistance to a measure calculated to cut off from them one large source
+of profit. Patriotism, which, however misguided, was sincere and free
+from all taint of personal covetousness, induced many, who wore wholly
+unconnected either with commerce or with the West Indies, to look with
+disfavor on a change which not only imperilled the interests of such
+important bodies of men, but which they were assured by those concerned,
+must render the future cultivation of estates in the West Indies
+impracticable; while such a result would not only ruin those valuable
+colonies, but would also extinguish that great nursery for our navy
+which was furnished by the vessels at present engaged in the West India
+trade. To disregard such substantial considerations to risk a loss of
+revenue, a diminution of our colonial greatness, and a weakening of our
+maritime power, even while engaged in a formidable war, under no other
+pressure but that of a respect for humanity and justice, was certainly a
+homage to those virtues, and also an act of self-denying courage, of
+which the previous history of the world had furnished no similar
+example; and it is one of which, in one point of view, the nation may be
+more justly proud than of the achievements of its wisest statesmen, or
+the exploits of its most invincible warriors. For it was the act of the
+nation itself. No previous sentiment of the people paved the way for
+Pitt's triumphs in finance, for Nelson's or Wellington's victories by
+sea and land; but the slave-trade could never have been abolished by any
+parliamentary leader, had not the nation as a whole become convinced of
+its wickedness, and, when once so convinced, resolved to brave
+everything rather than persist in it. The merit of having impressed it
+with this conviction belongs to Mr. Wilberforce, whose untiring,
+unswerving devotion of brilliant eloquence and practical ability to the
+one holy object, and whose ultimate success, give him a just claim to be
+reckoned among the great men of a generation than which the world has
+seen none more prolific of every kind of greatness. But the nation
+itself is also entitled to no slight credit for having so rapidly
+appreciated the force of his teaching, and for having encouraged its
+representatives to listen to his voice, by the knowledge that by
+adopting his measures they would be carrying out the wish and
+determination of the whole people.
+
+A measure for the strengthening of the army, introduced by the Secretary
+of State for War, Mr. Windham, though not one of perpetual force, since
+it required to be renewed every year, claims a brief mention, from the
+extent to which one of its clauses trenched on the freedom of the
+subject, by making every man of military age (from sixteen years
+old[164] to forty) liable to be compelled to submit to military training
+for a certain period of each year. "Nothing," to quote the Secretary's
+words, "was to exempt any man from the general training but his becoming
+a volunteer at his own expense, the advantage of which would be that he
+could train himself if he chose, and fight, if occasion required it, in
+the corps to which he should belong, instead of being liable to fall in
+among the regulars.... As out of the immense mass of the population some
+selection must be made, those called on to be trained were to be
+selected by lot, and he would have the people divided into three
+classes, between the ages of sixteen and forty: the first class to
+comprehend all from sixteen to twenty-four; the second, those between
+twenty-four and thirty-two; and the third, all from thirty-two to forty.
+The number of days for training he proposed to limit to twenty-six, with
+an allowance of a shilling a day for each man." The result aimed at by
+this part of his measure was the creation of a force different from and
+unconnected with the militia; and he did not conceal his hope that the
+military habits which it would implant in a large portion of the
+population would lead many of those thus about to be trained to enlist
+in the regular army. To the militia itself he paid a high but not
+undeserved compliment, declaring it "for home service certainly equal to
+any part of our regular forces, with the single exception that it had
+never seen actual service." But the militia could not be called on to
+serve out of the kingdom; and his object was to increase the force
+available for foreign service--"to see the great mass of the population
+of the country so far trained as to be able to recruit immediately
+whatever losses the regular army might sustain in action." As yet, the
+number of men yearly obtained by recruiting fell far short of the
+requirements of the service. Wellington had not yet begun that career of
+victory which created a national enthusiasm for war, and filled our
+ranks with willing soldiers. And another clause of the same bill was
+framed in the hope of making the service more acceptable to the
+peasantry, by limiting the time for which recruits were to be enlisted,
+and entering men, at first, in the infantry for seven years, or in the
+cavalry (as that branch of the service required a longer apprenticeship)
+for ten; then allowing them the option of renewing their engagement for
+two periods--in the infantry of seven years each, in the cavalry of six
+and five, with increased pay during each of the two periods, and a small
+pension for life, if the soldier retired after the second period; and
+"the full allowance of Chelsea," which was to be farther raised to a
+shilling a day, for those who elected to serve the whole twenty-one
+years. This principle the present reign has seen carried to a much
+greater extent, but the change is too recent for even the most
+experienced officers to be agreed on its effects. And it is only because
+of this recent extension of it that this clause is mentioned here. But
+the enactment of a law of compulsory service was clearly an inroad on
+the great constitutional right of every man to choose his own
+employment. At the same time, it is equally clear that it was only such
+an inroad as under the circumstances, was fully justifiable. It is true
+that all danger of French invasion had passed away with Trafalgar; but
+the kingdom was still engaged in a gigantic war, and the necessity of
+the case--always the supreme law--was so little denied by the
+Opposition, that their objections to the bill were directed entirely
+against the clause for limited enlistment, and not against that which
+abridged the subject's liberty, by compelling him to learn to serve his
+country in war.
+
+The reign of George III., which had now lasted fifty years, was drawing
+practically to a close. The excitement caused by the ministerial changes
+in 1801 had already brought on one relapse, though fortunately a very
+brief one, of the King's malady of 1788; and in the autumn of 1810 the
+death of the daughter who was supposed to be his especial favorite, the
+Princess Amelia, produced a recurrence of it, which, though at first the
+physicians entertained more sanguine hopes of his speedy recovery than
+on any former occasion, he never shook off. More than one change of
+ministry had recently taken place. In 1807 Lord Grenville had been
+compelled, as Pitt had been in 1801, to choose between yielding his
+opinions on the Catholic question or resigning his office, and had
+chosen the latter alternative. He had been succeeded for two years by
+the Duke of Portland; but in 1809 that nobleman had also retired, and
+had been succeeded by his Attorney-general, Mr. Perceval, the only
+practising barrister who had ever been so promoted. And he now being
+Prime-minister, and, as such, forced to make arrangements for carrying
+on the government during the illness of his sovereign, naturally
+regarded the course pursued in 1789 as the precedent to be followed.
+Accordingly, on the 20th of December he proposed for the adoption of the
+House of Commons the same resolutions which Pitt had carried twenty-two
+years before--that the King was prevented by indisposition from
+attending to public business; that it was the duty of Parliament to
+provide means for supplying the defect of the personal exercise of the
+royal authority, and its duty also to determine the mode in which the
+royal assent to the measures necessary could be signified. And he also
+followed Pitt's example in expressing by letter to the Prince of Wales
+his conviction that his Royal Highness was a person most proper to be
+appointed Regent, and explaining at the same time the restrictions which
+seemed proper to be imposed on his immediate exercise of the complete
+sovereign authority; though the advanced age at which the King had now
+arrived made it reasonable that those restrictions should now be limited
+to a single year. The Prince, on his part, showed that time had in no
+degree abated his repugnance to those restrictions, and he answered the
+minister's letter by referring him to that which he had addressed to
+Pitt on the same subject in 1788. And he induced all his brothers to
+address to Perceval a formal protest against "the establishment of a
+restricted Regency," which they proceeded to describe as perfectly
+unconstitutional, as being contrary to and subversive of the principles
+which seated their family upon the throne of this realm.[165]
+
+Perceval, however, with Pitt's example before him, had no doubt of the
+course which it was his duty to pursue; and the Opposition also, for the
+most part, followed the tactics of 1789; the line of argument now
+adopted by each party being so nearly identical with that employed on
+the former occasion, that it is needless to recapitulate the topics on
+which the different speakers insisted; though it is worth remarking that
+Lord Holland, who, as the nephew of Fox, thought it incumbent on him to
+follow his uncle's guidance, did on one point practically depart from
+it. As his uncle had done, he denied the right of the Houses to impose
+any restrictions on the Prince's exercise of the royal authority; but,
+at the same time, he consented to put what may be called a moral
+limitation on that exercise, by adding to an amendment which he proposed
+to the resolution proposed by the minister an expression of "the farther
+opinion of the House that it will be expedient to abstain from the
+exercise of all such powers as the immediate exigencies of the state
+shall not call into action, until Parliament shall have passed a bill or
+bills for the future care of his Majesty's royal person during his
+Majesty's present indisposition."
+
+It is remarkable that the leaders of the Opposition were in a great
+degree stimulated in the line they took by the very same hopes which had
+animated Fox and his followers in 1789--the expectation that the
+Regent's first act would be to discard the existing ministry, and to
+place them in office. But again they were disappointed in their
+anticipations, of the realization of which they had made so sure that
+they had taken no pains to keep them secret. They even betrayed their
+mortification to the world when the Prince's intentions on the subject
+of the administration became known by the violence of their language in
+Parliament, some of their party denouncing the employment of the Great
+Seal to give the royal assent to the bill as "fraud and forgery." Nor,
+indeed, could the Regent himself, even while expressing his intention to
+make no change in the administration, lest "any act of his might in the
+smallest degree have the effect of interfering with the progress of his
+sovereign's recovery," suppress an expression of dissatisfaction at the
+recent arrangements, which he considered had placed him in "a situation
+of unexampled embarrassment," and had created "a state of affairs ill
+calculated, as he feared, to sustain the interests of the United Kingdom
+in this awful and perilous crisis, and most difficult to be reconciled
+to the general principles of the British constitution."[166] There were
+at this time general and apparently well-founded hopes of the King's
+recovery. For at intervals during the whole of January the
+Prime-minister had interviews with his Majesty; and, on the very day on
+which the bill became law, the King himself mentioned it to Lord Eldon,
+the Chancellor, and said that he acquiesced in it from perfect
+confidence in the advice of his physicians, and on the sound judgment
+and personal attachment of his ministers.
+
+For the present, therefore, no change was made in the administration;
+but when, in the spring of the following year, Mr. Perceval was
+murdered, the necessity for a new arrangement which this strange and
+calamitous atrocity forced upon the Regent--who by this time had come
+into possession of his full authority--led to his making offers of the
+conduct of affairs to more than one prominent statesman, all of them, as
+is somewhat remarkable, being peers. And, though the proposals
+eventually came to nothing, and the negotiations terminated in the
+re-establishment of the former ministry, with Lord Liverpool at its
+head, yet some of the causes to which their failure was publicly or
+generally attributed seem desirable to be recorded, because the first,
+and that most openly avowed, bears a not very distant resemblance to the
+complication which baffled Sir Robert Peel's endeavors to form an
+administration in 1839; and another corresponds precisely to a proposal
+which, in 1827, the Regent--then King George IV.--did himself make to
+the Duke of Wellington. It is unnecessary to dwell on the singular
+manner in which the Regent first professed to give his confidence to
+Lord Wellesley, then transferred it to Lord Moira,[167] and then to a
+certain extent included Lord Grey and Lord Grenville in it. Nor would it
+be profitable to discuss the correctness or incorrectness of the
+suspicion expressed by Mr. Moore, in his "Life of Sheridan"--who was
+evidently at this time as fully in the Regent's confidence as any one
+else--that "at the bottom of all these evolutions of negotiation there
+was anything but a sincere wish, that the object to which they related
+should be accomplished."[168] The reason avowed by Lord Grey and Lord
+Grenville for refusing a share in the projected administration was the
+refusal of Lord Moira, who had been employed by the Prince to treat with
+them on the subject, to allow them to make a power of removing the
+officers at present filling "the great offices of the household"[169] an
+express condition of their acceptance of ministerial office. They
+affirmed that a "liberty to make new appointments" to these offices had
+usually been given on every change of administration. But Lord Moira,
+while admitting that "the Prince had laid no restriction on him in that
+respect," declared that "it would be impossible for him to concur in
+making the exercise of this power positive and indispensable in the
+formation of the administration, because he should deem it on public
+grounds peculiarly objectionable." Such an answer certainly gives a
+great color to Moore's suspicion, since it is hardly possible to
+conceive that Lord Moira took on himself the responsibility of giving it
+without a previous knowledge that it would be approved by his royal
+master. In a constitutional point of view, there can, it will probably
+be felt, be no doubt that the two lords had a right to the liberty they
+required. And the very men concerned, the great officers of the
+household, were evidently of the same opinion, since the chief, Lord
+Yarmouth, informed Sheridan that they intended to resign, in order that
+he might communicate that intention to Lord Grey; and Sheridan, who
+concealed the intelligence from Lord Grey, can hardly be supposed, any
+more than Lord Moira, to have acted in a manner which he did not expect
+to be agreeable to the Prince. But, in Canning's opinion, this question
+of the household was only the ostensible pretext, and not the real
+cause, of those two lords rejecting the Regent's offers; the real cause
+being, as he believed, that the Prince himself had already named Lord
+Wellesley as Prime-minister, and that they were resolved to insist on
+the right of the Whig party to dictate on that point to the Regent,[170]
+just as, in 1782, Fox had endeavored to force the Duke of Portland on
+the King, when his Majesty preferred Lord Shelburne. As has been
+intimated in a former page, it will be seen hereafter that in 1839 a
+similar claim to be allowed to remove some of the ladies of the royal
+household, and the rejection of that claim by the sovereign, prevented
+Sir R. Peel from forming an administration. And, as that transaction was
+discussed at some length in Parliament, it will afford a better
+opportunity for examining the principle on which the claim and practice
+(for of the practice there is no doubt) rest. For the present it is
+sufficient to point out the resemblance between the cases.
+
+But it is remarkable that, unwarrantable as the pretension of the Whig
+leaders was to dictate to the Regent to whom he should confide the lead
+of the government (if, indeed, Canning be correct in his opinion), yet
+it was not one to which the Regent felt any repugnance, since, in 1827,
+when Lord Liverpool's illness again left the Treasury vacant, he, being
+then on the throne as George IV., proposed to the Duke of Wellington to
+desire the remaining members of the administration themselves to select
+a chief under whom they would be willing to continue in his service; but
+the Duke told him that the plan of allowing them to choose their own
+leader would be most derogatory to his position; that the choice of the
+Prime-minister was an act which ought to be entirely his own, for that,
+in fact under the British constitution, it was the only personal act of
+government which the King of Great Britain had to perform.[171] Though
+not generally a great authority on constitutional points, we apprehend
+that the Duke was clearly correct in this view, which, indeed, has been
+so invariably carried out in practice, that the King's suggestion would
+not have deserved mention had it not been a king's. So far from it
+belonging to any individual subject or to any party to name the
+Prime-minister, to do so is even beyond the province of the Parliament.
+Parliament decides whether it will give its confidence to an
+administration of one party or the other; but not only has no vote ever
+been given on the question whether one member of the dominant party be
+fitter or not than another to be its head, but we do not remember a
+single instance of any member of either House expressing an opinion on
+the subject in his place in Parliament. To do so would be felt by every
+member of experience to be an infringement on the prerogative of his
+sovereign; and it may be added that a contrary practice would certainly
+open the door to intrigue, or, what would be equally bad, a suspicion of
+intrigue, and would thus inevitably diminish the weight which even the
+Opposition desire to see a Prime-minister possess both in Parliament and
+in the country.
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 148: It is somewhat remarkable that Lord Macaulay, in his
+endeavors to estimate the population in 1685, takes no notice of any of
+these details mentioned by Mr. Abbott.]
+
+[Footnote 149: The details of this census of 1801 are given in a note in
+the preceding chapter (see page 185), from which it appears that the
+entire population of the United Kingdom was in that year 16,395,870. Sir
+A. Alison, in different chapters of the second part of his "History of
+Europe," gives returns of subsequent censuses, from the last of which
+(c. lvi., s. 34, note), it appears that in 1851 the population amounted
+to 27,511,862. an increase of 11,116,792 in half a century.]
+
+[Footnote 150: "Lives of the Chief-justices," by Lord Campbell, iii.,
+87, life of Lord Kenyon.]
+
+[Footnote 151: "What is this," said George III. to Mr. Dundas, "which
+this young lord (Castlereagh) has brought over, which they are going to
+throw at my head? The most Jacobinical thing I ever heard of! I shall
+reckon any man my personal enemy who proposes any such measure."--_Life
+of Pitt_, iii., 274.]
+
+[Footnote 152: "Lives of the Chancellors," c. clxxxiv., life of Lord
+Erskine.]
+
+[Footnote 153: "Lives of the Chancellors," c. clix., life of Lord
+Thurlow.]
+
+[Footnote 154: See "Memoires de M. de Metternich," ii., 156.]
+
+[Footnote 155: "Lives of the Chief-justices," iii., 175.]
+
+[Footnote 156: Lord Stanhope, "History of England," i., 133.]
+
+[Footnote 157: "Lives of the Chief-justices," ii., 451. He is quoting H.
+Walpole.]
+
+[Footnote 158: Ibid., iii., 187.]
+
+[Footnote 159: Campbell's "Lives of the Chief-justices," II., 139, life
+of Chief-justice Holt; and p. 418, life of Lord Mansfield.]
+
+[Footnote 160: "Life of Wilberforce," i., 158.]
+
+[Footnote 161: The division in the Lords was 100 to 36; in the Commons,
+283 to 16.]
+
+[Footnote 162: Afterward the Earl Grey of 1831.]
+
+[Footnote 163: See especially his "Letters to Lord Castlereagh," p. 814;
+and "Life of Lord Liverpool," i., 512; ii., 35, 49, 127.]
+
+[Footnote 164: Lord Colchester's "Diary," ii., 49, dated April 3, 1806,
+says eighteen years. But Mr. Windham's speech, as reported in the
+"Parliamentary History," second series, vi., 685, says sixteen years;
+and as he divides the ages into three classes, the two latter of which,
+from twenty-four to thirty-two, and from thirty-two to forty, are of
+eight years each, it is probable that the younger class was of the same
+duration, i.e., from sixteen to twenty-four.]
+
+[Footnote 165: Lord Colchester's "Diary," ii., 300.]
+
+[Footnote 166: See "Diary of Lord Colchester" (Speaker at the time), c.
+xxxvi., p. 316. He gives the whole of the Prince's letter to Perceval
+(which had been composed by Sheridan), and of Perceval's reply. The
+Regency Bill became law February 5, 1811.]
+
+[Footnote 167: A letter of Lord Wellesley to Lord Grey, June 4 (given by
+Pearce, "Life of Lord Wellesley," iii., 270), shows that Lord Moira had
+been in communication with Lord Grey and Lord Grenville before Lord
+Wellesley had given up the idea of forming a ministry. And though Lord
+Grey in his reply (p. 272) expresses his conviction that Lord Moira's
+letter was not "an authorized communication," but only "a private
+communication," it is clear that it could not have been written without
+the privity of the Regent.]
+
+[Footnote 168: "Life of Sheridan," ii., 425.]
+
+[Footnote 169: Pearce's "Life of Lord Wellesley," iii., 276. All the
+letters which passed between Lord Grey, Lord Grenville, Lord Moira, and
+Lord Wellesley himself are given at full length by Mr. Pearce in that
+chapter.]
+
+[Footnote 170: Stapleton's "George Canning and his Times," p. 202.]
+
+[Footnote 171: Mr. Stapleton affirms that his Royal Highness actually
+did adopt this plan on this occasion: "His Royal Highness adopted the
+unprecedented course of commanding his servants to elect the
+First-minister. Their choice fell on Lord Liverpool."--_George Canning
+and his Times_, p. 208. Mr. Stapleton, however, gives no authority for
+this assertion, and he was probably mistaken, since Lord Liverpool's
+papers afford no corroboration of it, but rather tend to disprove it.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+
+The Toleration Act.--Impropriety of making Catholic Emancipation (or any
+other Important Matter) an Open Question.--Joint Responsibility of all
+the Ministers.--Detention of Napoleon at St. Helena.--Question whether
+the Regent could Give Evidence in a Court of Law in a Civil
+Action.--Agitation for Reform.--Public Meetings.--The Manchester
+Meeting.--The Seditious Meetings Prevention Bill.--Lord Sidmouth's Six
+Acts.
+
+
+The war was daily becoming of more exciting interest, and, so far as our
+armies were concerned, was rapidly assuming greater proportions. While
+the Duke of Portland was still at the head of affairs, Napoleon, by his
+unprovoked attacks on both the Peninsular kingdoms, had at last opened a
+field of action to our armies, in which even the most sanguine of those
+who placed a loyal confidence in the old invincibility of English
+prowess could not have anticipated the unbroken series of glories which
+were to reward their efforts. For four years Lord Wellington had
+contended against all the most renowned marshals of the Empire,[172]
+driving them back from impregnable lines of defence, defeating them in
+pitched battles, storming their strongest fortresses, without ever
+giving them room to boast of even the most momentary advantage obtained
+over himself; and he was now on the eve of achieving still more
+brilliant and decisive triumphs, which were never to cease till he had
+carried his victorious march far into the heart of France itself.
+
+At such a time it may well be supposed that the attention of the new
+ministry was too fully occupied with measures necessary for the conduct
+of the war to leave it much time for domestic legislation. Yet even its
+first session was not entirely barren.
+
+In the first excitement of the Restoration, when the nation was still
+exasperated at the recollection of what it had suffered under the
+triumphant domination of the Puritans, two laws had been framed to
+chastise them, conceived in a spirit as intolerant and persecuting as
+had dictated the very worst of their own. One, which was called the
+Conventicle Act, inflicted on all persons above the age of sixteen, who
+should be present at any religious service performed in any manner
+differently from the service of the Church of England, in any
+meeting-house, where more than five persons besides the occupiers of the
+house should be present, severe penalties, rising gradually to
+transportation; and gave a single magistrate authority to convict and to
+pass sentence on the offenders. The other, commonly known as the Five
+Mile Act, forbade all ministers, of any sect, who did not subscribe to
+the Act of Uniformity, and who refused to swear to their belief in the
+doctrine of passive obedience, from teaching in any school, and from
+coming within five miles of any city, corporate town, or borough sending
+members to Parliament, or any town or village in which they themselves
+had resided as ministers. The latter statute had fallen into complete
+disuse, and many of the provisions of the former had been relaxed,
+though magistrates in general construed the relaxing enactments as
+leaving the relaxations wholly at their discretion to grant or to
+withhold, and were very much in the habit of withholding or abridging
+them. Other statutes, such as the Test Act, had subsequently been passed
+against every sect of Dissenters, though they had only imposed civil
+disabilities, and had not inflicted penalties. But the new
+Prime-minister was a man to whose disposition anything resembling
+persecution was foreign and repugnant. Before his predecessor's unhappy
+death he had already discussed with him the propriety of abolishing laws
+conceived in such a spirit; and he no sooner found himself at the head
+of the government than he prepared a bill to carry out his views. He
+drew a distinction between the acts inflicting penalties and those which
+only imposed disabilities. With these latter he did not propose to
+interfere; but, in July, his colleague, Lord Castlereagh, introduced
+into the House of Commons a bill to repeal the Conventicle Act and the
+Five Mile Act altogether, and, when it had passed the Commons, he
+himself moved its adoption by the Lords, enforcing his recommendation by
+the argument, that "an enlarged and liberal toleration was the best
+security to the Established Church, a Church not founded on the
+exclusion of religious discussion, but, in its homilies, its canons, and
+all the principles on which it rested, courting the investigation of the
+Scriptures, upon which it founded its doctrines." At the same time,
+while urging the repeal of acts which he truly branded as a disgrace to
+the statute-book, he was not blind to the duty imposed on him, as
+responsible for the public tranquillity, of taking care that meetings
+held ostensibly for purposes of devotion should not be perverted to the
+designs of political agitators; and therefore he provided in the bill
+for the registration of all places appropriated to religious worship,
+and for the exaction from "the preachers and teachers in those meetings
+of some test or security in the oaths to be taken by them." He had
+already secured the acquiescence of the bishops, and he was equally
+successful now in winning the assent of the House. The conditions, such
+as they were, did not prevent the bill from being entirely acceptable to
+the Non-conformists; and though their spokesman in the House of Commons,
+Mr. W. Smith, member for Norwich, confessed a wish "that it had gone a
+little farther, and had granted complete religious liberty," he at the
+same time expressed sincere gratitude on the part of the Non-conformists
+for what was thus done for them; and declared that, "as an act of
+toleration, it certainly was the most complete which had hitherto been
+passed in this country." It was, in fact, the beginning of the
+abandonment of that system of discouragement of and hostility to all
+sects except the Established Church, which had hitherto been regarded by
+a large party as one of the most essential principles of the
+constitution. And as such it makes the year 1812 in some respects a
+landmark in our constitutional history.
+
+Mr. Smith had referred to an omission which prevented him from speaking
+of the bill as complete. He was alluding to the Test and Corporation
+Acts, which had been passed ten years later than the Conventicle Act, in
+the same reign of Charles II., and which many of the Non-conformists,
+and especially the Unitarians, had urged Lord Liverpool to include in
+this measure of repeal, but which he decided on retaining. As has been
+said above, he drew a distinction between acts inflicting penalties and
+those which went no farther than imposing political disabilities,
+feeling that any relief of Protestant Dissenters from such disabilities
+must inevitably lead to the concession of a similar indulgence to Roman
+Catholics, and not being as yet prepared to admit to Parliament the
+members of a Church which recognized the duty of obedience in any matter
+to a foreign sovereign; for, as the disabilities had been originally
+imposed on the Roman Catholics, so they were now maintained on
+political, not religious, grounds; and even those most opposed to a
+relaxation of them were careful to explain their resistance to be one
+which time and a change of circumstances might mitigate.[173]
+
+As a fitter opportunity for discussing the question will be afforded by
+the Duke of Wellington's bill, in 1829, we should not have mentioned it
+at all in this place, had not Lord Liverpool, in arranging his
+administration, adopted a mode of dealing with it which, though rather a
+parliamentary or departmental than a constitutional innovation, was,
+nevertheless, one of so strange a character as to seem to call for
+examination. Ever since the formation of Walpole's ministry it had been
+the invariable rule and practice for all the members of the cabinet to
+act in concert on all measures of importance, or, indeed it may be said,
+on all measures on which a Parliamentary vote was taken. But, in
+arranging his administration after Mr. Perceval's death, Lord Liverpool
+found it absolutely impossible to form one satisfactory either to the
+nation or to himself if it were to be confined to members in perfect
+agreement with himself on the subject of the retention of the
+disabilities affecting the Roman Catholics; and therefore, in order to
+be able to form a ministry generally strong and respected, he adopted
+the strange expedient of allowing every member of it to act
+independently on this one question. He made it what was called an open
+question. The arrangement, as explained to the House of Commons by Lord
+Castlereagh, the ministerial leader of that assembly, was that, "in
+submission to the growing change of public opinion in favor of those
+claims (the Roman Catholic claims), and the real sentiments of certain
+members of the government, it had been resolved upon, as a principle,
+that the discussion of this question should be left free from all
+interference on the part of the government, and that every member of
+that government should in it be left to the free and unbiassed
+suggestions of his own conscientious discretion."
+
+It was an arrangement which secured the Prime-minister the co-operation
+of Lord Castlereagh himself, and eventually of Mr. Canning; but it
+failed to propitiate the Opposition, the leader of which in the House of
+Commons, Mr. Ponsonby, turned it into open ridicule, affirming that
+"nothing could be more absurd than a cabinet professing to have no
+opinion on such an important subject." And it must be confessed that Mr.
+Ponsonby's language on the subject seems the language of common-sense.
+So far from the importance of a question justifying such an arrangement,
+that importance appears rather to increase, if possible, the necessity
+for absolute unanimity in the administration than to diminish it; and on
+a grave and momentous subject to leave each member of a ministry free to
+pronounce a separate and different judgment, so that one may resist what
+his colleague advocates, is to abdicate the functions of government
+altogether. To permit such liberty was either a proof that the ministry
+was weak altogether--which it was not--or that its conduct on this
+question was weak. In either case, it was a mischievous precedent that
+was thus set;[174] and the fact that it has since been followed in more
+than one instance, is so far from being any justification of it, that it
+rather supplies an additional reason for condemning it, as being the
+cause of wider mischief than if it had been confined to one single
+question, or had influenced the conduct of one cabinet only. It has
+often been said that the name "cabinet" is unknown to the law, and that
+what we call the cabinet is, in fact, only a committee of the Privy
+Council. As a statement of law the assertion may be correct, but it is
+certain that for more than a century and a half the constitution has
+adopted the principle that the cabinet consists of the holders of a
+certain, to some extent a fluctuating, number of the principal state
+officers; and, recognizing the responsibility of all for the actions of
+each member of it, does by that recognition sanction an expectation that
+on all questions, or at all events on all but those of the most trivial
+character, they will speak and act with that unanimity which is
+indispensable, not only to the strength of the government itself, but to
+its being held in respect by the people; such respect being, indeed,
+among the most essential elements of its strength.
+
+The incidents of the war itself do not belong to a work such as this;
+but, tantalizing as it must be to an historian of any class to pass over
+the brilliant series of achievements which gave Britain the glory of
+being twice[175] the principal agent in the deliverance of Continental
+Europe, the glories of Salamanca, Victoria, Orthes, and Waterloo must be
+left to other writers, who, it is not unpatriotic to hope, may never
+again have similar cause for exulting descriptions. But out of the
+crowning triumph of Waterloo a difficulty arose which, though it may be
+difficult to characterize the principle on which it was settled, since
+it was not strictly a question of constitutional, international, or
+military law; and though the circumstances were so peculiar that the
+conclusion adopted is never likely to be referred to as a precedent,
+seems still deserving of a brief mention, especially as an act of
+Parliament was passed to sanction the decision of the cabinet. Baffled
+by the vigilance of our cruisers in every attempt to escape from one of
+the western ports of France to America, Napoleon was at last compelled
+to surrender himself to a British squadron. But, though he was our
+prisoner, the Prime-minister considered us, in all our dealings with
+him, as so bound by engagements to our allies, that he was to be
+regarded as "the common prisoner of all, so far that we should not give
+him up or release him without the joint consent of all." The question
+was full of difficulty. There were, probably, very few persons in this
+or any other country who did not coincide in the impropriety of
+releasing him, and so putting it in his power once more to rekindle a
+war in Europe. But it was a political view of the case, founded on a
+consideration of what was required by the tranquillity of Europe; and it
+was not easy to lay down any legal ground to justify the determination.
+Some regarded him as a French subject, and, if that view were correct,
+he could hardly be detained by us as a prisoner of war after we had
+concluded a treaty of peace with France. But, again, it seemed to some,
+the Lord Chancellor being among them, a questionable point whether in
+the last campaign we had been at war with France; whether, on the
+contrary, we had not assumed the character of an ally of France against
+him. And, on the supposition that we had been at war with France, a
+second question was raised by Lord Ellenborough, the Chief-justice,
+"what rights result on principle from a state of war, as against all the
+individuals of the belligerent nations--rights, whatever they may be,
+seldom, if ever, enforced against individuals, because individuals
+hardly ever make war but as part of an aggregate nation." The
+question--as, after consultation with Lord Ellenborough and his own
+brother, Sir William Scott, it finally appeared to Lord Eldon, on whom
+the Prime-minister naturally depended, as his chief legal counsellor,
+though in its political aspect he judged for himself--was, firstly,
+"whether it could possibly be inconsistent with justice or the law of
+nations that, till some peace were made by treaty with some person
+considered as Napoleon's sovereign, or till some peace were made with
+himself, we should keep him imprisoned in some part of our King's
+dominions." And, secondly, "whether there were any person who could
+possibly be considered his sovereign, after the treaty of 1814 had
+clothed him with the character of Emperor of Elba, with imperial dignity
+and imperial revenue." Lord Liverpool himself, however, raised another
+question: whether, by his invasion of France, he had not forfeited his
+right to be regarded as an independent sovereign; resting this doubt on
+a suggestion which, among others, he proposed to the Lord Chancellor,
+that "at Elba he enjoyed only a limited and conditional sovereignty,
+which ceased when the condition on which he held it was violated."
+
+This last suggestion, it must be confessed, appears untenable, as
+totally inconsistent with the language of the Treaty of Fontainebleau,
+under the provisions of which Napoleon became sovereign of Elba, and
+which does not contain a single article which bears out the opinion that
+his sovereignty was limited or conditional. On the contrary, the words
+of the treaty expressly agree that "Elba should form during his life a
+separate principality, which should be possessed by him in full
+sovereignty and property."
+
+There is no need to discuss the views of Blucher. On the news of
+Napoleon's landing at Frejus reaching the plenipotentiaries assembled at
+the Congress of Vienna, they at once issued a declaration that, "in
+breaking the convention which had established him at Elba, Buonaparte"
+(for they refused him his imperial appellation of Napoleon) "had
+destroyed the only legal title on which his existence depended.... He
+had placed himself out of the pale of civil and social relations, and,
+as the enemy and disturber of the peace of the world, he was delivered
+over to public justice." And the old Prussian, burning with a desire to
+avenge the indignities and injuries which he had inflicted on Prussia,
+avowed his determination to execute him as an outlaw, if he should fall
+into his hands. And it is still less worthwhile to inquire--though Lord
+Holland in his place in Parliament did desire the House to consult the
+judges on the point--whether, if Napoleon were a prisoner of war, he
+"were not entitled to his _habeas corpus_, if detained after the
+signature of a treaty of peace with all the powers, or any of which he
+could be considered as the subject."
+
+On the whole, the simplest view of the position and of our detention of
+him, the view most reconcilable with the principles which regulate the
+waging and the relinquishing a state of war, seems to be to consider
+that Napoleon was a sovereign with whom we were at war; that that war
+could only be terminated by a treaty of peace between ourselves and him;
+that it rested with us to conclude, or to abstain from concluding, any
+such treaty; and that, till we should conclude it, we had clearly a
+right to detain him as a prisoner of war. It must, at the same time, be
+admitted that modern history afforded no precedent for the detention of
+a prisoner for his whole life (unless, indeed, Elizabeth's imprisonment
+of the Queen of Scots may be considered as one), and that the most solid
+justification for it was necessity. To quote the language of Lord Eldon,
+"I believe it will turn out that, if you can't make this a _casus
+exceptionis_ or _omissus_ in the law of nations, founded upon necessity,
+you will not really know what to say upon it. _Salus Reipublicae suprema
+lex_, as to one state; _Salus omnium Rerumpublicarum_ must be the
+_suprema lex_ as to this case."[176]
+
+In the course of the year 1818 a somewhat singular question as to the
+position of the Regent was raised by a claim advanced by Colonel
+Berkeley to produce his Royal Highness as a witness in a court of law.
+The Prince consulted the Prime-minister, and the Prime-minister referred
+it to the Attorney and Solicitor General, not concealing his own
+impression that it could not be consistent with his constitutional
+position and prerogative for the King to appear as a witness to be
+subjected to examination and cross-examination.[177] They, in their
+statement of opinion, assumed it to be an undeniable principle of the
+constitution that the sovereign, "by reason of his royal character,
+could not give testimony." And therefore they had no doubt that the
+Regent, exercising his authority, was equally prevented from so doing.
+Colonel Berkeley's counsel had urged that, even if he could not appear
+in open court and be sworn, he had the privilege of communicating his
+evidence in a peculiar mode, by certificate under the Sign Manual or
+Great Seal. But the Attorney and Solicitor General professed that they
+could not discover whence this last privilege was derived; they urged,
+as an insurmountable objection to such a contrivance, that "all
+instruments under the Sign Manual or Great Seal must, in point of form,
+be in the name of and on behalf of the King, which would manifestly be
+incongruous when the evidence certified was not that of the King, but of
+the Regent himself." And they quoted a case in which Lord Chief-justice
+Willes had said "that the certificate of the King, under his Sign
+Manual, of a fact (except in an old case in Chancery) had always been
+refused." As it had been urged also, on Colonel Berkeley's behalf, that
+the Prince had formerly "joined in proving the will of the Duke of
+Brunswick," his brother-in-law, they farther expressed an opinion that
+"he ought not to have done so, but should have left it to the other
+executors."
+
+On the point whether "the King himself could give evidence orally or in
+any other manner," their opinion expressed very plainly the principle on
+which they maintained that he could not. "That he was not compellable to
+do so; that he could not be sworn (there being no power capable of
+administering an oath to him in a court of justice). That, whether his
+testimony be given _viva voce_ or otherwise, no question in chief or on
+cross-examination could be proposed to him, was admitted by Colonel
+Berkeley's counsel. And that his testimony must be conclusive as to the
+facts stated by him, appeared necessarily to follow from the perfection
+ascribed by law to his royal character. For such remarkable exceptions,
+therefore, to the case of all other witnesses they could not but think
+that strong and decisive authority ought to be produced; while the
+silence of text-writers on the subject, so far from being favorable to
+the notion that the King can give evidence, appeared to afford a
+directly contrary inference." And they summed up their opinion in a few
+words: "that his Royal Highness the Prince Regent, while in the personal
+exercise of the royal authority, was in the situation of the King in
+this respect, and that the King could not by any mode give evidence as a
+witness in a civil suit."
+
+It is very improbable that Colonel Berkeley should have made the
+application without previously ascertaining the willingness of the
+Prince to give evidence, could such a course be permitted. And as his
+Royal Highness, on receiving this opinion of the law-officers of the
+crown, did not come forward as a witness, that opinion may be held to
+have settled the question. And, apart from the constitutional objections
+relied on by those able lawyers, it is evident that there would be
+serious practical objections to the sovereign being made a witness. It
+would be derogatory to his royal character to put himself in a position
+where comments could be made, either by the opposing barrister or by the
+public outside, on his evidence. And, on the other hand, it would be
+perilously unfair to one litigant for his adversary to be able to
+produce a witness who was not subject to cross-examination, nor to
+remarks upon his testimony.
+
+The reign of George III. was now drawing to its close, and, if it
+produced no legislation affecting the principles of the constitution (it
+will presently be seen that it did produce one measure which its
+opponents branded as a violation of these principles), yet in its last
+years it witnessed the revival of an agitation which was kept up with
+varying animation till it was temporarily quieted by the concession of
+its demands. We have seen that one of Pitt's earliest efforts at
+legislation had been directed to a reform in Parliament, an object which
+to the end of his life he considered of great importance, though the
+revolutionary spirit aroused by the troubles in France, and the open
+sympathy with the French Jacobins and Republicans avowed by a party
+among ourselves--which, if numerically weak, was sufficiently loud and
+active to be dangerous--prevented him from ever re-opening the subject.
+But, though the French Revolution in this way proved for the time an
+insurmountable obstacle to the success of the reformers, in another way
+it insured the revival of the question, by the general spirit of inquiry
+which it awakened among the population at large, and which soon went
+beyond the investigation of any single abuse or anomaly. For even less
+far-sighted statesmen than Pitt confessed the existence of much that was
+not only theoretically indefensible, but practically mischievous. The
+period, little short of a century, which elapsed between the death of
+William III. and Pitt's accession to office had been one of almost
+complete stagnation and apathy. The Scotch Union, the Septennial Bill,
+the establishment of a militia, and the Place Bill of 1743 were the only
+instances of any legislation deserving the name of constitutional which
+made the reigns of Anne and the first two Georges memorable. And in the
+very nature of things it was impossible that, after so long a slumber,
+there should not be much to do, and many, whether capable or incapable,
+eager to bear a share in the work. The sudden cessation of the
+excitement of war had begotten a restless craving for some other
+excitement to take its place, and none seemed so creditable as energy
+and acuteness in the discovery and removal of abuses. Complaints were
+made, and not without reason, of the working of the poor-law; of the
+terrible severity of our criminal code; of the hardships and sufferings
+of the younger members of the working classes, especially in the
+factories; of the ignorance of a large portion of the people, in itself
+as prolific a cause of mischief and crime as any other. But, though
+committees and commissions were appointed by Parliament to investigate
+the condition of the kingdom in respect of these matters, a feeling was
+growing up that no effectual remedy would be applied till the
+constitution of the House of Commons itself were reformed, so as to make
+it a more real representation of the people than it could as yet be
+considered. And a farther stimulus to this wish for such a Parliamentary
+reform was supplied by the distress which a combination of circumstances
+spread among almost all classes in the years immediately following the
+conclusion of the second treaty of peace.[178] The harvests of the years
+1816 and 1817 were unusually deficient, and this pressed heavily on the
+farmers and landed proprietors. The merchants and manufacturers, who,
+while every part of the Continent was disturbed or threatened by the
+operations of contending armies, had practically enjoyed almost a
+monopoly of the trade of the world, found their profits reduced, by the
+new competition to which the re-establishment of peace exposed them, to
+a point which compelled them to a severe reduction of expenditure. The
+uncertainty felt as to the results to be brought about by the inevitable
+repeal of the Bank Act of 1797, and the return to cash payments--results
+which it was impossible to estimate correctly beforehand--had a tendency
+to augment the distress, by the general feeling of uneasiness and
+distrust which it created. And the employers of labor could not suffer
+without those who depended on them for employment suffering still more
+severely. The consequence was, that there was a general stagnation of
+trade; numbers of artisans and laborers of every kind were thrown out of
+work, and their enforced idleness and poverty, which was its result,
+made them ready to become the tools of demagogues such as are never
+wanting in the hour of distress and perplexity. Meetings were convened,
+ostensibly to petition for reform, but in reality to afford
+opportunities for mob-orators, eager for notoriety, to denounce the
+government and those whom they styled the "ruling classes," as the
+causes of the present and past evils. From these meetings multitudes
+issued forth ripe for mischief. In some places they rose against the
+manufacturers, and destroyed their machines, to the recent introduction
+of which they attributed their want of employment. In others, still more
+senselessly, they even set fire to the stores of grain in the
+corn-dealers' warehouses, aggravating by their destruction the most
+painful of their own sufferings. On one occasion, a mob which had
+assembled in one of the eastern districts of London, on pretence of
+framing a petition to be presented to the Prince Regent, at the close of
+the meeting paraded the streets with a tricolor flag, the emblem of the
+French Revolutionists, and pillaged a number of shops, especially those
+of the gun-makers, spreading terror through all that side of the
+metropolis. In at least one instance the violence of the rioters rose to
+the height of treason. Assassins fired at the Regent in the Park as he
+was returning from the House of Lords, whither he had been to open
+Parliament; and when it was found that they had missed their aim, the
+mob attacked the royal carriage, pelting it with large stones, and
+breaking the windows; nor was it without some difficulty that the escort
+of troops cleared a path for him through the mob, and enabled him to
+reach Carlton House in safety.
+
+The first effect of these outrages was to damage the cause of Reform
+itself, even such uncompromising reformers as Lord Grey denouncing
+"meetings at which extensive schemes of Reform were submitted to
+individuals incapable of judging of their propriety." The second
+consequence was to compel the ministers to take steps to prevent a
+recurrence of such tumults and crimes. At first they were contented with
+a temporary suspension of the _Habeas Corpus_ Act; but, even while that
+suspension was in force, it did not entirely prevent meetings, at some
+of which the language of the speakers certainly bordered on sedition;
+and when the suspension was taken off, fresh meetings on a larger scale,
+and of a more tumultuous character than ever, were held in more than one
+rural district; finally, in July of 1819, the whole kingdom was thrown
+into a violent state of excitement by a meeting held at Birmingham, at
+which the leaders, assuming the newly-invented party name of Radicals,
+not only demanded the remodelling of the whole system of government,
+but, because Birmingham as yet sent no members to the House of Commons,
+took it upon themselves to elect Sir Charles Wolseley, a baronet of
+respectable family, as their representative to the Parliament, and
+charged him to claim a place in the House of Commons in the next
+session, by the side of those elected in obedience to the royal writs.
+Sir Charles was at once arrested on the charge of having at this meeting
+used seditious language calculated to lead to a breach of the peace; but
+the Radical leaders, far from being intimidated by this demonstration of
+vigor on the part of the government, immediately summoned a similar
+meeting in Manchester, announcing their intention to elect a
+representative of that great town likewise, which, though the largest of
+all the manufacturing towns, was also unrepresented in the Imperial
+Parliament. The magistrates prohibited the meeting. It was only
+postponed for a week, when the people assembled in such formidable
+numbers (no estimate reckoned them at fewer than 60,000), that the
+ordinary civil authorities deemed themselves unequal to dealing with it,
+and called in the aid first of the Yeomanry and then of a hussar
+regiment. The soldiers behaved with great forbearance, as soldiers
+always do behave on such occasions; but they were bound to execute the
+orders which were given them to arrest some of the leaders, and, in the
+tumult which was the inevitable consequence of their attempt to force a
+way through so dense a crowd, three or four lives were, unfortunately,
+lost.
+
+So unusual a catastrophe called out the energies of both parties. The
+Radical leaders published manifestoes declaring the people had been
+"massacred" by the soldiers by the orders of the government. Meetings
+were held to denounce the conduct of the ministers, one being even
+promoted by Lord Fitzwilliam, as Lord-lieutenant of Yorkshire, a dignity
+of which he was instantly deprived; while, on the other hand, the
+grand-juries of Cheshire and Lancashire made reports of the condition of
+those counties to the Secretary of State, which showed that a most
+alarming spirit prevailed over the greater part of the district. "The
+most inflammatory publications had been issued in the principal towns,
+at a price which put them within the reach of the poorest classes of
+society. The training and military drilling of large bodies of men under
+regular leaders had been carried on to a great extent for some time,
+chiefly by night; and there was no doubt that an extensive manufacture
+of arms was going on." What was a hardly inferior symptom of danger was
+a system of intimidation which prevailed to a most serious degree. Many
+magistrates had received notices threatening their lives, and
+combinations had been formed to withhold custom from publicans and
+shopkeepers who had come forward to support the civil power. In many
+parts of the two counties the grand-juries declared "that no warrant of
+arrest or other legal process could be executed; the payment of taxes
+had ceased, and the landlords were threatened with the discontinuance of
+their rents."
+
+It was admitted that the spirit of disaffection was local, confined to
+three or four counties; but those counties were, next to Middlesex
+itself, the most populous and among the most important in the kingdom,
+and there was danger lest the feeling, if not checked, might spread. The
+crisis seemed so momentous, that some even of the Opposition leaders
+volunteered their counsels and aid to the ministers in dealing with it.
+And the ministers, after long deliberation, decided on calling
+Parliament together in November, and introducing some bills which they
+conceived necessary to enable them to restore and preserve tranquillity.
+They were six in number; and--perhaps, with some sarcastic reference to
+Gardiner's Six Acts in the sixteenth century--they were very commonly
+spoken of as Lord Sidmouth's Six Acts, that noble lord being the
+Home-secretary, to whose department they belonged. It is not necessary
+here to do more than mention the general purport of five of them. One
+prohibited military training without the sanction of the government;
+another empowered magistrates to search for arms which they had reason
+to believe were collected for illegal purposes; the third authorized the
+seizure of seditious and blasphemous libels; the fourth subjected
+publications below a certain size to the same stamp as that required for
+a newspaper; the fifth regulated the mode of proceeding in trials for
+misdemeanor of a political character. But these enactments were regarded
+as little more than arrangements of detail or procedure involving no
+principles, and some of them were admitted even by the most steadfast
+opponents of the ministers to be necessary. But the sixth, designed to
+restrain the practice of holding large open-air meetings--not, indeed,
+forever, but for a certain period, fixed at five years--was strongly
+resisted by the greater portion of the Whig party in both Houses, as a
+denial to the people of one of their most ancient and constitutional
+rights.[179]
+
+Its principal clauses enacted that "no meeting exceeding the number of
+fifty persons (except a meeting of any county or division of any county,
+called by the Lord-lieutenant or sheriff of such county, etc., or by
+five or more acting justices of the peace for such county, or by the
+major part of the grand-jury; or any meeting of any city, borough, etc.,
+called by the mayor or other head officer of such city, etc.) should be
+holden for the purpose or on the pretext of deliberating upon any public
+grievance, or upon any matter relating to any trade, manufacture, etc.,
+or upon any matter of Church or State, or of considering, proposing, or
+agreeing to any petition, address, etc., etc., unless in the parish or
+township within which the persons calling any such meeting usually
+dwell;" and it required six days' notice of the intention to hold such
+meetings, with their time, place, and object, to be given to a
+magistrate. It empowered the magistrate to whom such notice was given to
+alter the time and place. It forbade adjournments intended to evade
+these prohibitions. It forbade any one to attend such meetings except
+freeholders of the county, or parishioners of the parish, or members of
+the corporation of the city or borough in which they were held, or
+members of the House of Commons for such places. It empowered
+magistrates to proceed to the places where such meetings were being
+held, and, if they thought it necessary, to require the aid of
+constables. It enacted that any meeting, the tendency of which should be
+"to incite or stir up the people to hatred and contempt of the person of
+his Majesty, his heirs and successors, or of the government or
+constitution of this country as by law established, should be deemed an
+unlawful assembly." It empowered one or more justices of the peace, in
+the event of any meeting being held contrary to the provisions of this
+act, to warn every one present, in the King's name, to depart; and made
+those who did not depart in obedience to such warning liable to
+prosecution for felony, and, if convicted, to seven years'
+transportation. It forbade the display of flags, banners, or ensigns at
+any meeting, and the employment of any drum, or military or other music;
+but it excepted from its operation "any meeting or assembly which should
+be wholly holden in any room."
+
+There was one peculiarity in the line taken by the opponents of the
+bill, that they did not deny that the meetings which had induced the
+ministers to propose it were an evil, dangerous to the general
+tranquillity; but it was strongly urged by Lord Erskine and others that
+the existing laws were quite strong enough to deal with them, so that a
+new enactment was superfluous; and by others, in both Houses, that such
+meetings were "an ancient and constitutional mode of discussing abuses
+or petitioning Parliament," any interference with which was a greater
+evil than the meetings themselves, as being a violation of the
+constitution. Mr. Brougham in particular admitted, to the full extent of
+the assertions of the ministers themselves, "the wickedness and folly of
+many of the speeches" made at the recent meetings. He expressed with
+great force his entire disapproval of the system on which these meetings
+had been conducted, and admitted that the martial array which had been
+exhibited, and the vastness of the numbers of those who had attended,
+were of themselves calculated to excite alarm; but he declared that "he
+could not on that account acquiesce in a total subversion of a popular
+right." On the other hand, the ministers themselves did not deny "the
+general right of the people to petition the Legislature, or to carry
+their addresses to the foot of the throne. And therefore (as Lord
+Harrowby, the President of the Council, admitted) there could be no
+doubt of their right to assemble, so far as was necessary to agree to
+their petitions or addresses. It was a right that did not depend on the
+Bill of Rights, on which it was usually grounded, but had existed long
+before. But this bill," he contended, "imposed no restrictions on the
+legitimate enjoyment of that privilege; it only regulated the meetings
+at which it was to be exercised." And Lord Liverpool affirmed that the
+bill was not only "consistent with the existing laws and principles of
+the constitution, but was even proposed in furtherance of those
+principles, and for the purpose of protecting the people of this country
+against a series of evils which, if not checked, must subvert their laws
+and liberties."
+
+In attempting to form a correct judgment on the question whether this
+bill were constitutional or unconstitutional, it must, I think, be
+admitted that, as has been remarked before, the terms "constitutional"
+and "unconstitutional" are somewhat vague and elastic. There is no one
+document--not Magna Charta, nor the Petition of Eight, nor the Bill of
+Rights--which can be said to contain the whole of the British
+constitution. Its spirit and principles are, indeed, to be found in all
+the laws, to which they give animation and life, but not in any one law.
+And among its leading principles are those which embrace the right of
+every individual to freedom of action and freedom of speech, so long as
+he does not commit any crime himself, nor tempt others to do so. Yet it
+does not follow that a new enactment which for a while abridges or
+suspends that freedom of action or speech is inconsistent with those
+constitutional principles.
+
+Ministers, to whom the government of a country is intrusted, do wrong if
+they limit their operations to the punishment of offences which have
+been committed. It is at least equally their duty, as far as possible,
+to prevent their commission; to take precautionary measures, especially
+at times when there is notorious danger of offences being committed. At
+the same time they are bound not to legislate under the influence of
+panic; not to yield to fears having no substantial ground. And in their
+measures of precaution they are farther bound to depart from or overstep
+the ordinary law as little as is compatible with the attainment of their
+object. In all such cases each action of theirs must stand or fall by
+its own merits; by the greatness of the emergency which has caused it,
+and by its sufficiency for its end. For as no law, except such as
+forbids moral crimes, is invariable, so even the dearest privileges of
+each subject, being his for the common good, are liable to temporary
+suspension for that common good. But the burden of justification lies on
+those who propose that suspension.
+
+Now, that this bill was such a suspension of the long-established rights
+of the subject, and so far an overstepping of the principles of the
+constitution, is admitted by the very fact of its framers only proposing
+for it a temporary authority. Had it not invaded a valuable and real
+right, it might have been made of perpetual obligation. But it is not
+easy to see how it can be denied that the dangers against which it was
+intended to guard were also real. It was certain that itinerant
+demagogues were visiting districts with which they had no connection,
+for the sole purpose of stirring up political agitation. It was clear
+that such meetings as they convened, where those assembled could only be
+counted by tens of thousands, were too large for deliberation, and were
+only meant for intimidation; and equally clear that, though the existing
+laws may have armed the magistrate with authority to disperse such
+meetings, they did not furnish him with the means of doing so without at
+least the risk of bloodshed (for such a risk must be involved in the act
+of putting soldiers in motion), and still less did they invest him with
+the desirable power of preventing such meetings. It was necessary,
+therefore, to go back to the original principles and objects of every
+constitution, the tranquillity, safety, and welfare of the nation at
+large. And it does not appear that this bill went beyond what was
+necessary for that object. Indeed, though party divisions are not always
+trustworthy tests of the wisdom or propriety of a measure, the unusual
+magnitude of the majorities by which on this occasion the minister was
+supported in both Houses may fairly be regarded as a testimony to the
+necessity of the bill,[180] while its sufficiency was proved by the
+abandonment of all such meetings, and the general freedom from agitation
+in every part Of the country which prevailed in the following year,
+though its most remarkable incident was one of which demagogues might
+well have taken advantage, if they had not had so convincing a proof of
+the power of government, and of the resolution of the ministers to exert
+it.[181]
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 172: Against Junot, at Vimiera and Rolica, in 1808; Soult, at
+Oporto, and Victor, at Talavera, in 1809; Massena and Ney, at Busaco and
+Torres Vedras, in 1810; Massena and Bessieres, at Fuentes d'Onor, in
+1811. Ciudad Rodrigo and Badajoz had been taken in 1812, in spite of the
+neighborhood of Soult and Marmont. In July, 1813, a month after the
+formation of Lord Liverpool's ministry, he routed Marmont at Salamanca;
+in 1813 he took Madrid, and routed Jourdain at Vittoria; and, having
+subsequently defeated Soult at Sauroren, he crossed the French frontier
+in October.]
+
+[Footnote 173: A resolution, moved by Mr. Canning, to take the claims of
+the Roman Catholics into consideration in the next session had been
+carried in June by the large majority of 129; and when Lord Wellesley
+brought forward a similar motion in the House of Lords, not only did
+Lord Liverpool "protest against its being inferred from any declaration
+of his that it was, or ever had been, his opinion that under no
+circumstances would it be possible to make any alteration in the laws
+respecting the Roman Catholics," but the Chancellor, Lord Eldon, who was
+generally regarded as the stoutest champion of the existing law, rested
+his opposition entirely on political grounds, explaining carefully that
+he opposed the motion, "not because he quarrelled with the religion of
+the Roman Catholics, but because their religious opinions operated on
+their political principles in such a way as to render it necessary to
+adopt some defence against them," and met the motion by moving the
+previous question, avowedly because "he did not wish, at once and
+forever, to shut the door of conciliation;" and the previous question
+was only carried by a single vote--126 to 125.]
+
+[Footnote 174: "It (difference on the Catholic question) was an evil
+submitted to by the government, of which Mr. Fox, Lord Grenville, and
+Lord Grey were members, in the years 1806, 1807, as well as by the
+governments of Mr. Perceval, Lord Liverpool, and the Duke of
+Wellington."--_Peel's Memoirs_, i., 62. This passage would seem to imply
+that Peel believed the Catholic question to have been left "open" in
+1806; but there is not, so far as the present writer is aware, any trace
+of such an arrangement on record, and Lord Liverpool's letter to the
+King, of November 10, 1826 ("Life," iii., 436), shows clearly that he
+was not aware of such a precedent for the arrangement which, in 1812,
+"he and others advised his Majesty" to consent to. Moreover, the
+condemnation passed on it by Mr. Ponsonby, who had been Chancellor of
+Ireland in 1806 and 1807, seems a clear proof that he knew nothing of
+it, though it is hardly possible that he should have been ignorant of it
+if it had existed.]
+
+[Footnote 175: To whom the chief glory of the Waterloo campaign belongs
+there can, of course, be no doubt; and though the Austrians and
+Prussians put forward a claim to an equal share, and Russia even to a
+preponderating one, in the first deposition of Napoleon, he himself
+constantly attributed his fall more to the Peninsular contest than to
+any of his wars east of the Rhine. And, indeed, it is superfluous to
+point out that almost to the last he gained occasional victories over
+the Continental armies, but that he never gained one advantage over the
+British force; and that Wellington invaded France the first week of
+October, 1813--nearly three months before a single Russian or German
+soldier crossed the Rhine.]
+
+[Footnote 176: Letter to Sir W. Scott, Twiss's "Life of Lord Eldon,"
+ii., 272. It is remarkable that in his "Life of Lord Ellenborough" Lord
+Campbell takes no notice of this case.]
+
+[Footnote 177: The opinion of the Attorney and Solicitor General, Sir S.
+Shepperd and Sir R. Gifford, is given at length in the author's "Life of
+Lord Liverpool," ii., 373.]
+
+[Footnote 178: It is a shrewd observation of Sully, that it is never any
+abstract desire for theoretical reforms, or even for increased
+privileges, which excites in lower classes to discontent and outrage,
+but only impatience under actual suffering.]
+
+[Footnote 179: The bill (entitled "The Seditious Meetings Prevention
+Bill"), 60 George III., c. 6, is given at full length in Hansard's
+"Parliamentary Debates," series 1., vol. xli., p. 1655.]
+
+[Footnote 180: In the House of Lords the majority was 135 to 38; in the
+House of Commons, 851 to 128. And even of this minority, many would have
+supported the bill, if the ministers would have consented to adopt an
+amendment proposed by Lord Althorp, to limit its operation to a few of
+the northern and midland counties, in which alone, as he contended, any
+spirit of dangerous disaffection had been exhibited.]
+
+[Footnote 181: It may be as well to mention that these pages were
+written in the autumn of 1880.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+
+Survey of the Reign of George III.--The Cato Street Conspiracy.--The
+Queen's Return to England, and the Proceedings against her.--The King
+Visits Ireland and Scotland.--Reform of the Criminal Code.--Freedom of
+Trade.--Death of Lord Liverpool.--The Duke of Wellington becomes
+Prime-minister.--Repeal of the Test and Corporation Act.--O'Connell is
+Elected for Clare.--Peel Resigns his Seat for Oxford.--Catholic
+Emancipation.--Question of the Endowment of the Roman Catholic
+Clergy.--Constitutional Character of the Emancipation.--The Propriety of
+Mr. Peel's Resignation of his Seat for Oxford Questioned.
+
+
+In the first month of 1820 George III. died. His had been an eventful
+reign, strangely checkered with disaster and glory; but, if we compare
+its close with its commencement, it was still more remarkably
+distinguished by a development of the resources and an increase in the
+wealth and power of the nation, to which the history of no other country
+in the same space of time affords any parallel.
+
+Regarded from the first point of view, our successes greatly outweighed
+our disasters. The loss of our North American Colonies, the only event
+which can be so described, was far more than counterbalanced by our vast
+acquisitions in India, at the Cape of Good Hope, and Malta; while to our
+maritime supremacy, in the complete establishment of which Rodney and
+Nelson had crowned the work of Anson and Hawke, was now added a splendor
+of military renown far surpassing that achieved by any other of the
+nations which had borne their share in the overthrow of Napoleon.
+
+The increase of our resources is sufficiently shown by a single fact. At
+his accession George III. found the kingdom engaged in the great seven
+years' war; one British army employed beyond the Rhine, another in
+India; fleets traversing the seas in every direction, capturing the
+Havana, in the West Indies; Manilla, in the East; and routing French
+squadrons in sight of their own harbors. While, to maintain these varied
+armaments, supplies were voted by Parliament in 1761 to what Lord
+Stanhope calls "the unprecedented amount of almost twenty millions." In
+1813 the supplies reached nearly six times that amount,[182] and that
+prodigious sum was raised with greater ease than the revenue of 1761,
+the interest on the necessary loans being also lower than it had been on
+the former occasion.
+
+The philosophical man of science will point with at least equal
+exultation to the great discoveries in art and science; to the
+achievements of the mechanic, the engineer, and the chemist; to the
+labors of Brindley and Arkwright and Watts, to which, indeed, this great
+expansion of the resources and growth of the wealth of the country is
+principally owing.
+
+While, as the preceding chapters of this work have been designed to
+show, our political progress and advancement had been no less steady or
+valuable; yet, important from a constitutional point of view as were
+many of the labors of our legislators in these sixty years, they are
+surpassed in their influence on the future history of the nation, as
+well as in the reality and greatness of the changes which were produced
+by them in the constitution, by the transactions of the reigns of the
+next two sovereigns, though the two united scarcely equalled in their
+duration a quarter of that of their venerable father.
+
+It has been seen how Pitt was baffled in his efforts to remodel the
+House of Commons, and to remove the disabilities under which the Roman
+Catholics labored, the reasons for which, even granting that they had
+been sufficient to justify their original imposition, had, in his
+judgment, long passed away. His pursuit of the other great object of his
+domestic policy, the emancipation of trade from the shackles which
+impeded its universal development, was rudely interrupted by the
+pressure of the war forced upon him by that very nation which he had
+desired to make the first partner, if one may use such an expression, in
+the prosperity which he hoped to diffuse by his commercial treaty with
+her. But, as in the case of other men in advance of their age, the
+principles which he had asserted were destined to bear fruit at a later
+period. And the mere fact of a change in the person of the sovereign
+seemed to make a change in the policy hitherto pursued less unnatural.
+
+Yet, memorable as the reforms which it witnessed were destined to make
+it, no reign ever commenced with more sinister omens than that at which
+we have now arrived. The new King had not been on the throne a month,
+when a conspiracy was discovered, surpassing in its treasonable atrocity
+any that had been heard of in the kingdom since the days of the
+Gunpowder Plot; and, even before those concerned in that foul crime had
+been brought to punishment, the public mind was yet more generally and
+profoundly agitated by a scandal which, in one point of view, was still
+more painful, as in some degree involving the whole kingdom in its
+disgrace.
+
+The marriage of the present sovereign to Mrs. Fitzherbert has already
+been mentioned. A few years afterward, in the year 1795, regarding that
+marriage as illegal, he had contracted a second with his cousin, the
+Princess Caroline of Brunswick. But, even in royal families, a more
+unfortunate alliance had never taken place. They had never met till she
+arrived in England for the wedding; and, as he had never professed any
+other motive for consenting to the match than a desire to obtain the
+payment of his debts, he did not think it necessary to disguise his
+feelings, or to change his habits, or even to treat her with decency for
+a single day. On his very first introduction to her he behaved to her
+with marked discourtesy.[183] Shortly after the marriage he formally
+separated himself from her, and, both before and after the separation,
+lived in undisguised licentiousness. She, on her part, indignant at his
+neglect and infidelity, and exasperated at the restrictions which he
+presently placed on her intercourse with their only child, made no
+secret of her feelings, and on many occasions displayed such disregard
+of the ordinary rules of prudence and propriety, that he had some color
+for charges of infidelity to her marriage vows which, after a few years,
+he brought against her. The King, her uncle, could not refuse to appoint
+a commission to investigate the truth of the accusation; but the
+commissioners unanimously acquitted her of any graver fault than
+imprudence. She was again received at court, from which she had been
+excluded while the inquiry was pending; but her husband's animosity
+toward her was not appeased. As time wore on, and as the King's
+derangement deprived her of her only protector, it even seemed as if he
+desired to give it all the notoriety possible, till at last, wearied out
+by his implacable persecution, she sought and obtained his permission to
+quit the country and take up her abode abroad. It was a most unfortunate
+resolution on her part. She fixed her residence in Italy, where she
+gradually learned to neglect the caution which she had observed in
+England, till, after a year or two, reports arose of her intimacy with a
+servant whom she had raised from a menial situation to that of the chief
+officer of her household, and whom she admitted to a familiarity of
+intercourse which others besides her husband thought quite incompatible
+with innocence. He sent agents into Italy to inquire into the truth of
+those rumors; and their report so greatly confirmed them that, even
+before the King's death, he laid it before the Prime-minister, with a
+demand that he should at once take steps to procure him a divorce, in
+which he professed to believe that the Princess herself would willingly
+acquiesce. He was so far correct, that her legal advisers were willing
+to advise her to consent to "a formal separation, to be ratified by an
+act of Parliament." But such an arrangement fell far short of the
+Prince's wishes. The Princess Charlotte, the heiress to his throne, had
+died in childbirth two years before, and he was anxious to be set free
+to marry again. The ministers were placed in a situation of painful
+embarrassment. There was an obvious difficulty in pointing out to one
+who already stood toward them in the character of their sovereign, and
+who must inevitably soon become so, that his own conduct made the
+prospect of obtaining a divorce from the Ecclesiastical Courts hopeless;
+and the only other expedients calculated to attain his end, "a direct
+application to Parliament for relief, founded upon the special
+circumstances of the case," or "a proceeding against the Princess for
+high-treason," were but little more promising. Indeed, it was afterward
+ascertained to be the unanimous opinion of the judges that the charge of
+high-treason could not be legally sustained, since the individual who
+was alleged to be the partner in the criminality imputed to her was a
+foreigner, and therefore, "owing no allegiance to the crown," could not
+be said to have violated it.[184]
+
+He chafed under their resistance to his wish, and would have deprived
+them of their offices, could he have relied on any successors whom he
+might give them proving more complaisant; but, before he could make up
+his mind, the death of George III. forced upon both him and them the
+consideration of his and his wife's position, since it made it necessary
+to remodel the prayer for the royal family, and instantly to decide
+whether her name and title as Queen were to be inserted in it. He was
+determined that they should not be mentioned; and, as the practice of
+praying for a Queen Consort by name appeared not to have been
+invariable, they were willing to gratify him on this point, though it
+was evidently highly probable that she would consider this as a fresh
+insult, sufficient to justify her in carrying out a threat, which she
+had recently held out, of returning to England. Her ablest advisers did
+not, indeed, regard it in this light, since the prayer as now framed
+implored the Divine protection for "all the royal family" in general
+terms, in which she might be supposed to be included, and made no
+separate mention of any member of the family.[185] But, unfortunately,
+she was much more under the influence of counsellors who were neither
+lawyers nor statesmen, but who only desired to use her as a tool to
+obtain notoriety for themselves. A long negotiation ensued. It was
+inevitable that some application should be made to Parliament in
+connection with her affairs, since the annuity which had been settled
+upon her by Parliament in 1814, on the occasion of her departure from
+England, had expired with the life of the late King. And the ministers
+proposed that that annuity should now be raised from L35,000 to L50,000,
+on condition of her remaining abroad, having, by their positive refusal
+to concur in any proceedings against her while she remained abroad,
+extorted the King's acquiescence in this proposal, though he called it a
+"great and painful sacrifice of his personal feelings." They sought to
+conciliate her acceptance of it by mentioning her in it by her title of
+"Queen," and by coupling with it a sanction to her appointment of her
+law-officers, an Attorney and Solicitor General, an act which could only
+be exercised by a Queen. And, though a part of the condition of her
+residence abroad required that she should do so under some other title,
+that seemed only a conforming to an ordinary practice of royal princes
+on their travels. At the same time, the ministers stated frankly to Mr.
+Brougham, a lawyer of the highest reputation as an advocate, whom she
+had appointed her Attorney-general, that, if she should reject the
+offer, and come to England, as she had already announced her intention
+of doing, such a course would leave them no alternative, but would
+compel them to institute proceedings against her.
+
+Eventually she preferred the advice of others to that of Mr. Brougham,
+or, as it may, perhaps, be more consistent with the real fact to say,
+she yielded to her own feelings of hatred of her husband, which, it must
+be confessed, were far from unnatural. She believed, or professed to
+believe, that he had more to dread from an exposure of his conduct than
+she had from any revelations of her actions; and, under this impression,
+in the spring she crossed the Channel and took up her residence in
+London. It was a step which seemed to Lord Liverpool to leave him no
+alternative, and, in consequence, he at once took the course which he
+had from the beginning conceived her arrival would render indispensable.
+He brought down to Parliament a royal message from the King, announcing
+that her return to England had made it necessary to communicate to the
+Houses documents relating to her conduct since her departure from the
+kingdom, which he recommended to their immediate and serious attention.
+He proposed the appointment by ballot of a committee of the House of
+Lords to examine those documents; and when the committee had reported
+that the documents containing "allegations deeply affecting the honor of
+the Queen, etc., ... appeared to the committee calculated to affect not
+only the honor of the Queen, but also the dignity of the crown and the
+moral feelings and honor of the country, so that in their opinion, they
+should become the subject of a solemn inquiry, which might be best
+effected in the course of a legislative proceeding," he introduced a
+"Bill of Pains and Penalties" to deprive her of her title of Queen, and
+to annul her marriage.
+
+No one would willingly dwell on so melancholy and disgraceful a subject.
+As far as the Queen was concerned, a protracted investigation, during
+which a number of witnesses, favorable and unfavorable, were examined,
+left no doubt on the mind of almost all dispassionate people that the
+misconduct alleged against her had been abundantly proved. At the same
+time there was a feeling equally general that the King's treatment of
+her from the very beginning of their married life had disentitled him to
+any kind of relief; and this sentiment was so strongly shown by the
+gradual diminution of the majority in favor of the bill, as it proceeded
+through its several stages, that Lord Liverpool, who had already
+abandoned the clause annulling the marriage, eventually withdrew the
+whole bill, perceiving the impossibility of inducing the House of
+Commons to pass it when it should go down to that House.
+
+No act of Lord Liverpool's ministry has been attacked with greater
+bitterness than that of allowing any proceedings whatever to be taken
+against the Queen, partly on the ground that, however profligate her
+conduct had been, it had certainly not been more gross than that of her
+husband, which had provoked and given opportunity for her errors; partly
+because a great scandal was thus published to the world, and a shock was
+given to the national decency and morality which the ministers, above
+all men, were bound to avoid; partly, also, because the mode of
+proceeding adopted was alleged to be wholly unprecedented; and because,
+as was contended, the power of Parliament ought not to be invoked to
+inflict penalties which, if deserved, should have been left to the
+courts of law. It cannot be denied that there is weight in these
+objections; but, in estimating their force, it must be considered that
+every part of the conduct of the ministers showed that their motive was
+not the gratification of the King's private feelings, whether directed
+to the object of indulging his enmity against his wife or to that of
+obtaining freedom to contract a second marriage; on the contrary, so
+long as the Queen remained abroad, no language could be more distinct,
+consistently with the respect due to his royal dignity, than that in
+which they expressed to him their insurmountable objection to every mode
+of proceeding against her which he had suggested, founded almost equally
+on considerations of "the interests of his Majesty and of the
+monarchy,"[186] and "the painful obligation" under which they conceived
+themselves to lie "of postponing their regard for his Majesty's feelings
+to great public interests."
+
+But when the Queen came to England the case was greatly altered. The
+question now forced on the consideration of the cabinet was, not the
+mode of avoiding an intolerable scandal, but the choice between two
+scandals, both of the gravest character. The scandal to be dreaded from
+the revelations of the conduct of both King and Queen, that could not
+fail to result from the investigation which, in justice, must precede
+any attempt to legislate on the subject, was, indeed, as great as ever;
+but it had now to be compared with the alternative scandal of allowing a
+woman lying under such grievous imputations to preside over the British
+court, as, if resident in England, and in undisturbed possession of her
+royal rank, she of necessity must preside. The consequence would
+evidently have been that the court would have been deserted by all who
+could give lustre and dignity to it by their position and character;
+and, in the slights thus offered to her, royalty and the monarchy
+themselves would seem to be brought into contempt. The latter scandal,
+too, would be the more permanent. Grievous and shameful as might be the
+disclosures which must be anticipated from an investigation in which the
+person accused must be permitted the employment of every means of
+defence, including recrimination, the scandal was yet one which would,
+to a certain extent, pass away with the close of the inquiry. But, if
+she were left undisturbed in the enjoyment of her royal rank, and of
+privileges which could not be separated from it, that scandal would last
+as long as her life--longer, in all probability, than the reign. It is
+hardly too much to say that the monarchy itself might have been
+endangered by the spectacle of such a King and such a Queen; and the
+ministers might fairly contend that, of two great dangers and evils,
+they had, on the whole, chosen the least.
+
+Lastly, if the Queen's conduct was to be investigated, though the mode
+adopted was denounced as unconstitutional by the Opposition (for, not
+greatly to their credit, the leading Whigs made her guilt or innocence a
+party question), it does not seem to deserve the epithet, though it may
+be confessed to have been unsupported by any direct precedent. Isabella,
+the faithless wife of Edward II., had, indeed, been condemned by "the
+Lords" to the forfeiture of many of the estates which she had illegally
+appropriated; but it does not appear that her violation of her marriage
+vows, or even her probable share or acquiescence in her husband's
+murder, formed any portion of the grounds of her deprivation. And the
+Parliament which attainted Catherine Howard proceeded solely on her
+confession of ante-nuptial licentiousness, without giving her any
+opportunity of answering or disproving the other charges which were
+brought against her. Unprecedented, therefore, the course now adopted
+may be admitted to have been. But it was the only practicable one. The
+different minutes of the cabinet, which the Prime-minister laid before
+the King, established most conclusively the correctness of their opinion
+that no impeachment for high-treason could lie against her. She could
+not be an accomplice in such an offence of one who, being a foreigner,
+could not have committed it. It was equally impossible for the King to
+sue for a divorce, as one of his subjects might have done; because it
+was the established practice of Parliament not to entertain a bill of
+divorce without the judgment of the Ecclesiastical Court being
+previously obtained and produced. And, under the circumstances, to
+obtain from the Ecclesiastical Court such a sentence as could alone lay
+the foundation for a bill of divorce was clearly out of the question.
+
+The case was a new and extraordinary one, and, being such, could only be
+dealt with in some new and extraordinary manner. And in all such cases
+an appeal to Parliament seems the most, if not the only, constitutional
+mode of solving the difficulty. Where the existing laws are silent or
+inapplicable, the most natural resource clearly is, to go back to the
+fountain of all law; that is, to the Parliament, which alone is
+competent to make a new law. In one point of view the question may seem
+unimportant, since we may well hope that no similar case will ever arise
+to require the precedent now set to be appealed to; but not unimportant,
+if it in any way or degree contributes to establish the great principle,
+that the solution of all matters of moment to the state belongs to the
+Parliament alone: a principle which, in its legitimate completeness,
+carries with it a condemnation of many a modern association whose
+object, whether avowed or disguised, is clearly to supersede where it
+fails to intimidate the sole constitutional Legislature.
+
+The abandonment of the bill was naturally hailed as a triumph by the
+Queen and her partisans; but with the excitement of the struggle against
+the government the interest taken in her case died away. The next year,
+when she demanded to be crowned with her husband, his refusal to admit
+her claim elicited scarcely any sympathy for her under this renewed
+grievance; in truth, it was one as to which precedent was unfavorable to
+her demand. And the mortification at finding herself already almost
+forgotten contributed to bring on an illness of which she died in less
+than a year after the termination of what was called her trial; and in a
+short time both she and it were forgotten.
+
+For the next few years the history of the kingdom is one of progressive
+correction of abuses or defects. The King paid visits to Ireland and
+Scotland, parts of his dominions which his father had never once
+visited, and in both was received with the most exultant and apparently
+sincere acclamations. And, though one great calamity fell on the
+ministry in the loss of Lord Castlereagh--who, in a fit of derangement,
+brought on by the excitement of overwork, unhappily laid violent hands
+on himself--his death, sad as it was, could not be said to weaken or to
+affect the general policy of the cabinet. Indeed, as he was replaced at
+the Foreign Office by his old colleague and rival, Mr. Canning, in one
+point of view the administration may be said to have been strengthened
+by the change, since, as an orator, Canning had confessedly no equal in
+either House of Parliament. Another change was productive of still more
+practical advantage. Lord Sidmouth retired from the Home Office, and was
+succeeded by Mr. Peel, previously Secretary for Ireland; and the
+transfer of that statesman to an English office facilitated reforms,
+some of which were as yet little anticipated even by the new Secretary
+himself. The earliest of them, and one not the least important in its
+bearing on the well-doing of society, the mitigation of the severity of
+our Criminal Code, was, indeed, but the following up of a series of
+measures in the same direction which had been commenced in the time of
+the Duke of Portland's second administration, and, it must be added, in
+spite of its resistance. The influence of various trades, and of the
+owners of different kinds of property, pressing in turns upon our
+legislators, had rendered our code the most sanguinary that had,
+probably, ever existed in Christendom. Each class of proprietor regarded
+only the preservation of his own property, and had no belief in the
+efficacy of any kind of protection for it, except such as arose from the
+fear of death; nor any doubt that he was justified in procuring the
+infliction of that penalty to avert the slightest loss to himself. The
+consequence was that, at the beginning of the present century, there
+were above two hundred offences the perpetrators of which were liable to
+capital punishment, some of a very trivial character, such as cutting
+down a hop-vine in a Kentish hop-garden, robbing a rabbit-warren or a
+fish-pond, personating an out-pensioner of Greenwich Hospital, or even
+being found on a high-road with a blackened face, the intention to
+commit a crime being inferred from the disguise, even though no overt
+act had been committed. An act of Elizabeth made picking a pocket a
+capital offence; another, passed as late as the reign of William III.,
+affixed the same penalty to shop-lifting, even when the article stolen
+might not exceed the value of five shillings. And the fault of these
+enactments was not confined to their unreasonable cruelty; they were as
+mischievous even to those whom they were designed to protect as they
+were absurd, as some owners began to perceive. In the list of capital
+offences was that of stealing linen from a bleaching-ground. And a large
+body of bleachers presented a petition to Parliament entreating the
+repeal of the statute which made it such on the ground that,
+practically, it had been found not to strike terror into the thieves,
+but almost to secure them impunity from the reluctance of juries to find
+a verdict which would sentence a fellow-creature to the gallows for such
+an offence.
+
+Nor was this by any means the only instance in which the barbarity of
+the law defeated its object. And its combined impolicy and inhumanity
+had some years before attracted the notice of Sir Samuel Romilly, who
+had been Solicitor-general in the administration of 1806, and who,
+shortly after its dissolution, began to apply himself to the benevolent
+object of procuring the repeal of many of the statutes in question, and
+in the course of a few years did succeed in obtaining the substitution
+of milder penalties for several of the less flagitious offences. He died
+in 1818; but the work which he had began was continued by Sir James
+Mackintosh, a man of even more conspicuous ability, and one who could
+adduce his own experience in favor of the changes which he recommended
+to the Parliament, since he had filled the office of Recorder of Bombay
+for eight years, and had discharged his duties with a most diligent and
+consistent avoidance of capital punishment, which he had never inflicted
+except for murder; his lenity, previously unexampled in that land,
+having been attended with a marked diminution of crime. He procured the
+substitution of milder penalties in several additional cases; and at
+last, in 1822, he carried a resolution engaging the House of Commons
+"the next session to take into its serious consideration the means of
+increasing the efficacy of the criminal law by abating its undue rigor."
+And this success had the effect of inducing the new minister to take the
+question into his own hands. Peel saw that it was one which, if it were
+to be dealt with at all, ought to be regulated by the government itself,
+and not be left to independent members, who could not settle it with
+satisfactory completeness; and therefore, in 1823, he introduced a
+series of bills to carry out the principle implied in Mackintosh's
+resolution of the preceding year, not only simplifying the law, but
+abolishing the infliction of capital punishment in above a hundred
+cases. He was unable to carry out his principle as fully as he could
+have desired. The prejudice in favor of still retaining death as a
+punishment for forgery was too strong for even his resolution as yet to
+overbear, though many private bankers supplied him with the same
+arguments against it in their case which had formerly been alleged by
+the bleachers. But the example which he now set, enforced as it was with
+all the authority of the government, was followed in many subsequent
+sessions, till at last our code, instead of the most severe, has become
+the most humane in Europe, and death is now never inflicted except for
+murder, or crimes intended or calculated to lead to murder. It is worth
+remarking, however, that neither Romilly, Mackintosh, nor Peel ever
+entertained the slightest doubt of the right of a government to inflict
+capital punishment. In the last address which Mackintosh delivered to
+the grand-jury at Bombay he had said: "I have no doubt of the right of
+society to inflict the punishment of death on enormous crimes, wherever
+an inferior punishment is not sufficient. I consider it as a mere
+modification of the right of self-defence, which may as justly be
+exercised in deterring from attack as in repelling it."[187] And in his
+diary, when speaking of a death-warrant which he had just signed, he
+says: "I never signed a paper with more perfect tranquillity of mind. I
+felt agitation in pronouncing the sentence, but none in subscribing the
+warrant; I had no scruple of conscience on either occasion."
+
+And it seems that his position is unassailable. The party whose interest
+is to be kept in view by the Legislature in imposing punishments on
+offences is society, the people at large, not the offender. The main
+object of punishment is to deter rather than to reform; to prevent
+crime, not to take vengeance on the criminal. And, if crime be more
+effectually prevented by moderate than by severe punishments, society
+has a right to demand, for its own security (as a matter of policy, not
+of justice), that the moderate punishment shall, on that ground, be
+preferred. That punishments disproportioned in their severity to the
+magnitude of the offence often defeated their object was certain. Not
+only had jurymen been known to confess that they had preferred violating
+their oaths to doing still greater violence to their consciences, by
+sending a man to the gallows for a deed which, in their opinion, did not
+deserve it, but the very persons who had been injured by thefts or
+forgeries were often deterred from prosecution of the guilty by the
+knowledge that the forfeiture of their lives must follow their
+conviction. It was almost equally certain that criminals calculated
+beforehand on the chance of impunity which the known prevalence of these
+feelings afforded them. Wherever the sympathy of the public does not go
+along with the law, it must, to a great extent, fail; and that the
+terrible frequency of sanguinary punishment had failed in all its
+objects, was proved by the fact that, in spite of the numerous
+executions which took place, crimes increased in a still greater
+proportion than the population. Under the reformed system, now first
+inaugurated on an extensive scale, crimes have become rarer, detection
+and punishment more certain--a combination of results which must be the
+object equally of the law-giver and the philanthropist.
+
+It is not quite foreign to this subject to relate that, a year or two
+before, a mode of trial had been abolished which, though long disused,
+by some curious oversight had still been allowed to remain on the
+statute-book. In the feudal times either the prosecutor or the prisoner,
+in cases of felony, had a right to claim that the cause should be
+decided by "wager of battle;" but it was an ordeal which, with one
+exception in the reign of George II., had not been mentioned for
+centuries. In 1817, however, the relatives of a woman who had been
+murdered, being dissatisfied with the acquittal of a man who had been
+indicted as her murderer, sued out "an appeal of murder" against him, on
+which he claimed to have the appeal decided by "wager of battle," and
+threw down a glove on the floor of the court to make good his challenge.
+The claim was protested against by the prosecutor; but Lord
+Ellenborough, the Chief-justice, pronounced judgment that, "trial by
+battle having been demanded, it was the legal and constitutional mode of
+trial, and must be awarded. It was the duty of the judges to pronounce
+the law as it was, and not as they might wish it to be."[188] He gave
+sentence accordingly; and, had the two parties been of equal stature and
+strength, the Judges of the Common Pleas might have been seen, in their
+robes, presiding from sunrise till sunset over a combat to be fought, as
+the law prescribed, with stout staves and leathern shields, till one
+should cry "Craven," and yield up the field. Fortunately for them, the
+alleged murderer was so superior in bodily strength to his adversary,
+that the latter declined the contest. But the public advancement of the
+claim for such a mode of decision was fatal to any subsequent exercise
+of it; and, in spite of the Common Council of London, who, confiding,
+perhaps, in the formidable appearance presented by some of the City
+Champions on Lord Mayor's Day, petitioned Parliament to preserve it, the
+next year the Attorney-general brought in a bill to abolish it, and the
+judges were no longer compelled to pronounce an absurd sentence in
+obedience to an obsolete law, framed at a time when personal prowess was
+a virtue to cover a multitude of sins, and might was the only right
+generally acknowledged.
+
+The foundation, too, was laid for other reforms. Lord Liverpool was more
+thoroughly versed than any of his predecessors, except Pitt, in the
+soundest principles of political economy; and in one of the first
+speeches which he made in the new reign he expressed a decided
+condemnation, not only of any regulations which were designed to favor
+one trade or one interest at the expense of another, but generally of
+the whole system and theory of protection; and one of his last measures
+made an alteration in the manner of taxing corn imported from foreign
+countries, which was greatly to the advantage of the consumer. It was
+known as the "sliding-scale," the tax on imported corn varying with the
+price in the market, rising when the price fell, and falling when it
+rose; the design with which it was framed being to keep the price to the
+consumer at all times as nearly equal as possible. At first, however, it
+was vehemently denounced by the bulk of the agriculturists, who were
+re-enforced on this occasion by a large party from among the Whigs, and
+especially by some of those connected with Ireland. But a more suitable
+period for discussing the establishment of Free-trade as the ruling
+principle of our financial policy will occur hereafter.
+
+The introduction of the sliding-scale was almost the last act of Lord
+Liverpool's ministry. At the beginning of 1827 he was preparing a fresh
+measure on the same subject, the effect of which was intended to
+diminish still farther the protection which the former act had given,
+and which was in consequence denounced by many landholders of great
+wealth and influence, led, on this subject, by the King's favorite
+brother, the Duke of York.[189] But, a few days after the meeting of
+Parliament, he was struck down by an attack of paralysis, from which he
+never recovered.
+
+In his post as Prime-minister he was succeeded by Canning, not without
+great reluctance on the part of the King; not, probably, so much because
+he feared to find in him any desire to depart from the policy of Lord
+Liverpool, except on the Catholic question (for even on matters of
+foreign policy, on which Canning had always been supposed most to fix
+his attention, he had adopted the line which Lord Liverpool had laid
+down for the cabinet with evident sincerity),[190] as because his
+Majesty had never wholly forgiven him for the attitude which he had
+taken, differing on one or two points from that of his colleagues on the
+Queen's case. And, as has been mentioned in a former chapter, he even,
+with the object of evading the necessity of appointing him, suggested to
+the Duke of Wellington the singular scheme of allowing the remaining
+members of Lord Liverpool's cabinet to select their own chief,[191]
+which the Duke, though coinciding with him in his dislike of Canning, of
+whom he entertained a very causeless suspicion, rejected without
+hesitation, as an abandonment of the royal prerogative in one of its
+most essential duties or privileges. Another of his Majesty's notions,
+if it had been carried out, would have been one of the strangest
+violations of constitutional principle and practice which it is possible
+to conceive. The Duke of York, who had for many years been
+Commander-in-chief, died in January of the same year, and on his death
+the King actually proposed to take that office on himself. For the
+moment Lord Liverpool was able to induce him to abandon the idea, and to
+confer the post on the Duke of Wellington. But it had taken such
+possession of his mind that he recurred to it again when, on Canning
+becoming Prime-minister, the Duke resigned the office; and he pressed it
+on the Cabinet with singular pertinacity till, on Canning's death, the
+Duke was prevailed on to resume the command. It is evident that no
+arrangement could possibly be more inconsistent with every principle of
+the constitution. The very foundation of parliamentary government is,
+that every officer of every department is responsible to Parliament for
+the proper discharge of his duties. But the investiture of the sovereign
+with ministerial office of any kind must involve either the entire
+withdrawal of that department from parliamentary control, or the
+exposure of the sovereign to constant criticism, which, however
+essential to the efficiency of the department, and consequently to the
+public service, would be wholly inconsistent with the respect due to the
+crown. The first alternative it is certain that no Parliament would
+endure for a moment; the second, by impairing the dignity of the
+monarch, could scarcely fail in some degree to threaten the stability of
+the monarchy itself.
+
+Canning's ministry was too brief to give time for any transaction of
+internal importance. That of Lord Goderich, who succeeded him, though
+longer by the almanac, was practically briefer still, since it never met
+Parliament at all, but was formed and fell to pieces between the
+prorogation and the next meeting of the Houses. But that which followed,
+under the presidency of the Duke of Wellington, though after a few
+months its composition became entirely Tory, is memorable for the first
+great departure from those maxims of the constitution which had been
+reckoned among its most essential principles ever since the Revolution.
+Of the measures which bear that character, one was carried against the
+resistance of the ministry, the other by the ministers themselves. And
+it may at first sight appear singular that the larger measure of the two
+was proposed by the Duke after those members of his cabinet who had
+originally been supposed to give it something of a Liberal complexion
+had quitted it. The Reform Bill of 1832--to which we shall come in the
+next chapter--has been often called a peaceful revolution. The
+Toleration Acts, as we may call the bills of 1828 and 1829, are scarcely
+less deserving of that character.
+
+The constitution, as it had existed for the last hundred and forty
+years, had been not only a Protestant but a Church of England
+constitution. Not only all Roman Catholics, but all members of
+Protestant Non-conforming sects, all who refused to sign a declaration
+against the doctrine of Transubstantiation, and also to take the
+Sacrament according to the rites of the one Established Church, were
+disqualified for any appointment of trust. That the object with which
+the Test Act had been framed and supported was rather political than
+religious is notorious; indeed, it was supported by the Protestant
+Dissenters, though they themselves were to suffer by its operation, so
+greatly at that time did the dread of Popery and the French King
+overpower every other consideration.[192] On the Roman Catholics, after
+the reign of James II. had increased that apprehension, the restrictions
+were tightened. But those which inflicted disabilities on the Protestant
+Non-conformists had been gradually relaxed. The repeal of two, the Five
+Mile and the Conventicle Acts, had, as we have seen in the last chapter,
+been recent measures of Lord Liverpool. But the Test Act still remained,
+though it had long been practically a dead letter. The Union with
+Scotland, where the majority of the population was Presbyterian, had
+rendered it almost impossible to maintain the exclusion of Englishmen
+resembling the Scotch in their religious tenets from preferments, and
+even from seats in the House of Commons, to which Scotchmen were
+admissible. And though one Prime-minister (Stanhope) failed in his
+attempt to induce Parliament to repeal the Test Act, and his successor
+(Walpole) refused his countenance to any repetition of the proposal,
+even he did not reject such a compromise as was devised to evade it; and
+in the first year of George II.'s reign (by which time it was notorious
+that many Protestant Non-conformists had obtained seats in municipal
+corporations, and even in the House of Commons, who yet had never
+qualified themselves by compliance with the act of 1673) a bill of
+indemnity was introduced by the minister, with at least the tacit
+consent of the English bishops, to protect all such persons from the
+penalties which they had incurred. And the bill, which was only annual
+in its operation, was renewed almost every year, till, in respect of all
+such places or dignities (if a seat in the House of Commons can be
+described by either of those names), no one thought of inquiring whether
+a man, so long as he were a Protestant, adhered to the Established
+Church or not; members of the House of Commons even openly avowing their
+nonconformity, and at times founding arguments on the fact.
+
+The practical nullification of the Test Act by these periodical bills of
+indemnity had been for some time used by two opposite parties--both that
+which regarded the maintenance of the exclusive connection of the
+constitution with the Church of England as of vital importance to both
+Church and constitution, and that which was opposed to all restrictions
+or disqualiflcations on religious grounds--as an argument in their
+favor. The one contended that there could be no sufficient reason for
+repealing a law from which no one suffered; the other, that it was a
+needless provocation of ill-feeling to retain a law which no one ever
+dreamed of enforcing. Hitherto the latter had been the weaker party. One
+or two motions for the repeal of the Test Act, which had been made in
+former years,[193] had been defeated without attracting any great
+notice; but in the spring of 1828 Lord John Russel, then a
+comparatively young member, but rapidly rising into influence with his
+party, carried a motion in the House of Commons for leave to bring in a
+bill to repeal the act, so far as it concerned the Protestant
+Non-conformists, by a very decisive majority,[194] in spite of all the
+efforts of Peel and his colleagues.
+
+The ministry was placed in a difficult position by his success, since
+the usual practice for a cabinet defeated on a question of principle was
+to resign; and it is probable that they would not have departed from
+that rule now, had not this defeat occurred so early in their official
+life. But on this occasion it seemed to them that other questions had to
+be considered besides the constitutional doctrine of submission on the
+part of a ministry to the judgment of the Parliament.[195] Theirs was
+now the fourth administration that had held office within twelve months;
+and their resignation, which would compel the construction of a fifth,
+could hardly fail not only to embarrass the sovereign, but to shake
+public confidence in government generally. It was also certain that they
+could rely on a division in the House of Lords being favorable to them,
+if they chose to appeal from one House to the other. Under these
+circumstances, they had to consider what their line of conduct should
+be, and there never were two ministers better suited to deal with an
+embarrassment of that kind than the Duke of Wellington and Mr. Peel. The
+Duke's doctrine of government was that "the country was never governed
+in practice according to the extreme principles of any party
+whatever;"[196] while Peel's disposition at all times inclined him to
+compromise. He was quite aware that on this and similar questions public
+feeling had undergone great alteration since the beginning of the
+century. There was a large and increasing party, numbering in its ranks
+many men of deep religious feeling, and many firm supporters of the
+principle of an Established Church, being also sincere believers in the
+pre-eminent excellence of the Church of England, who had a conscientious
+repugnance to the employment of the most solemn ordinance of a religion
+as a mere political test of a person's qualifications for the discharge
+of civil duties. In the opinion of the Bishop of Oxford (Dr. Lloyd),
+this was the feeling of "a very large majority of the Church itself,"
+and of the University.[197] Peel, therefore, came to the conclusion--to
+which he had no difficulty in bringing his colleague, the
+Prime-minister--that "it might be more for the real interests of the
+Church and of religion to consent to an alteration in the law" than to
+trust to the result of the debate in the House of Lords to maintain the
+existing state of things. Accordingly, after several conferences with
+the most influential members of the Episcopal Bench, he framed a
+declaration to be substituted for the Sacramental test, binding all who
+should be required to subscribe it--a description which included all who
+should be appointed to a civil or corporate office--never to exert any
+power or influence which they might thus acquire to subvert, or to
+endeavor to subvert, the Protestant Church of England, Scotland, or
+Ireland, as by law established. The declaration was amended in the House
+of Lords by the addition of the statement, that this declaration was
+subscribed "on the true faith of a Christian," introduced at the
+instigation of Lord Eldon, who had not held the Great Seal since the
+dissolution of Lord Liverpool's administration, but who was still looked
+up to by a numerous party as the foremost champion of sound
+Protestantism in either House.
+
+Not that the addition of these words at all diminished the
+dissatisfaction with which the great lawyer regarded the bill. On the
+contrary, he believed it to be not only a weapon wilfully put into the
+hands of the enemies of the Established Church, but a violation of the
+constitution, of which, as he regarded it "the existing securities were
+a part." He pointed out that "the King himself was obliged to take the
+sacrament at his coronation;" and he argued from this and other grounds
+that "the Church of England, combined with the state, formed together
+the constitution of Great Britain; and that the acts now to be repealed
+were necessary to the preservation of that constitution."
+
+With every respect for that great lawyer, his argument on this point
+does not appear sustainable. For the bill in question did not sweep away
+securities for the Established Church, but merely substituted, for one
+which long disuse and indemnity had rendered wholly inoperative, a fresh
+security, which, as it would be steadily put in force, might fairly be
+expected to prove far more efficacious. And it can hardly be contended
+that it was not within the province of the Legislature to modify an
+existing law in this spirit and with this object, however important
+might be the purpose for which that law had originally been framed. Nay,
+it might fairly be argued that the more important that object was, the
+more were they who strengthened the means of attaining that object
+entitled to be regarded as faithful servants and supporters of the
+principle of the constitution.
+
+The measure, however, relieved the Protestant Dissenters alone. Not only
+did Lord Eldon's amendment preserve the Christian character of the
+Legislature, but the requirement to sign the declaration against
+Transubstantiation, which was unrepealed, left the Roman Catholics still
+under the same disqualifications as before. But the days of those
+disqualifications were manifestly numbered. Indeed, many of those who
+had followed the ministers in their original resistance to the repeal of
+the Test Act had been avowedly influenced by the conviction that it
+could not fail to draw after it the removal of the disabilities
+affecting the Roman Catholics. As has been said before, the disabilities
+in question had originally been imposed on the Roman Catholics on
+political rather than on religious grounds. And the political reasons
+for them had been greatly weakened, if not wholly swept away, by the
+extinction of the Stuart line of princes. Their retention or removal
+had, therefore, now become almost wholly a religious question; and the
+late bill had clearly established as a principle that, though the state
+had a right to require of members of other religious sects that they
+should not abuse the power which might arise from any positions or
+employments to which they might be admitted, to the subversion or injury
+of the Established Church of England, yet, when security for their
+innocuousness in this respect was provided, it was not justified in
+inquiring into the details of their faith. And if this were to be the
+rule of government for the future, the conclusion was irresistible that
+a similar security was all that the state was justified in demanding
+from Roman Catholics, and that it could have no warrant for
+investigating their opinion on Transubstantiation, or any other purely
+theological tenet. There could be no doubt that the feelings of the
+public had been gradually and steadily coming round to this view of the
+question. The last House of Commons had not only passed a bill to remove
+Roman Catholic disabilities (which was afterward thrown out in the House
+of Lords), but had also passed, by a still larger majority, a
+resolution, moved by Lord Francis Leveson Gower (who was now the
+Secretary for Ireland), in favor of endowing the Roman Catholic priests
+in Ireland. And at the late general election the opinions of the
+candidates on what was commonly called Catholic Emancipation had been
+the great cardinal question with a great number, probably a majority, of
+the constituencies.
+
+It may be remarked that it was not the Test Act which excluded Roman
+Catholics from Parliament, but a bill which, fifteen years later, had
+been passed (probably under the influence of Lord Shaftesbury) at the
+time when the whole kingdom was excited by the daily expanding
+revelations of the Popish Plot.[198] And this bill had a loop-hole which
+was never discovered till now but the discovery of which totally changed
+the whole aspect of the question. Even before the bill repealing the
+Test Act had passed through all its stages, Sir Francis Burdett had
+again induced the House of Commons to pass a resolution condemning the
+continuance of the Roman Catholic disabilities; to which, however, the
+peers, by a far larger majority, refused their concurrence.[199] But,
+within a month of this division, the aspect of the whole question was
+changed by the shrewdness of an Irish barrister, who had discovered the
+loop-hole or flaw in the bill of 1678 already alluded to, and by the
+energy and promptitude with which he availed himself of his discovery.
+Mr. O'Connell had a professional reputation scarcely surpassed by any
+member of the Irish Bar. He was also a man of ancient family in the
+county of Kerry. And, being a Roman Catholic, he had for several years
+been the spokesman of his brother Roman Catholics on most public
+occasions. He now, on examination of the bill of 1678, perceived that,
+though it forbade any Roman Catholic from taking a seat in either House
+of Parliament, it contained no prohibition to prevent any constituency
+from electing him its representative. And when, on the occasion of some
+changes which were made in the cabinet, the representation of the County
+Clare was vacated by its member, Mr. Vesey Fitzgerald, accepting the
+office of President of the Board of Trade, O'Connell instantly offered
+himself as a candidate in opposition to the new minister, who, of
+course, sought re-election.
+
+Mr. Fitzgerald was a man who had always supported the demands of the
+Roman Catholics; he was also personally popular, and had the undivided
+support of nearly all the gentlemen and principal land-owners of the
+county, in which he himself had large property. But O'Connell's cause
+was taken up by the entire Roman Catholic priesthood; addresses in his
+favor were read at the altars of the different churches; and, after five
+days' polling, Mr. Fitzgerald withdrew from the contest. The Sheriff, in
+great perplexity, made a special return, reporting that "Mr. Fitzgerald
+was proposed, being a Protestant, as a fit person to represent the
+county in Parliament; that Mr. O'Connell, a Roman Catholic, was also
+proposed; that he, Mr. O'Connell, had declared before the Sheriff that
+he was a Roman Catholic, and intended to continue a Roman Catholic; and
+that a protest had been made by several electors against his return."
+
+It was accepted as a return of O'Connell, who, however, made no attempt
+to take his seat, though when he first stood he had assured the electors
+that there was no law to prevent him from doing so; but the importance
+of his success was not to be measured by his actual presence or absence
+in the House of Commons for the remainder of a session. It had made it
+absolutely impossible to continue the maintenance of the disabilities;
+what one Irish constituency had done, other Irish constituencies might
+be depended on to do.[200] And it was quite certain that, as opportunity
+offered, almost every constituency in Munster and Connaught, and many in
+Leinster, would follow the example of Clare, and return Roman Catholic
+representatives; while to retain a law which prevented forty or fifty
+men duly elected by Irish constituencies from taking their seats must
+have appeared impossible to all but a few, whom respect for the
+undoubted sincerity of their attachment to their own religion and to the
+constitution, as they understood it, is the only consideration which can
+save them from being regarded as dangerous fanatics. At all events, the
+ministers were not among them. And the Duke of Wellington, though he had
+previously hoped, by postponing the farther consideration of the
+question for a year or two, to gain time for a calmer examination of it
+when the existing excitement had cooled down,[201] at once admitted the
+conviction that the result of the Clare election had rendered farther
+delay impossible. In his view, and that of those of his colleagues whose
+judgment he estimated most highly, the Irish constituencies and their
+probable action at future elections were not the only parties whose
+opinions or feelings must be regarded by a responsible statesman; but to
+them must be added the constituencies of the larger island also, since,
+while, to quote the language of Mr. Peel, "the general election of 1826
+had taken place under circumstances especially calculated to call forth
+the manifestation of Protestant feeling throughout the country," they
+had returned a majority of members in favor of concession, as was proved
+by the recent division on Sir F. Burdett's motion. Moreover, apart from
+the merits or demerits of concession, taken by itself, there was a
+manifest danger that the keeping up of the excitement on the subject by
+a continued adherence to the policy of restriction might, especially
+among such a people as the Irish, so impulsive, and, in the lower
+classes, so absolutely under the dominion of the priests, kindle an
+excitement on other subjects also, still more difficult to deal with. It
+was even already certain that the Roman Catholic priests were
+endeavoring to tamper with the loyalty of the soldiers of their
+persuasion. Nor was it clerical influence alone that the government had
+to dread. A year or two before a Catholic Association had been formed,
+which included among its members all the wealthiest and ablest of the
+Roman Catholic laymen, noblemen, squires, and barristers. Its
+organization had been so skilfully conducted, and all its measures had
+been so carefully kept within the requirements of the law, that the
+crown lawyers, on being consulted, pronounced it impossible to interfere
+with it; and, by what may be called a peaceful agitation, it had
+attained such extraordinary power over the minds of the bulk of the
+Roman Catholics, that the Lord-lieutenant reported that "he was quite
+certain that they could lead on the people to open rebellion at a
+moment's notice, and that their organization was such that, in the hands
+of desperate and intelligent leaders, they would be extremely
+formidable[202]."
+
+Under all these circumstances, the Duke had no hesitation in deciding
+that it had become absolutely necessary to concede the demands of the
+Roman Catholics and their supporters for a removal of their political
+disabilities. And it was equally obvious that, the more promptly the
+concession was made, the more gracious it would seem, and the greater
+was the probability of its having the conciliatory and tranquillizing
+effect the hope of which made it so desirable. He was not a man to lose
+time when he had once made up his mind. It was already too late in the
+session for anything to be done in 1828; but the Parliament had scarcely
+been prorogued before he put his views on the subject before the King,
+and began, in concert with the Home-secretary, to frame a bill such as
+he hoped might settle the long-agitated question, without doing more
+violence than was necessary to the feelings of those whose opposition or
+reluctance he was aware he should have to encounter: among whom was the
+King himself, who, though thirty years before he had, with an
+ostentation rather unbecoming, considering his position, put himself
+forward as an advocate of Emancipation, had subsequently changed his
+opinion, and had recently taken more than one occasion to declare that
+he had never doubted that, as the head and protector of the Protestant
+religion, he was bound to refuse his assent to any relaxation of the
+existing law.[203] The Duke, however, was too well acquainted with his
+royal master's character to apprehend any real firmness of resistance
+from him; but he knew that a great majority of the clergy, and no small
+portion of the country gentlemen, were conscientiously and immovably
+fixed in opposition to any concession at all, some refusing to regard
+the question in any but a purely religious light, and objecting to
+associate in the task of legislation for those whom they regarded as
+adherents of an idolatrous superstition; while those who mingled
+political reasoning with that founded on theology dwelt also on the
+danger to be apprehended to the state, if political power were given to
+those whose allegiance to the King was divided with another allegiance
+which they acknowledged to a foreign prelate. And he had presently an
+unmistakable proof afforded him how great was the strength of this party
+in the country. Peel was one of the representatives of the University of
+Oxford; and, as from his earliest enjoyment of a seat in Parliament he
+had been a prominent opponent of the Roman Catholic claims, he
+considered that it was to that maintenance of a policy identified in
+their eyes with that Protestant ascendency which his supporters took to
+be both the chief bulwark and one of the most essential parts of the
+constitution that he owed his position as their member. With a
+conscientiousness which was rather overstrained, and not quite
+consistent with the legitimate position of a member of the House of
+Commons as a representative, and not a delegate, he now conceived that
+his change of view on the subject made it proper for him to give his
+constituents an opportunity of making choice of some one else who should
+more faithfully represent them. He accordingly resigned his seat,
+offering himself at the same time for re-election. But he was defeated
+by a very large majority, though his competitor was one who could not
+possibly be put on a level with him either for university distinction or
+for parliamentary eminence.
+
+Not the less, however, for all their difficulties and discouragements,
+did the ministers proceed in the course on which they had resolved. They
+inserted in the speech with which the King opened the session of 1829 a
+recommendation to the Houses "to take into consideration the whole
+condition of Ireland, and to review the laws which imposed civil
+disabilities on his Majesty's Roman Catholic subjects." And with as
+little delay as possible they introduced a bill to remove those
+disabilities. But there was another measure which they felt it to be
+indispensable should precede it. A previous sentence of the royal speech
+had described the Catholic Association as one "dangerous to the public
+peace, and inconsistent with the spirit of the constitution, keeping
+alive discord and ill-will among his Majesty's subjects, and one which
+must, if permitted to continue, effectually obstruct every effort
+permanently to improve the condition of Ireland." And the ministers
+naturally regarded it as their first duty to suppress a body which could
+deserve to be so described. They felt, too, that the large measure of
+concession and conciliation which they were about to announce would lose
+half its grace, and more than half its effect, if it could possibly be
+represented as a submission to an agitation and intimidation which they
+had not the power nor the courage to resist. They determined, therefore,
+to render such an imputation impossible, by previously suppressing the
+Association. It was evident that it could not be extinguished by any
+means short of an act of Parliament. And the course pursued, with the
+discussions which took place respecting it, show in a very clear and
+instructive manner the view taken by statesmen of the difference between
+what is loyal or illegal, constitutional or unconstitutional; their
+apprehension that conduct may be entirely legal, that is to say, within
+the letter of the law, but at the same time perfectly unconstitutional,
+outside of and adverse to the whole spirit of the constitution. The
+royal speech had not ventured to describe the Association as illegal.
+The Duke of Wellington expressly admitted that "in the original
+institution and formation of the society there was nothing strictly
+illegal."[204] And its founder and chief, Mr. O'Connell, had been at all
+times careful to inculcate on his followers the necessity of avoiding
+any violation of the law. But the speech had also declared the
+association to be "inconsistent with the spirit of the constitution."
+And its acts, as the Duke proceeded to describe them, certainly bore out
+that declaration. "Those acts consisted principally in levying a tax
+upon certain of his Majesty's subjects called Catholic rent, and this by
+means and acts of extreme violence; by appointing persons to collect
+these rents; and farther by adopting measures to organize the Catholic
+population; by appointing persons to superintend that organization; and
+by assuming to themselves the government of the country; and, still
+more, affecting to assume it. Besides, they expended this rent in a
+manner contrary to, and utterly inconsistent with, all law and order and
+the constitution of the country." No member of either House denied the
+accuracy of this description of the Association's proceedings. And if it
+were correct, it was incontrovertible that the denunciation of it as an
+utterly unconstitutional body was not too strong. Indeed, the fact of
+its "levying a tax" upon a portion of the King's subjects (to say
+nothing of the intimidation, amounting to compulsion, by which, as was
+notorious, it was in many instances exacted) was the assumption of one
+of the most important functions of the Imperial Parliament; it was the
+erection of an _imperium in imperio_, which no statesmen intrusted with
+the government of a country can be justified in tolerating. And this was
+felt by the Opposition as well as by the ministers; by the Whigs as
+fully as by the Tories. The most eloquent of the Whig party, Mr.
+Stanley, was as decided as Mr. Peel himself in affirming that the
+existence of the Association was "inconsistent with the spirit of the
+constitution," and that it was "dangerous that the people of a country
+should look up to any public body distinct from the government, opposed
+to the government, and monopolizing their attachment and
+obedience."[205]
+
+It was, therefore, with the almost unanimous approval of both parties
+that the bill framed for the suppression of the Association was
+received. The framing of such a bill was not unattended by difficulties,
+as Peel acknowledged,[206] since "no one wished to declare that every
+political meeting was illegal;" while at the same time it was necessary
+to guard against "having its enactments evaded, since a more dangerous
+precedent than the successful evasion of acts of the Legislature could
+scarcely be conceived." But the measure, as it was proposed, skilfully
+steered clear of these difficulties. It met them by intrusting "the
+enforcement of the law to be enacted to one person alone." The bill
+proposed "to give to the Lord-lieutenant, and to him alone, the power of
+suppressing any association or meeting which he might think dangerous to
+the public peace, or inconsistent with the due administration of the
+law; together with power to interdict the assembly of any meeting of
+which previous notice should have been given, and which he should think
+likely to endanger the public peace, or to prove inconsistent with the
+due administration of the law." And farther, "to interdict any meeting
+or association which might be interdicted from assembling, or which
+might be suppressed under this act, from receiving and placing at their
+control any moneys by the name of rent, or any other name." But the act
+was not to be one of perpetual duration. It could not be concealed that
+such a prohibition or limitation of the general right of public meeting
+and public discussion was a suspension of a part of the constitution;
+and therefore the ministers were content to limit its operation "to one
+year and the end of the then next session of Parliament," feeling
+"satisfied that there would be no objection to continue it, if there
+should be any necessity for its continuance." And this limitation was a
+substantial mitigation of its severity. It made the bill, as Mr. Stanley
+correctly described it, "not a permanent infringement on the
+constitution, but a temporary deviation from it, giving those powers
+which were necessary at the moment," but not maintaining them an hour
+longer than they were necessary.
+
+And this seems to be the course most in accordance with the spirit of
+the constitution, with former practice, with common-sense. Deeds which
+violate the letter of the law can be dealt with by the law. But actions
+or courses of action which, even if they may be thought to overstep the
+law, transgress it so narrowly as to elude conviction, can only be
+reached by enactments which also go in some degree beyond the ordinary
+law; and, so going beyond it, are to that extent encroachments on the
+ordinary privileges and rights of the subject, and suspensions of the
+constitution. But the very term "suspension" shows that the power
+conferred is but temporary, otherwise it would be synonymous with
+abrogation. And all parties may wisely agree, as they did in this
+instance, to a temporary suspension of the people's rights, though there
+would be none to whom their permanent abrogation would not be
+intolerable.
+
+The bill, then, for the suppression of the Association passed with
+universal approval, and it may be regarded as furnishing a model for
+dealing with similar associations, if ever they should arise. And as
+soon as it was passed Mr. Peel introduced the greater measure, that for
+the repeal of the disabilities. In drawing the necessary bill the
+ministers had had two questions of special importance to consider:
+firstly, whether it should be unlimited concession which should be
+granted, such as would throw open to the Roman Catholics every kind of
+civil office; and, secondly, whether it should be accompanied by any
+other measure, which might render it more palatable to its adversaries,
+as diminishing a portion at least of the dangers which those who
+regarded the question in a purely political light most apprehended. On
+the first point it was determined that, with the exception of three
+civil offices, those of the Lord Chancellors of England and Ireland and
+the Lord-lieutenant of Ireland,[207] and some of a purely ecclesiastical
+character, such as the Judge of the Court of Arches, every kind of
+preferment should be opened to the Roman Catholics.[208] The declaration
+against Transubstantiation and the oath of supremacy, certain
+expressions in which were the obstacles which had hitherto kept the
+Roman Catholics out of office and out of Parliament, were to be
+repealed, and another to be substituted for them which should merely
+bind him who took it to defend the King, to maintain the Protestant
+succession, and to declare that "it was not an article of his faith, and
+that he renounced, rejected, and abjured the opinion, that princes
+excommunicated or deposed by the Pope might be deposed and murdered; and
+that he disclaimed, disavowed, and solemnly abjured any intention to
+subvert the present Church Establishment as settled by law within this
+realm, and that he would never exercise any privilege to which he was or
+might become entitled to disturb or weaken the Protestant religion or
+Protestant government in this kingdom."[209]
+
+The second question was, it will probably be confessed, even more
+important. Pitt, who had always contemplated, and had encouraged the
+Irish Roman Catholics to contemplate, the abolition of their political
+disabilities as an indispensable appendage to, or, it may be said, part
+of the Union, had designed, farther, not to confine his benefits to the
+laymen, but to endow the Roman Catholic clergy with adequate stipends, a
+proposal which was received with the greatest thankfulness, not only by
+the Irish prelates and clergy themselves, but also by the heads of their
+Church at Rome, who were willing, in return, to give the crown a veto on
+all the ecclesiastical appointments of their Church in the two
+islands.[210] The justice of granting such an endowment could hardly be
+contested. The Reformation in Ireland, if what had taken place there
+could be called a reformation at all, had been wholly different from the
+movement which had almost extinguished Popery in England. The great
+majority of the Irish people had never ceased to adhere to the Romish
+forms, and the Reformation there had been simply a transfer of the
+property of the Romish Church to the Church of England, unaccompanied by
+any corresponding change of belief in the people, who had an undeniable
+right to claim that the state, while making this transfer, should not
+deprive of all provision the clergy to whose ministrations they still
+clung with a zeal and steadiness augmented rather than diminished by the
+discouragements under which they adhered to them.
+
+The policy of granting such endowment was equally conspicuous. No
+measure could so bind the clergy to the government; and no such security
+for the loyalty and peaceful, orderly behavior of the poorer classes
+could be provided, as might be expected from the attachment to the
+government of those who had over them an influence so powerful in its
+character and so unbounded in its strength as their priests. And the
+Duke of Wellington, who had at one time been himself the Irish
+Secretary, and, as an intimate friend of Lord Castlereagh, who held that
+office at the time of the Union, had a perfect knowledge of what had
+been intended at that time--and who was, of course, aware of the very
+decided favor which the House of Commons had so lately shown to the
+project--proposed to follow out Pitt's plan in that particular, and to
+connect a provision[211] for the Roman Catholic clergy with the removal
+of their political disabilities from the laymen. Unluckily, Peel, who,
+throughout the whole transaction, was, of all the cabinet, the
+counsellor on whose judgment he most relied, took a different view of
+the expediency of making such a provision, having, indeed, "no objection
+to it in point of principle." But he saw many practical difficulties,
+which he pressed on the Duke with great earnestness. He argued that for
+the government "to apply a sum of money to the payment of the ministers
+of the Church of Rome in Ireland, granting a license for the performance
+of their spiritual functions, would be a virtual and complete
+supersession, if not repeal, of the laws which prohibit intercourse with
+Rome;" and asked, "Could the state affect to be ignorant that the bishop
+whom it paid derived his right to be a bishop from the See of Rome?"
+Another difficulty he found in the apprehension that "the admission of
+the right of the Roman Catholic clergy to an endowment might produce
+similar claims on the part of the Dissenters in England, who contribute
+in like manner to the support of their own religion and of the
+established religion also." He suggested, farther, that, if the Roman
+Catholic priest were allowed, in addition to his stipend, "to receive
+dues, Easter offerings, etc., from his parishioners, his condition would
+then be better than that of the ministers of the Established Church in
+many of the parishes in Ireland." And, finally, he urged the practical
+objection, that the endowment would greatly strengthen the opposition to
+the whole measure, by the reluctance which, "on purely religious
+grounds," many would feel to the endowment of the Roman Catholic faith,
+who would yet be inclined to acquiesce in the removal of the
+disabilities, "on grounds rather political than religious." He was "not
+insensible to the importance of establishing some bond of connection
+between the Roman Catholic clergy and the state;" but he believed that
+the omission of a provision for their endowment "was important to the
+ultimate success of the government in proposing the measure before
+them."
+
+It is not probable that the Duke was greatly influenced by the first, or
+what may be called the constitutional, objection--that any concert with
+the Papal Court with respect to the appointments or endowments of its
+clergy would be a violation of the act which prohibited any intercourse
+with Rome. The removal of the disabilities required the repeal of one
+act of Parliament; and, if the holding communications with Rome on the
+subject of clerical appointments should be so construed as to require
+the repeal of another, it would hardly seem that there could be any
+greater violation of or departure from the principles of the
+constitution in repealing two acts than in repealing one. As to the
+second of Peel's objections, the English Dissenters could not possibly
+be said to stand on the same ground as the Irish Roman Catholics, since
+their ministers had certainly never been deprived by any act of the
+state of any provision which they had previously enjoyed; but their
+position as unendowed ministers was clearly one of their own making. The
+possible inferiority in point of emolument of some of the Protestant
+cures in Ireland to that which might be enjoyed by some of the Roman
+Catholic clergy could hardly be regarded as the foundation of any
+argument at all, since no law had ever undertaken, or ever could
+undertake, to give at all times and under all circumstances equal
+remuneration to equal labors. But the consideration last suggested was
+exactly the one to influence such a mind as that of the Duke of
+Wellington, generally contented to deal with a present difficulty. He
+was determined to carry Emancipation, because he saw that the Clare
+election had made it impossible to withhold or even to delay it; and,
+being so determined, he was desirous to avoid encumbering it with any
+addition which might increase the opposition to it. At the same time he
+was far from being sanguine of its effect, "with whatever guards or
+securities it might be accompanied, to pacify the country or to avert
+rebellion,"[212] which, in his apprehension, was undoubtedly impending;
+and, under the influence of these combined feelings, he eventually
+withdrew that clause from the bill. It was accompanied by another bill,
+disfranchising the forty-shilling freeholders in Ireland. They were a
+class of voters sunk in the deepest poverty, and such as certainly could
+not well be supposed capable of forming, much less of exercising, an
+independent judgment on political matters. Yet this bill is remarkable
+as having been the only enactment passed since the Revolution to narrow
+the franchise. It had no opposition to anticipate from English or Scotch
+members, and was accepted by the Irish members as the price of
+Emancipation.
+
+No measure that had ever been framed since the Revolution had caused
+such excitement in the country; but the preponderance of feeling in its
+favor was equally marked in both Houses of Parliament. In the House of
+Commons 320 supported it, while only 142 could be marshalled against it.
+In the House of Lords 213 divided for it against 109. And in April it
+received the royal assent.
+
+The general policy of removing the disabilities it is not necessary to
+discuss here. It is quite clear that the Clare election had rendered it
+impossible to maintain them. And if some of those who judge of measures
+solely by their effects still denounce this act, as one which has failed
+in its object of tranquillizing Ireland, many of those who admit the
+failure ascribe it to the omission to accompany it by one securing a
+state endowment for the Roman Catholic clergy, pronouncing it, without
+that appendage, a half measure, such as rarely succeeds, and never
+deserves success. However that may be, it is certain that the measure,
+coupled with the repeal of the Test Act of the previous year, was one
+which made a great and permanent change in the practical working of the
+constitution of the kingdom, as it had been interpreted for the last one
+hundred and fifty years. Of that constitution one of the leading
+features, ever since the Restoration, had been understood to be the
+establishment and maintenance of the political as well as the
+ecclesiastical ascendency of the Church of England. On that ascendency
+the repeal of the Test Act in 1828 had made the first, and that a great,
+inroad, and the present statute entirely abolished it as a principle of
+government. So far as political privileges went, every Christian sect
+was now placed on a footing of complete equality. But so to place them
+may fairly be regarded as having been required not only by justice and
+expediency, but by reasons drawn from the history of the nation and from
+the circumstances under which these disabilities had been imposed.
+Before the Rebellion no one was excluded from the English Parliament on
+account of his religion, whether he was a Roman Catholic, a
+Presbyterian, or a member of any other of the various sects which were
+gradually arising in the country. It was not till after the Restoration
+that a recollection of the crimes of the Puritans, when they had got the
+upper-hand, and the fear of machinations and intrigues, incompatible
+with the freedom and independence of the people, which were imputed to
+the Roman Catholics, gave birth to the statutes depriving both
+Protestant and Roman Catholic Non-conformists of all legislative and
+political power. The restrictions thus imposed on the Presbyterians and
+other Protestant sects had, as we have seen, been gradually relaxed by a
+periodical act of indemnity. Indeed, after the Union with Scotland, it
+was impossible with any show of consistency to maintain them, since, as
+it has been already pointed out, after Presbyterianism had been
+recognized as the established religion of Scotland, it would have seemed
+strangely unreasonable to regard it as a disqualification on the
+southern side of the Border. But, as long as the Stuart princes were
+from time to time disquieting the government by their open invasions or
+secret intrigues, no such relaxation could with safety be granted to the
+Roman Catholics, since it could hardly be expected that they would
+forbear to employ any power which they might acquire for the service of
+a prince of their own religion. That danger, however, which ever since
+1745 had been a very shadowy one, had wholly passed away with the life
+of the last Stuart lay prince, Charles Edward; and his death left the
+rulers of the kingdom and advisers of the sovereign free to take a
+different and larger view of their duty to the nation as a whole.
+
+It was notorious that the number of Non-conformists was large. In the
+middle of the last century it had received a considerable accession
+through the institution of the new sect of Wesleyan Methodists; which,
+through the supineness of the clergy of the Established Church in that
+generation, had gradually increased, till it was estimated that the
+various Dissenting sects in England equalled at least half the number of
+the members of the Established Church. In Wales they were believed to
+form the majority. In Scotland three-fourths of the people were
+Presbyterians; and in Ireland the Roman Catholics outnumbered the
+Protestants in nearly the same proportion. Taking England, Wales,
+Scotland, and Ireland together, a calculation which reckoned the
+different sects of Protestant and Roman Catholic Non-conformists united
+at half the entire population would probably not have erred very widely
+from the truth.
+
+It must have been the aim of every statesman deserving of the name to
+weld these different religious parties into one harmonious whole, as far
+as their civil position went. And measures which had that tendency could
+not be foreign to the constitution, properly understood. A constitution
+which confines its benefits to one-half of a nation hardly merits the
+title of a constitution at all. For every constitution ought to extend
+its protection and its privileges equally to every portion of the
+people, unless there be some peculiarity in the principles or habits of
+any one portion which makes its participation in them dangerous to the
+rest. It had undoubtedly been the doctrine of Pitt, and of the greater
+part of those who since his time had held the reins of government, that
+if any portion of the King's subjects did cherish a temper dangerous to
+the rest, it was because they were debarred from privileges to which
+they conceived themselves to have a just right, and that their
+discontent and turbulence were the fruit of the restrictions imposed on
+them. In proposing to remove such a grievance Pitt certainly conceived
+himself to be acting in accordance with the strictest principles of the
+constitution, and not so much innovating upon it as restoring it to its
+original comprehensiveness. And so of the measure, as it was now
+carried, it will apparently be correct to say that, though it did make
+an important change in the practical working of the constitution, it
+made it only by reverting to the fundamental principles of civil and
+religious liberty, to which every subject had a right; which had only
+been temporarily restrained under the apprehension of danger to the
+state, and which the cessation of that apprehension made it a duty to
+re-establish in all their fulness.
+
+But it is by no means clear that in the conduct of the measure the
+constitution was not violated in one very important point, the proper
+relation subsisting between a constituency and its representative, by
+Mr. Peel's resignation of his seat for the University of Oxford. That he
+was sensible that the act stood in need of explanation is proved by the
+careful statement of the motives and considerations that determined him
+to it, which he drew up twenty years afterward. They were of a twofold
+character. To quote his own words: "When I resolved to advise, and to
+promote to the utmost of my power, the settlement of that question, I
+resolved at the same time to relinquish, not only my official
+station,[213] but the representation of the University of Oxford. I
+thought that such decisive proofs that I could have no object, political
+or personal, in taking a course different from that which I had
+previously taken, would add to my influence and authority, so far, at
+least, as the adjustment of the particular question at issue was
+concerned." "I cannot deny that in vacating my seat I was acting upon
+the impulse of private feelings, rather than upon a dispassionate
+consideration of the constitutional relations between a representative
+and his constituents. I will not seek to defend the resolution to which
+I came by arguments drawn from the peculiar character of the academic
+body, or from the special nature of the trust confided to its members;
+still less will I contend that my example ought to be followed by others
+to whom may be offered the same painful alternative of disregarding the
+dictates of their own consciences, or of acting in opposition to the
+opinions and disappointing the expectations of their constituents. I
+will say no more than that my position was a very peculiar one, that I
+had many painful sacrifices to make, and that it would have been a great
+aggravation of them, if it could have said with truth that I was
+exercising an authority derived from the confidence of the University to
+promote measures injurious, in her deliberate judgment, either to her
+own interests or to those of the Church."
+
+No one would willingly censure too severely an act dictated by a sense
+of honor, even if somewhat overstrained and too scrupulously delicate;
+but when Mr. Peel speaks of "defending" or not defending his deed, he
+clearly admits it to be one open to impeachment. And when he forbears to
+"contend that his example ought to be followed," he seems practically to
+confess a consciousness that any defence against such impeachment must
+fail; while the last sentence quoted above involves an assertion that a
+constituency (in this instance one of the two most important
+constituencies in the kingdom) could be justified in regarding a measure
+required by the safety, or at least by the welfare, of the state, as
+injurious to its own interests; and so far admits a possible severance
+between the interests of a particular class or body and those of the
+whole community, which can have no real existence. That, however, is not
+the point to be investigated here. The charge, as it seems, to which Mr.
+Peel's deed lays him open is, that by it he lowered the position and
+character of a member of Parliament from those of a representative to
+those of a delegate. It was an adoption of the principle laid down for
+his own guidance by a colleague of Mr. Burke above fifty years before,
+and indignantly repudiated by that great political philosopher, as
+proceeding from an entire misapprehension of the rights of a
+constituency and of a member[214] of Parliament. He told the electors of
+Bristol that "when they had chosen their member, he was not a member of
+Bristol, but a member of Parliament; and that if the local constituent
+should have an interest, or should form an opinion, evidently opposite
+to the real good of the rest of the community, the member for that place
+ought to be as far as any other from any endeavor to give it effect;"
+that a representative "owes to his constituents, not his industry only,
+but his judgment, and betrays instead of serving them, if he sacrifices
+it to their opinion." And in so saying he carried with him the
+concurrence and approval of all his contemporaries whose sentiments on
+such a question were entitled to weight.
+
+In the States-general of France each member was, by the original
+constitution of that body, a delegate, and not a representative. He
+could not even remonstrate against the most oppressive grievance of
+which the previous instructions of the constituent body had not
+instructed him to complain; and this limitation of his duties and powers
+was, undoubtedly, one very principal cause which led to the
+States-general so rapidly falling into utter disrepute. It was no light
+thing to take a step which had a tendency to bring down the British
+Parliament to the level of the despised and long-disused States-general.
+And it is the more necessary to put the case in a clear and true light,
+because at the present day there is an evident disposition on the part
+of constituencies to avail themselves of Peel's conduct in this instance
+as a precedent, in spite of his protest against its being so regarded,
+and to fetter their representatives with precise instructions; and a
+corresponding willingness on the part of candidates to purchase support
+at elections by a submissive giving of pledges on a variety of subjects,
+so numerous as to leave themselves no freedom of judgment at all. On the
+great majority of subjects which come before Parliament, a member of
+Parliament, if he be a sensible and an honest man, has a far better
+opportunity of obtaining correct information and forming a sound opinion
+than can be within reach of any constituency, whose proneness to
+misjudge is usually in exact proportion to the magnitude of its numbers.
+Every elector justifiably may, and naturally will, seek to ascertain
+that between the candidate whom he supports and himself there is a
+general conformity of opinion; an absolute identity he will never find,
+and he has no right to ask.[215]
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 182: L118,776,000. Alison, c. lxxvi.]
+
+[Footnote 183: See Lord Malmesbury's account of their first
+interview.--_Diaries of Lord Malmesbury_, iii., 218.]
+
+[Footnote 184: "Parliamentary Debates," series 2, ii., 632.]
+
+[Footnote 185: Mr. Brougham gave his opinion that if the Duke of York,
+or any other member of the royal family, had been named, it would have
+been offensive to the Queen; but the measure adopted he regarded as of a
+neutral character. (Mentioned by Lord Liverpool, "Life of Lord
+Liverpool," iii., 55.)]
+
+[Footnote 186: "Minutes of Cabinet," dated 10th and 14th February, 1820,
+forwarded the King by Lord Liverpool ("Life of Lord Liverpool," iii.,
+35-88).]
+
+[Footnote 187: "Life of Sir J. Mackintosh," by R.J. Mackintosh, ii.,
+110, 116.]
+
+[Footnote 188: "Lives of the Chief-justices," iii., 171.]
+
+[Footnote 189: In a letter on the subject to Lord Liverpool, the Duke
+goes the length of calling the proposed bill "an experiment which,
+should it fail, must entail the dreadful alternative of the entire ruin
+of the landed interests of the empire, with which he is decidedly of
+opinion that the nation must stand or fall."--_Life of Lord Liverpool_,
+iii., 434.]
+
+[Footnote 190: At one time it was the fashion with writers of the
+Liberal party to represent Lord Liverpool as led by Lord Castlereagh in
+the earlier, and by Canning in the later, part of his administration;
+but Lord Liverpool's correspondence with both these ministers shows
+clearly that on every subject of foreign as well as of home policy he
+was the real guide and ruler of his cabinet. Even the recognition of the
+independence of the South American provinces of Spain--which is so often
+represented as exclusively the work of Canning--the memorandum on the
+subject which Lord Liverpool drew up for the cabinet proves that the
+policy adopted was entirely his own, and that as such he adhered to it
+resolutely, in spite of the avowed disapproval of the Duke of Wellington
+and the known unwillingness of the King to sanction it; and it may be
+remarked (as he and Lord Castlereagh have sometime been described as
+favoring the Holy Alliance), that the concluding sentence of his letter
+to the Duke on the subject expresses his hostility, not only to that
+celebrated treaty, but to the policy which dictated and was embodied in
+it. (See Lord Liverpool's memorandum for the cabinet and letter to the
+Duke of Wellington, December 8, 1824.)--_Life of Lord Liverpool_, iii.,
+297-305.]
+
+[Footnote 191: See ante, p. 222.]
+
+[Footnote 192: "With much prudence or laudable disinterestedness," says
+Hallam ("Constitutional History," ii., 532).]
+
+[Footnote 193: The last time had been in 1790, when there had been a
+majority of 187 against it.--_Peel's Memoirs_, i., 99.]
+
+[Footnote 194: 237 to 193.]
+
+[Footnote 195: "Peel's Memoirs," i., 68.]
+
+[Footnote 196: "Wellington's Civil Despatches," iv., 453.]
+
+[Footnote 197: See his letter to Peel, March 23 ("Peel's Memoirs," i.,
+92-100).]
+
+[Footnote 198: The entry of this bill in Cobbett's "Parliamentary
+History" is: "The House of Commons testified a very extraordinary zeal
+in unravelling the Popish Plot, and, to prevent mischief in the
+interval, passed a bill to disable Papists from sitting in either House
+of Parliament," to which the Lords, when the bill came up to their
+House, added a proviso exempting the Duke of York from its operation.
+An. 1678; October 26 to November 21.---_Parliamentary History_, iv.,
+1024-1039.]
+
+[Footnote 199: In the House of Commons the majority for Sir F. Burdett's
+resolution was six--372 to 266. But, in the House of Lords, Lord
+Lansdowne, moving the same resolution, was defeated by forty-five--182
+to 137.]
+
+[Footnote 200: See Fitzgerald's letter to Peel ("Peel's Memoirs," i.,
+114).]
+
+[Footnote 201: "Peel's Memoirs," i., 121.]
+
+[Footnote 202: See "Lord Anglesey's Letters," _ibid._, pp. 126, 147.]
+
+[Footnote 203: As early as the year 1812, on the negotiations (mentioned
+in a former chapter) for the entrance of Lord Grenville and Lord Grey
+into the ministry, the Duke of York mentioned to both those noblemen
+that the Regent had an insuperable objection to the concession of
+Emancipation. And it seems probable that it was the knowledge of his
+sentiments on that point that greatly influenced the course which Lord
+Liverpool subsequently pursued in regard to that question.--See _Life of
+Lord Liverpool_, i, 381.]
+
+[Footnote 204: Speech on moving the second reading of the bill in the
+House of Lords, February 19, 1829 ("Hansard," xx., 389).]
+
+[Footnote 205: Speech on the first reading of the bill, February 10
+("Hansard," xx., 208).]
+
+[Footnote 206: Speech on the first reading ("Hansard," xx., 198).]
+
+[Footnote 207: An amendment was proposed by Lord Chandos to add the
+office of Prime-minister to these three, on the ground that if a Roman
+Catholic were Prime-minister "he might have the disposal of all the
+patronage of the state and the Church vested in his hands." But Mr. Peel
+pointed out that the law of England "never recognized any such office as
+that of Prime-minister. In the eyes of the law the ministers were all on
+an equality." And the position, such as it was, being a conventional
+one, was not necessarily connected with the office of First Lord of the
+Treasury. "In a recent instance his late right honorable friend, Mr.
+Canning, had determined to hold the office of Prime-minister with that
+of Secretary of State. And when Lord Chatham was Prime-minister, he did
+not hold the office of First Lord of the Treasury." At the same time he
+explained that the impropriety of intrusting a Roman Catholic with
+Church patronage was already guarded against in the bill, a clause of
+which provided that "it should not be lawful for any person professing
+the Roman Catholic religion directly or indirectly to advise the crown
+in any appointment to or disposal of any office or preferment, lay or
+ecclesiastical, in the united Church of England and Ireland, or of the
+Church of Scotland."--_Hansard_, xx., 1425.]
+
+[Footnote 208: Many years afterward the restriction as to the Lord
+Chancellorship of Ireland was abolished.]
+
+[Footnote 209: The plan which Pitt had intended to propose was to
+substitute in lieu of the Sacramental test a political test, to be
+imposed indiscriminately on all persons sitting in Parliament, or
+holding state or corporation offices, and also on all ministers of
+religion, of whatever description, etc., etc. This test was to disclaim
+in express terms the sovereignty of the people, and was to contain an
+oath of allegiance and "fidelity to the King's government of the realm,
+and to the established constitutions of Church and state."--Letter of
+Lord Grenville, given in _Courts and Cabinets of George III._, and
+quoted by Lord Stanhope, _Life of Pitt_, iii., 270. This plan seems very
+preferable to that now adopted, since it removed every appearance of
+making a distinction between the professors of the different creeds,
+when the same oath was to be taken by all indifferently.]
+
+[Footnote 210: The question had been discussed with the highest Papal
+authorities more than once since the beginning of the century. In 1812
+Mgr. Quarantotti, the prelate who, during the detention of the Pope in
+France by Napoleon, was invested with the chief authority in
+ecclesiastical affairs at Rome, in a letter to the Vicar-apostolic, Dr.
+Poynter, formally announced the consent of the Papal See to give the
+King a veto on all ecclesiastical appointments within the United
+Kingdom; and, after his return to Rome, Pio VII. himself confirmed the
+former title by a second addressed, by his instructions, to the same Dr.
+Poynter, which letter, in 1816, was read by Mr. Grattan in the House of
+Commons, it being throughout understood that this concession of the veto
+to the King was conditional on the abolition of the disabilities and the
+endowment of the priesthood. And in 1825, after Lord Francis Egerton's
+resolution had been carried in the House of Commons, Dr. Doyle, one of
+the most eminent of the Roman Catholic bishops in Ireland, in an
+examination before a committee of the House of Lords, expressed the
+willingness of the Roman Catholic clergy to accept a state provision, if
+it were permanently annexed to each benefice, and accompanied with a
+concession of an equality of civil rights to the Roman Catholic
+laity.--See _Life of Lord Liverpool_, ii, 145; _Diary of Lord
+Colchester, March_ 17, 1835, iii., 373; _Peel's Memoirs_, i., 306, 333
+_seq._]
+
+[Footnote 211: The sum to be thus employed seems to have been intended
+to be L300,000 a year.--_Peel's Memoirs_, i., 197. On the whole question
+of the payment and Peel's objections to it, see _ibid._, pp. 197, 306.]
+
+[Footnote 212: See his "Civil Despatches," iv., 570. In February, 1829,
+he said to Lord Sidmouth, "It is a bad business, but we are aground."
+"Does your Grace think, then," asked Lord Sidmouth, "that this
+concession will tranquillize Ireland?" "I can't tell; I hope it will,"
+answered the Duke, who shortly discovered, and had the magnanimity to
+admit, his mistake.--_Life of Lord Sidmouth_, iii., 453. It is
+remarkable that the question of endowing the Roman Catholic clergy was
+again considered by Lord John Russell's ministry in 1848. A letter of
+Prince Albert in October of that year says, with reference to it: "The
+bishops have protested against Church endowment, being themselves well
+off; but the clergy would gratefully accept it if offered, but dare not
+avow this."--_Life of the Prince Consort_, ii., 186.]
+
+[Footnote 213: This first extract refers in part to the proposal which
+he made to the Duke to resign his office as Secretary of State, and to
+support the Emancipation as a private member, a design which he only
+relinquished at the Duke's earnest entreaty. The second extract refers
+to the seat in Parliament alone.--See _Peel's Memoirs_, i., 310, 312.]
+
+[Footnote 214: Speech to the electors of Bristol on being declared by
+the sheriffs duly elected member for that city, November 3,
+1774.--_Burke's Works_, iii., 11, ed 1803.]
+
+[Footnote 215: It is worth pointing out, however, that, as if it were
+one of the natural fruits of the Reform Bill, the Liberal Committee of
+the Livery of London in 1832 passed a series of resolutions asserting
+the principle of delegation without the slightest modification; one
+resolution affirming "that members chosen to be representatives in
+Parliament ought to do such things as their constituents wish and direct
+them to do;" another, "that a signed engagement should be exacted from
+every member that he would at all times and in all things act
+conformably to the wishes of a majority of his constituents, or would at
+their request resign the trust with which they had honored
+him."--_Annual Register_, 1832, p. 300; _quoted by Alison_, 2d series,
+v., 355.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+
+Demand for Parliamentary Reform.--Death of George IV., and Accession of
+William IV.--French Revolution of 1830.--Growing Feeling in Favor of
+Reform.--Duke of Wellington's Declaration against Reform.--His
+Resignation: Lord Grey becomes Prime-minister.--Introduction of the
+Reform Bill.--Its Details.--Riots at Bristol and Nottingham.--Proposed
+Creation of Peers.--The King's Message to the Peers.--Character and
+Consequences of the Reform Bill.--Appointment of a Regency.--
+Re-arrangement of the Civil List.
+
+
+One of Pitt's great measures of domestic, apart from financial or
+commercial, policy having become law, it seemed in some degree natural
+to look for the accomplishment of the other, a reform of the House of
+Commons, which, indeed, after the conclusion of the war, had been made
+at times the subject of earnest petition, being one in which a far
+greater number of people had a lively interest than that excited by
+Catholic Emancipation. The Englishmen who had advocated that measure had
+been striving for the adoption of a principle rather than for a
+concession from which they could expect any personal benefit, since very
+few in any English or Scotch constituency were Roman Catholics, or
+desired to return a Roman Catholic representative. But thousands in
+every county, including the whole body of citizens of some of the
+largest and most flourishing towns, felt a personal concern in the
+attainment of Parliamentary Reform, as the measure which would give
+them, and which could alone give them, that voice in the affairs of the
+kingdom to which they felt themselves entitled, but which they had never
+yet enjoyed.
+
+And before the end of the next session the prospect of the early success
+of their aspirations was greatly increased by the death of the King.
+George IV., who in his early manhood had attached himself to the Whigs
+with an ardor and ostentation altogether unbecoming his position as heir
+to the throne, had formally separated himself from them after the death
+of Fox in 1806, and had gradually come to regard their adversaries with
+a favor as exclusive as he had formerly shown to themselves. But the
+Duke of Clarence, who now succeeded to the throne, had always shown a
+leaning toward the Whigs, who of late had been commonly regarded as the
+reforming party. While the war lasted, and during the few remaining
+years of the reign of George III., no active steps toward Reform were
+taken in Parliament; but under George IV. more than one borough
+convicted of gross and habitual corruption, as has been mentioned, was
+disfranchised. Grampound was so punished in the time of Lord Liverpool,
+and its members were transferred to Yorkshire, so as to give that
+largest of the counties four representatives; and it may be remarked
+that this arrangement caused the Prime-minister to suggest an
+improvement in the details of an election--which was afterward
+universally adopted--when, in reply to a remark on the great
+inconvenience that was found to exist in taking the poll at once in so
+large a county as Yorkshire, he hinted at the possibility of obviating
+that difficulty by allowing polls to be taken in different parts of the
+county. And, since the Duke had been in office, two more boroughs,
+Penrhyn and East Retford, had also been disfranchised; though the
+Reformers failed in their endeavor to get the seats thus vacated
+transferred to Manchester and Birmingham. With the accession of the new
+sovereign, however, they became more active. They found encouragement in
+other circumstances also. Many of those who were commonly called the
+Ultra Tories had been so alienated from the Duke's government by the
+Emancipation Act, that they were known to be ready to coalesce with
+almost any party for the sake of overturning his administration.
+Moreover, as forty years before, the French Revolution of 1789 had
+caused great political excitement in England, so now the new French
+revolution of July acted as a strong stimulus on the movement party in
+this as well as in other countries; and altogether there was a very
+general feeling that the time for important changes had come. The Duke
+of Wellington was not blind to the prevalence of the idea; and, being by
+no means willing to admit that his own policy of the preceding year had
+in the least contributed to strengthen it, he conceived it to be his
+duty to discountenance it by every means in his power; but the steps
+which he took with that object only invigorated and inflamed it. As
+Prime-minister, he inserted in the speech with which the new sovereign
+opened his first Parliament in the autumn after his accession a general
+panegyric on that "happy form of government under which, through the
+favor of Divine Providence, this country had enjoyed for a long
+succession of years a greater share of internal peace, of commercial
+prosperity, of true liberty, of all that constitutes social happiness,
+than had fallen to the lot of any other country of the world." And in
+his own character, a few nights afterward, he added a practical
+commentary on those sentences of the royal speech, when, in allusion to
+Lord Grey's expression of a hope that the ministers would prepare "to
+redress the grievances of the people by a reform of the Parliament," he
+repudiated the suggestion altogether, avowing that the government were
+contemplating no such measure, and adding that "he would go farther, and
+say that he had never read or heard of any measure up to that moment
+which in any degree satisfied his mind that the state of the
+representation could be improved or rendered more satisfactory to the
+country at large than at that moment. He was fully convinced that the
+country possessed at that moment a Legislature which answered all good
+purposes of legislation to a greater degree than any Legislature had
+ever answered them in any country whatever.... And he would at once
+declare that, as far as he was concerned, as long as he held any station
+in the government of the country, he should always feel it his duty to
+resist any measure of Reform when proposed by others."
+
+Such uncompromising language was, not unnaturally, regarded by the
+Opposition in both Houses as a direct defiance, and the challenge was
+promptly taken up both in and out of Parliament. It happened that at
+this moment the ministry was extremely unpopular in the City; not,
+indeed, on account of his hostility to Reform, but in consequence of the
+recent introduction by the Home-secretary of a police force in London,
+on the model of one which the Duke himself, when Irish Secretary, had
+established in Dublin. The old watchmen had been so notoriously
+inefficient that it might have been expected that the change would have
+been hailed with universal approval and gratitude, but it met with a
+very different reception. Many of the newspapers which had not yet
+forgiven the passing of Catholic Emancipation made it a ground for the
+strongest imputations on the Duke himself, some of them even going the
+length of affirming that he aimed at the throne, and that the
+organization of this new force was the means on which he reckoned for
+the attainment of his object. No story is too gross for the credulity of
+the populace. To hear of such a plot was to believe it; to believe it
+was to resolve to defeat it; and at the beginning of November the
+government received several warnings that a plan was in agitation to
+raise a formidable riot on Lord Mayor's Day, when the King and the Duke
+himself were expected to dine with the Lord Mayor. The Lord Mayor even
+wrote to the Duke to suggest the prudence of his coming "strongly and
+sufficiently guarded," and the result of this advice was certainly
+strange. The Duke cared little enough about personal danger to himself,
+but he regarded himself as specially bound by his office to watch over
+the public tranquillity, and to do nothing that might be expected to
+endanger it. He was at least equally solicitous that a new reign should
+not open with a tumult which could in any way be regarded as an insult
+to the King; and, under the influence of these feelings, he took the
+responsibility of giving the King the unprecedented advice of abandoning
+his intention of being present at the Guildhall banquet. Such a step had
+an inevitable tendency to weaken the ministry still farther by the
+comments which it provoked. Even his own brother, Lord Wellesley, did
+not spare his sarcasms, pronouncing it "the boldest act of cowardice he
+had ever heard of;" while the Reformers ascribed the unpopularity which
+it confessed to the Duke's declaration against any kind or degree of
+Reform; and, to test the correctness of this opinion, Mr. Brougham, who,
+in the House of Commons, was the most eloquent champion of Reform, gave
+notice of a motion on the subject for the 16th of November. Before that
+day came, however, the ministry had ceased to exist. On the preceding
+evening it had been defeated on a proposal to refer to a select
+committee the consideration of the Civil List, a new settlement of which
+was indispensable at the beginning of a new reign, and on the morning of
+the 16th the Duke resigned, not only advising the King to intrust the
+formation of the new cabinet to Lord Grey--who was universally
+recognized as the head of the Whig party--but recommending his Majesty
+also to be prepared to consent to a measure of moderate Reform, which,
+though he could not bring himself to co-operate in it, he was satisfied
+that the temper of the House of Commons, if not of the people
+out-of-doors also, rendered unavoidable.[216] The advice was taken. Lord
+Grey had no difficulty in forming a ministry in which the Whigs were
+aided by the junction of several of the more moderate Tories, who had
+regarded Canning as their leader; and from the very beginning
+Parliamentary Reform was proclaimed to be the one great object of his
+government. It would be more correct to call it a Reform of the House of
+Commons, since there was no idea of interfering with the House of Lords,
+even in those parts of it which were of a representative character, the
+Scotch and Irish peers. But, by whatever title the ministerial policy
+was designated, no one misunderstood what was intended; and as
+Parliament was, after a few days, adjourned over the Christmas holidays,
+the recess was spent by a sub-committee of the cabinet in framing a
+measure.
+
+The great extension of our trade, which was the fruit partly of his wise
+commercial policy, and partly of the long war; the rapid and prodigious
+growth of our manufactures, developed by the inventive ingenuity of our
+mechanics and engineers, had given a consideration and influence to the
+commercial, manufacturing, and moneyed classes which could not be
+disregarded. The land-owners, who had previously almost monopolized the
+representation, no longer constituted the wealthiest class of the
+community. Pitt himself had raised a banker to the peerage. More
+recently, men closely connected with the commercial classes had become
+cabinet ministers, one of whom had even subsequently sacrificed office
+to his feeling of the propriety of enfranchising a single town,
+Birmingham. But there were other towns at least equal in importance to
+Birmingham which were unrepresented, and it was clearly impossible to
+maintain a system which gave representatives to boroughs like Gatton,
+Old Sarum, or Corfe Castle--where the electors scarcely outnumbered the
+members whom they elected--and withheld them from large and opulent
+manufacturing centres like Manchester, Leeds, and Sheffield. The
+enfranchisement, therefore, of these towns, and of others whose
+population and consequent importance, though inferior to theirs, was
+still vastly superior to those of many which had hitherto returned
+representatives, was so manifestly reasonable and consistent with the
+principles of our parliamentary constitution, that it was impossible to
+object to it. And their enfranchisement unavoidably led to the
+disfranchisement of the smaller boroughs, unless the House of Commons
+were to be enlarged to a number which was not likely to tend to the
+facilitation of business. Indeed, in the opinion of the framers of the
+bill, the House was _already too large_, and they proposed to reduce its
+number by upward of sixty--a step to which it is probable that many of
+those whose opposition contributed to defeat it subsequently repented of
+their resistance. Nevertheless, the line adopted by the Duke of
+Wellington's ministry showed that there was still a large party to whom
+reform on a large scale was altogether distasteful; and accordingly the
+bill which, under the influence of these considerations, Lord Grey's
+administration brought forward in the spring of 1831, gave rise to the
+fiercest struggles in both Houses of Parliament that had been witnessed
+for many generations. One Parliament was dissolved; two sessions of that
+which followed were opened in a single year; once the ministry itself
+was dissolved, though speedily reconstructed; and three bills were
+framed, each in some degree differing from its predecessor in some of
+its details, though all preserved the same leading principles of
+disfranchising wholly or partially the smaller boroughs; of
+enfranchising several large and growing towns; of increasing the number
+of county representatives; and of enfranchising also some classes which
+previously had had no right of voting. It would be a waste of time to
+specify the variations in the three bills. It is sufficient to confine
+our attention to that which eventually became law. Fifty-six boroughs
+were wholly disfranchised; those in which the population fell short of a
+certain number (2000), and where the amount of assessed taxes paid by
+the inhabitants was correspondingly small. Thirty more were deprived of
+one of their members, being those in which the population was between
+2000 and 4000. And the seats thus vacated were divided between the towns
+which since the Revolution had gradually grown into importance, the
+suburbs of the metropolis, and the counties, the majority of which were
+now divided into two halves, each half returning two members, as many as
+had previously represented the whole. The boundaries of the boroughs,
+too, were in most cases extended.
+
+More important, perhaps, in its influence on subsequent legislation was
+the alteration made in the qualifications which constituted an elector.
+Hitherto the franchise, the right of voting at elections, had been based
+on property. The principle had not, indeed, been uniformly adhered to in
+the boroughs, where, as Lord John Russell, in the speech with which he
+introduced the bill, pointed out, a curious variety of courses had been
+adopted. "In some," as he described the existing practice, "the
+franchise was exercised by 'a select corporation;' that is to say, it
+was in the possession of a small number of persons, to the exclusion of
+the great body of the inhabitants who had property and interest in the
+place represented. In ancient times, he believed, every freeman, being
+an inhabitant householder resident in the borough, was competent to
+vote. As, however, this arrangement excluded villeins and strangers, the
+franchise always belonged to a particular body in every town--a body
+undoubtedly possessed of property, for they bore the charges of their
+members, and on them were assessed the subsidies and taxes voted by
+Parliament. But when villeinage ceased, various and opposite courses
+seemed to have been pursued in different boroughs. In some, adopting the
+liberal principle that all freemen were to be admitted, householders of
+all kinds, down to the lowest degree, and even sometimes beyond, were
+admitted. In others, adopting the exclusive principle that villeins and
+strangers were no part of the burgesses, new corporations were erected,
+and the elective franchise was more or less confined to a select body."
+But all these diversities and varieties were now swept away, and a
+uniform franchise was established, all tenants whose rent amounted to
+L10 receiving the franchise in boroughs, while by a kindred amendment,
+which was forced on the ministers at a very early stage of the measure,
+tenants at will whose tent amounted to L50 became entitled to vote in
+the counties.
+
+The arrangements for taking the poll were also greatly changed. Instead
+of the fifteen days which had of late been allowed for a county
+election, two were now thought sufficient.[217] In boroughs the time was
+abridged in a similar proportion, and the arrangement was facilitated by
+a division of counties into several convenient polling districts, so
+that no elector should require to travel more than a few miles to record
+his vote.
+
+This last change was universally accepted as a great practical
+improvement, from its tendency to lessen the expense of election
+contests, which had risen to an enormous and ruinous height. But every
+other part of the scheme was viewed with the greatest repugnance, not to
+say dread, by the Opposition; and every one of the bills was fought step
+by step in the House of Commons. The first bill was only carried by a
+majority of one; the second was absolutely rejected by the House of
+Lords; and on the third the ministers, after carrying it triumphantly
+through the Lower House, were defeated in the Upper House on a point of
+detail, which, though of no great importance in itself, they regarded as
+an indication that the peers, though they had consented to read it a
+second time, would insist on remodelling it to a great degree, and, if
+they were not allowed to do so, would again reject it altogether.
+
+Meanwhile, the people were wrought up to a pitch of frenzy absolutely
+unprecedented. Never had agitators, among whom some of the ministers
+themselves were not ashamed to appear, been so unscrupulous in their
+endeavors to excite discontent. One cabinet minister wrote inflammatory
+articles in the newspapers; another publicly called the legitimate
+opposition of the peers "the whisper of a faction." And their exertions
+soon bore fearful fruit. In London some of the peers who had been most
+prominent in their objections to the bill were hooted and pelted, and
+one, Lord Londonderry, was nearly murdered. The King and Queen were
+insulted by mobs in the Park, some of the rioters even openly
+threatening the Queen with death, because she was believed to be
+favorable to the anti-Reformers. In some of the most important
+provincial towns the discontent broke out into actual insurrection. At
+Bristol a tumultuous mob, whose numbers were swelled by crowds of the
+worst ruffians of the metropolis, sought to murder the Recorder, Sir
+Charles Wetherall, when he came down to that city to hold the
+quarter-sessions; and, when defeated in their attack on him, stormed the
+Mansion House, and set it, with the Bishop's Palace and other public
+buildings, and scores of private houses, on fire, several of the rioters
+themselves, who had got drunk, perishing in the flames. A similar mob
+rose in arms at Derby, but did less mischief, as there the magistrates
+knew their duty better. But Nottingham almost equalled Bristol in its
+horrors. Because the Duke of Newcastle was a resolute anti-Reformer, a
+ferocious gang attacked and set on fire the fine old Castle; and, not
+content with committing fearful ravages in the town, roamed over the
+adjacent district, attacked the houses of many of the leading country
+gentlemen, plundering and burning the dwellings, and in more than one
+instance murdering some of the inhabitants.
+
+The King had hitherto borne himself between the contending parties in
+the state with scrupulous fairness to both. Though, he had, probably,
+been taken by surprise by the sweeping character of the changes his
+ministers had proposed, he had given them a frank support, consenting,
+even at a moment's notice, to dissolve the Parliament after the
+unfavorable division in the House of Commons on the first bill; but he
+had, at the same time, warned them that he would never consent to employ
+any means of coercion to overbear the free decision of the House of
+Lords. And he had more than once rejected as unconstitutional their
+solicitations to allow them to make peers with that object. At last they
+endeavored to compel his consent by resigning their offices, though the
+ground for so decided a step can hardly be deemed sufficient, since the
+provocation which they alleged was only Lord Lyndhurst's success in
+carrying an amendment to take the enfranchising clauses of the bill
+before those of disfranchisement, so as to give the latter a more
+gracious appearance, as if the boroughs to be extinguished were made to
+suffer, not so much for their own positive unworthiness as in order to
+make room for others which had become of undeniably greater importance.
+The King took the strictly constitutional line of accepting their
+resignation and intrusting the Duke of Wellington with the task of
+forming a new administration, warning the Duke, at the same time, that
+he considered himself now pledged to grant a large measure of Reform;
+but the Duke found the task impracticable, and then, as the only means
+of averting farther insurrectionary tumults, which bore no slight
+resemblance to civil war, and might not impossibly end in it, the King
+did at last consent to permit the creation of a sufficient number of
+peers to insure the passing of the bill. But he could not overcome his
+repugnance to the measure as a severe blow to the constitution--one
+which would in effect be tantamount to the extinction of the
+independence of the Upper House as a legislative body; and, thinking no
+means unjustifiable that would avert the necessity of such a creation,
+he conceived the idea of authorizing his private secretary, Sir Herbert
+Taylor, to request the chief peers on the Opposition side to absent
+themselves from the division on the third reading. It seemed to him, and
+indeed to many of them, the only thing that could be done. Their
+judgment of the character and eventual consequences of the ministerial
+bill was unaltered; but they saw the violence of the public feeling on
+the subject, and the danger to the state of too stubborn and
+uncompromising a resistance to it, and, yielding loyal obedience to
+their royal master's wish, they retired from the House without voting.
+Those who remained passed the bill, and in the beginning of June, 1832,
+it became law.
+
+We have ventured in a previous chapter to call in question the propriety
+of the conduct of the King's father, George III., in using his personal
+entreaties to influence the House of Lords against the India Bill of Mr.
+Fox. The transaction which has been related here is the second and only
+other instance since the Revolution of a sovereign having recourse to
+such a device to sway the votes of members of either House. But the
+circumstances were so entirely different, nay, so diametrically
+opposite, that an opinion of the impropriety of the sovereign's deed in
+the former case imposes no obligation on the ground of consistency to
+censure it in the later instance. The interference of George III. was
+designed to thwart and defeat his ministers on a measure of which he had
+not previously intimated any disapproval. William IV., on the other
+hand, was exerting himself to support his ministers, not, as it seems
+probable, without some sacrifice of his own judgment. His father acted
+as he did to avert an inroad on his prerogative and independence, which
+he had been persuaded to apprehend, but the danger of which can hardly
+be said to have been proved beyond all question; so that even those who
+think the result of his action fortunate for the nation cannot defend
+the action as one that on any constitutional principle can be justified.
+The son, at a far more critical moment, adopted the course which he did
+adopt as the only means which he saw of extricating the state and the
+nation from an alternative of great calamities: the extinction of, or at
+least a deep wound to, the legislative independence of the House of
+Lords, by the following of a single precedent[218] which had ever since
+been universally condemned; or, on the other hand, a continuance of
+outrages and tumults which had already disgraced the nation in the eyes
+of the world, and which, if renewed and continued, could not fail to
+imperil the safety of the state. Such a motive may certainly be allowed
+to excuse the irregularity of the act.
+
+When, however, we come to consider the proposal to create peers, which
+drove the King to take such a step, that is a question on which, while
+it is still more important, it is also more difficult to form a
+satisfactory judgment. It was denounced by the Duke of Wellington and
+other peers as utterly unconstitutional and revolutionary; as a
+destruction of the great principle of the equality of the two Houses; as
+a denial to the peers of their right to form and act upon their own
+deliberate judgment; and as a reduction of their position to that of a
+body existing merely to register the decrees of the other House. Indeed,
+that it had this character was admitted by Lord Grey himself, with no
+abatement beyond such mitigation as might be found in the idea that it
+was only intended to affect their decision on a single question. So far
+it may be said that even while defending it he condemned it; _Habemus
+confitentem reum_. But the task of a ruler or legislator is often but a
+choice between difficulties, or even between manifest evils. And, even
+if an act or course be admitted to be intrinsically evil, taken by
+itself, yet, if the evil which it is calculated or designed to avert be
+a greater evil still, the defence is complete, or, at all events,
+sufficient. And this, in fact, is the principle of the justification
+which Lord Grey alleged. He was, perhaps, unconsciously referring to a
+passage in Mr. Hallam's great work on "Constitutional History" (then
+very recently published), in which, while discussing Sunderland's
+Peerage Bill, and admitting that "the unlimited prerogative of
+augmenting the peerage is liable to such abuses, at least in theory, as
+might overthrow our form of government," he proceeds to point out that
+in the exercise of this, as of every other power, "the crown has been
+carefully restrained by statutes, and by the responsibility of its
+advisers;" but that, while "the Commons, if they transgress their
+boundaries, are annihilated by a proclamation" (that is, by a
+dissolution) "against the ambition, or, what is much more likely, the
+perverse haughtiness of the aristocracy, the constitution has not
+furnished such direct securities.... The resource of subduing an
+aristocratical faction by the creation of new peers could never be
+constitutionally employed, except in the case of a nearly equal balance;
+but it might usefully hang over the heads of the whole body, and deter
+them from any gross excesses of faction or oligarchical spirit. The
+nature of our government requires a general harmony between the two
+Houses of Parliament."[219] In the present case no one could impute the
+difference between the two Houses to any "perverse haughtiness" on the
+part of the peers. But the difference existed, and was too deeply
+founded on the cautious principles of the Tory party to be surmountable
+by ordinary means. It was certain also that the Commons would not give
+way; that, without danger to the public peace, they could not give way.
+And this was, in fact, Lord Grey's contention: that a crisis had arisen
+in which compulsion must be exercised on one or other of the disagreeing
+parties; and that coercion of the peers by an augmentation of their
+number, or a threat of it, was the only compulsion practicable. In
+upholding this position, however, it must be remarked that he was
+betrayed into the use of language which was as great a violation of
+constitutional and parliamentary principle and usage as the action which
+he was recommending; language, too, which was quite unnecessary to
+strengthen his argument. He accused the Lords of "opposing the declared
+and decided wishes both of the crown and the people;" of "acting
+adversely to the crown;" and this introduction of the sovereign's name
+to overawe the assembly was unconstitutional in the highest degree. For,
+constitutionally, the sovereign has no right to signify his opinion,
+nor, indeed, any recognized means of signifying it but by giving or
+withholding his royal assent to measures which the two Houses have
+passed. On any bill which has not yet been passed by them he has, as has
+been already implied, no legitimate means whatever of expressing his
+judgment. The time has not come for him to do so. Moreover, the
+statement was, probably, not believed by any one to be strictly true,
+for it was pretty generally understood that the King would have
+preferred a far more moderate measure. But, indeed, in the very speech
+in which the Prime-minister made this use of the King's name he
+presently added an observation which was a sufficient condemnation of
+his previous language. For, in denouncing the "vile attacks which had
+been made on his Majesty in the public press," and disclaiming all share
+in them (a disclaimer which however true of himself, could not, it is
+believed, have been uttered with equal truth by all his colleagues), he
+pointed out that "it ought always to be recollected that it is contrary
+to the principles of the constitution to arraign the personal conduct of
+the sovereign." It follows, as a matter of course, that it is equally
+contrary to those principles to allege his personal opinions in either
+House on any measure before it, since, if alleged, they must be open to
+criticism; unless, indeed, the mere allegation of the royal sentiments
+were to be taken as decisive of the question, in which case all freedom
+of discussion would be at once extinguished.
+
+But this irregularity, into which the Prime minister was apparently
+betrayed by his desire of victory, must not be allowed to affect our
+verdict on the main question; and, now that the lapse of time has
+enabled us to contemplate dispassionately the case on which he had to
+decide, it will, probably, be thought that his justification of his
+conduct in recommending a creation of peers is fairly made out. That,
+under any pressure short of that, the peers would have again rejected
+the Reform Bill, or at least would have pared it down to much smaller
+proportions than would have satisfied the popular demand for Reform, may
+be regarded as certain; and equally certain that such a line of conduct
+would have led to a renewal of disgraceful and dangerous tumults. The
+minister, therefore, as has been said before, had to choose between two
+evils. It was a grievous dilemma; but those who had to deal with it
+(even while it may be admitted that they cannot be held wholly free from
+blame, as having themselves contributed by their own language to the
+popular excitement and irritation)[220] may be excused for thinking the
+wound inflicted on the constitution, by thus overbearing the voice of
+one House of Parliament on a single occasion, less formidable in its
+immediate fruit, and more capable of being remedied and retrieved, than
+that which would have followed from a renewal of insurrectionary
+tumults, even if they should have come short of actual civil war.
+
+One critic of these transactions[221] whose experience and high
+reputation entitle his opinion to respectful consideration, after
+reminding his readers that, "although Parliament is said to be
+dissolved, a dissolution extends, in fact, no farther than to the
+Commons, and that the Peers are not affected by it; no change can take
+place in the constitution of their body, except as to a small number of
+Scotch representative peers," proceeds to argue that, "so far as the
+House of Peers is concerned, a creation of peers by the crown on
+extraordinary occasions is the only equivalent which the constitution
+has provided for the change and renovation of the House of Commons by a
+dissolution. In no other way can the opinions of the House of Lords be
+brought into harmony with those of the people." But it may be feared
+that this comparison is rather ingenious than solid. Indeed, the writer
+himself limits such an expedient as a creation of peers to insure the
+passing of a particular measure to "extraordinary occasions." But a
+dissolution of the House of Commons is so far from being so limited,
+that it is the natural and inevitable end of every House of Commons
+after an existence which cannot exceed seven years, and which is very
+rarely so protracted. And though it may be, and probably has been, the
+case that a House of Commons has passed measures to which it had no
+great inclination, lest it should provoke a minister to a premature
+dissolution, yet no submission on its part can long postpone it; and a
+threat or apprehension of a dissolution would certainly fail to overcome
+the opposition of the House of Commons, or of a party within it, if the
+measure before them seemed open to serious objection. The presumed or
+presumable immortality of the one body, and the limited existence of the
+other, seem to constitute so essential a difference between them as must
+prevent the measures adopted toward one being fairly regarded as any
+guide to a justification of those employed in the case of the other.
+
+The Reform Bill of 1832 has sometimes been called a new Revolution, and
+to some extent it deserved the name; for it was not, like the Catholic
+Emancipation Act, a mere restoration of privileges to any class or
+classes of the people which had once been enjoyed by them, and had
+subsequently been withdrawn, but it was a grant of a wholly new
+privilege to places and to classes which had never enjoyed it; while it
+was manifest that the political power thus conferred on these classes
+involved a corresponding diminution of the powers of those who had
+hitherto monopolized it. It was also the introduction of a new
+principle. The old doctrine of the constitution had been, that the
+possession of freehold property, as the only permanent stake in the
+country, was the only qualification which could entitle a subject to a
+voice in the government and legislation of the kingdom. The new doctrine
+was that, as others besides owners of land contributed to the revenue by
+the payment of taxes, those who did so contribute to a sufficient amount
+had a right to a voice, however indirect or feeble, in the granting of
+those taxes; and so far it was the extension and application to subjects
+at home of the principle for which Lord Chatham and Burke had contended
+sixty years before in the case of the American Colonies, that taxation
+and a right to representation went together; a principle which, many
+ages before, had been laid down by the greatest of our early kings as
+the foundation of our parliamentary constitution and rights. But this
+principle, however generally it may have been asserted, had hitherto
+been but very partially carried out in practice, and the old borough
+system had been skilfully devised by successive kings and ministers to
+keep the political power in the hands of the crown and the aristocracy.
+It was with that object that most of the boroughs which were first
+allowed to return members under the Tudors had been enfranchised,[222] a
+great noble or landholder, whose affection to the government could not
+be doubted, being often able to obtain the promotion of some village or
+petty town in the neighborhood of his estates to the dignity of a
+parliamentary borough, and thus acquiring a great addition to his
+political and social importance by his power of influencing the
+election. No one could deny that the existence of such boroughs was an
+abuse, or at least an anomaly, rendered the more conspicuous as time
+went on by the denial of representatives to towns which contained as
+many thousands of citizens as they could boast single burgesses. At the
+same time it was equally undeniable that the aristocracy, generally
+speaking, exerted their influence advantageously for the state. A peer
+or great squire who could return the members for a borough took a worthy
+pride in the abilities and reputation of those whom he thus sent to
+Parliament; especially the leaders of the two parties sought out
+promising young men for their seats; and it has often been pointed out
+that, of the men who in the House of Commons had risen to eminence in
+the country before the Reform Bill, there was scarcely one who had not
+owed his introduction to Parliament to the patron of one of those
+boroughs which were now wholly or partially disfranchised; while on one
+or two occasions these "rotten boroughs," as, since Lord Chatham's time,
+they were often derisively called, had proved equally useful in
+providing seats for distinguished statesmen who, for some reason or
+other, had lost the confidence of their former constituents. So, when
+Bristol had disgraced itself by the rejection of Burke, Malton had
+averted the loss with which Parliament and the country were threatened
+by again, through the influence of Lord Rockingham, returning the great
+statesman as their representative. So, to take a later instance,
+Westbury, under the influence of Sir Manasseh Lopes, had provided a
+refuge for Sir Robert Peel, when the course which he had taken on
+Catholic Emancipation had cost him his seat for Oxford. And these
+practical uses of these small boroughs--anomalies in a representative
+system, as they were called in the debates on the subject, and as they
+must be confessed to have been--were so important, that some even of
+those who felt compelled by their principles to vote for their
+parliamentary extinction have, nevertheless, confessed a regret for the
+sacrifice, lamenting especially that it has, in a great degree, closed
+the doors of the House of Commons against a class whose admission to it
+is on every account most desirable, the promising young men of both
+parties.
+
+In one point of great importance the framers of the Reform Bill of 1832
+proved to be mistaken. They justified the very comprehensive or sweeping
+range which they had given it by their wish to make it a final
+settlement of the question, and by the expression of their conviction
+that the completeness with which it had satisfied all reasonable
+expectations had effectually prevented any necessity for ever re-opening
+the question. Their anticipations on this head were not shared by their
+opponents, who, on the contrary, foretold that the very greatness of the
+changes now effected would only whet the appetite for a farther
+extension of them; nor by a growing party, now beginning to own the
+title of Radicals, which till very recently had only been regarded as a
+reproach, and who, even before the bill passed,[223] expressed their
+discontent that it did not go farther, but accepted it as an instalment
+of what was required, and as an instrument for securing "a more complete
+improvement." And their expectations have been verified by subsequent
+events. Indeed, it may easily be seen that the principles on which one
+portion of the bill--that which enfranchised new classes of voters--was
+framed were such as, in shrewd hands, might easily be adduced as
+arguments in favor of the necessity of reconsideration of the question
+from time to time. So long as the right of voting was confined to owners
+of property, or members of corporate bodies, the line thus laid down was
+one which was not liable to be crossed. But the moment that tenancy was
+added to ownership, and a line was drawn distinguishing electors from
+non-electors, not by the nature of their qualifications, but by the
+amount of their rent, detail was substituted for principle; and the
+proposer or maintainer of the rule that the qualification should be a
+yearly rental of L10 might be called on to explain why, if L10 were a
+more reasonable limit than L15, L8 were not fairer than L10. Or again,
+if the original argument were, that a line must of necessity be drawn
+somewhere, and that L10 was the lowest qualification which seemed to
+guarantee such an amount of educated intelligence in the voter as would
+enable him to exercise the franchise conferred on him judiciously and
+honestly, such reasoning would from time to time invite the contention
+that the spread of education had rendered L8 tenants now as enlightened
+as L10 tenants had been some years before. And thus the measure of 1832,
+instead of forever silencing the demand for Reform by the completeness
+of its concessions, did in fact lay the foundation for future agitation,
+which has been farther encouraged and fed by farther submission to it,
+and which its leaders, who have so far triumphed, show no purpose to
+discontinue. To discuss whether such extensions of the franchise as have
+already been adopted, and those farther steps in the same direction
+which are generally understood to be impending, will eventually be found
+compatible with the preservation of our ancient monarchical
+constitution, is a fitting task for the statesmen and senators whose
+duty it is to examine in all their bearings the probable effects of the
+measures which may be proposed. But the historian's business is rather
+"to compile the records of the past" than to speculate on the
+future.[224] And the course which was too perilous or difficult for Mr.
+Hallam to undertake we will follow his example in avoiding. But it
+cannot be denied that, if the Reform Bill of 1832 transferred the chief
+political power of the state from the aristocracy to the middle classes,
+a farther lowering of the qualification for the exercise of the
+franchise must transfer it from the middle to the lower classes; and
+that those who view such transfer with alarm, and deprecate it as
+fraught with peril to all our ancient institutions, maintain their
+opinions by arguments as old, indeed, as the days of the Roman
+republic,[225] but which have not lost strength by lapse of time, if
+indeed, they have not been fortified by events in the history of more
+than one modern nation.
+
+Even before the introduction of the first Reform Bill one measure had
+been passed of constitutional importance, though the concurrence of both
+parties in its principle and details prevented it from attracting much
+notice. Two daughters who had been born to the King and Queen had died
+in their infancy, and the royal pair were now childless; and, as some
+years had elapsed since the birth of the last, it was probable that they
+might remain so. The presumptive heiress to the throne was, therefore,
+the daughter of the deceased Duke of Kent, the Princess Victoria, our
+present most gracious sovereign, and, as she was as yet only eleven
+years of age, it was evidently necessary to provide for the contingency
+of the death of the King before she should attain her majority. A
+Regency Bill for that purpose had, therefore, been prepared by the Duke
+of Wellington's cabinet, and had been introduced by Lord Chancellor
+Lyndhurst in the House of Lords before the resignation of the ministry.
+It could not be so simple in its arrangements as such bills had
+sometimes been, since there was more than one contingency possible, for
+which it was requisite to provide. It was possible not only that William
+IV. might die within the next seven years, but also that at his death he
+might leave a child, or his widow in a state which warranted the
+expectation of one, the latter case being the more difficult to decide
+upon, since no previous Regency Bill furnished any precedent for the
+ministers' guidance.
+
+The first point, however, to be settled was, who was the most proper
+person to administer the affairs of the kingdom as Regent, in the event
+of the heiress to the crown being still a minor at the King's death. It
+was a question on which it was evidently most desirable that no
+difference of opinion should be expressed. And, in fact, no difference
+existed. The leaders of both parties--the Duke and his colleagues, who
+had framed the bill, and Lord Grey, with his colleagues, who adopted
+it--agreed that the mother of the young sovereign would be the fittest
+person to exercise the royal authority during the minority; and,
+farther, that she should neither be fettered by any limitations to that
+authority, nor by any councillors appointed by Parliament nominally to
+advise and assist, but practically to control her. It was felt that a
+Regent acting for a youthful daughter would need all the power which
+could be given her; while, as she could never herself succeed to the
+throne, she could be under no temptation, from views of personal
+ambition, to misuse the power intrusted to her.
+
+At first sight it seemed a more difficult and delicate question what
+course should be pursued with reference to the possible event of the
+King dying while the Queen, his widow, was expecting to become a mother.
+As has been said above, no precedent was to be found in any former bill;
+yet it seemed to be determined by the old constitutional maxim, that the
+King never dies. Not even for a moment could the throne be treated as
+vacant, and, therefore, it was proposed and determined that in such a
+case the Princess Victoria must instantly be proclaimed Queen, and the
+Duchess of Kent must instantly assume the authority of Regent; but that,
+on the birth of a posthumous child to the Queen Dowager, the Princess
+and the Duchess, as a matter of course, should resume their previous
+rank, and Queen Adelaide become Regent, and govern in the name of her
+new-born infant and sovereign. The strict constitutional correctness of
+the principle elaborately and eloquently expounded to the peers by Lord
+Lyndhurst was unanimously admitted, and the precedent now set was
+followed, with the needful modification, when, ten years afterward, it
+became necessary to provide for the possibility of Queen Victoria dying
+during the minority of her heir. The parent of the infant sovereign,
+Prince Albert, was appointed Regent, with the cordial approval of the
+nation; the dissent of the Queen's uncle, the Duke of Sussex who, with a
+very misplaced ambition, urged instead the appointment of a Council of
+Regency, of which he hoped to become the most influential member, only
+serving to make the unanimity of the rest of the Parliament more
+conspicuous.
+
+A somewhat kindred question, inasmuch as it affected the personal
+arrangements, if they may be so termed, of the sovereign, was settled in
+the same session, and on a new principle. What was called the Civil List
+had hitherto been placed on a footing which was at once unintelligible
+and misleading. The expression was first used at the Revolution, and was
+applied not only to that portion of the revenue which was devoted to the
+personal expenses of the sovereign, but also to many branches of the
+civil expenditure of the state, with which, in fact, he had no concern
+whatever. Not only the salaries of the great officers of the household,
+but those also of the ministers, ambassadors, and of the judges, were
+paid out of it, as well as those of many place-holders of various
+classes, and pensions to a large amount. Amounts embracing such a
+variety of miscellaneous and unconnected expenses could hardly be
+expected to be kept with regularity, and there was lavish waste in every
+department. Burke's bill had rectified some of the abuses, and had also
+pointed out the way to some other reforms which were gradually adopted;
+but still numbers of charges were left untouched, and there was scarcely
+any one subject which afforded more topics to unscrupulous demagogues
+than the amount of the Civil List, which the ignorant multitude were
+constantly assured that the King enjoyed to squander on his own
+pleasures, though, in fact, the greater part of it was expended in the
+service of the state, and was entirely free from his control. Only a
+portion of the sum which went under this name was voted annually by the
+Parliament. A portion was derived from the Crown Lands, from duties
+known as Droits of the Crown and Droits of the Admiralty, etc., the
+amount of which fluctuated, and with which Parliament was admitted to
+have no right to interfere. But the working of the whole was
+satisfactory to no one--neither to the King himself, nor to those who
+upheld the right of the Parliament to have a predominant control of
+every branch of expenditure of the public money. The feeling that the
+whole of the royal income and expenditure should be placed on a
+different footing was general, and the fall of the Duke of Wellington's
+ministry had been immediately caused by the success of a proposal that,
+before fixing the new sovereign's Civil List, Parliament should refer
+the matter to a committee, that inquiry might be made into every part of
+it. Lord Grey's ministry were bound to act in conformity with a
+resolution on which they had, as it were, ridden into office; and the
+arrangement which they ultimately effected was one in which common-sense
+and the royal convenience and comfort were alike consulted. That portion
+of the Civil List of his predecessor which was voted by Parliament
+amounted to nearly L850,000 a year; but, besides that sum, George IV.
+enjoyed the income already mentioned as derived from Crown Lands,
+Droits, etc., while a farther large sum was furnished by the ancient
+revenue of the crown of Scotland, and another was received from Ireland.
+The ministers now proposed that all these sources of income should be
+handed over to the Treasury, and that the Civil List should henceforward
+be fixed at L510,000, being at the same time relieved from all the
+foreign and extraneous charges on it which had invidiously swelled the
+gross amount, without being in any way under the control of the
+sovereign, or in any way ministering to his requirements, either for
+personal indulgence or for the maintenance of the state and magnificence
+imposed on him by his position.
+
+Such a change was on every ground most desirable. It was clearly in
+accordance with our parliamentary constitution that grants of money made
+by the Parliament should express distinctly and unmistakably the objects
+to which they were really to be applied; and that the charges of
+departments connected with the government, the administration of
+justice, or the foreign service of the country, should not be mixed up
+with others of a wholly different character, so as to make what was, in
+fact, the expenditure of the nation wear the appearance of being the
+expenditure of the sovereign. Moreover, the assignment of many of the
+charges to the Civil List even gave a false character to the
+appointments themselves. If a sovereign was to pay ambassadors and
+judges out of what seemed to be his private income, the logical
+conclusion could hardly be avoided that he had a right to lower those
+salaries, or even to diminish the number of those appointments. And it
+may even be said that the less any real danger of such a right being so
+exercised was to be apprehended, the more unadvisable was it to retain
+an arrangement which in theory could be described as liable to such an
+abuse.
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 216: But it may be remarked that till very recently the people
+out-of-doors had ceased to show any great anxiety about Reform. Two or
+three years before, Lord Althorp, who, in Lord Grey's ministry, was
+Chancellor of the Exchequer and leader of the House of Commons, told
+Peel that the people had become so indifferent to it, that he never
+meant to bring forward the question again, and in the last seven years
+only fourteen petitions had been presented to Parliament in favor of it.
+In reality, such a feeling in the people would have been eminently
+favorable to a calm framing of a Moderate measure; but this indifference
+was soon changed into a more violent and widely diffused excitement than
+there was any record of since the days of the Popish Plot; that
+excitement, however, according to the confession of the historian of the
+Whig ministry and the Reform Bill, himself an ardent reformer, being "no
+spontaneous result of popular feeling, but being brought about by the
+incessant labors of a few shrewd and industrious partisans forming a
+secret, but very active and efficient, committee in London."--Roebuck's
+_History of the Whig Ministry_, etc., ii., 309.]
+
+[Footnote 217: In 1835 the two days were reduced to one.]
+
+[Footnote 218: The creation of twelve peers, in the reign of Queen Anne,
+to secure a majority in favor of the Peace of Utrecht.]
+
+[Footnote 219: "Constitutional History," iii., 331. See the whole
+passage.]
+
+[Footnote 220: Lord John Russell had publicly described the language of
+the Tory Peers in the debate on Lord Lyndhurst's amendment as "the
+whisper of a faction." And many articles of most extreme violence which
+appeared in the _Times_ about the same time were generally believed to
+have been written (in part at least) by the Lord Chancellor, Lord
+Brougham.]
+
+[Footnote 221: "Constitutional History of England," by Sir J.E. May, 1.,
+262.]
+
+[Footnote 222: Elizabeth enfranchised no fewer than sixty-two in the
+course of her reign, "a very large proportion of them petty boroughs,
+evidently under the influence of the crown or the peerage."--Hallam,
+_Constitutional History_ i., 360.]
+
+[Footnote 223: Sir A. Alison, "History of Europe," xxiii., 55, quotes a
+paragraph from the _Examiner_ newspaper, which says: "The ground,
+limited as it is, which it is proposed to clear and open to the popular
+influence, will suffice as the spot desired by Archimedes for the plant
+of the power which must ultimately govern the whole system. Without
+reform, convulsion is inevitable. Upon any reform farther reform is
+inevitably consequent, and the settlement of the constitution on the
+democratic basis certain."]
+
+[Footnote 224: Hallam, "Constitutional History," c. xvi., _in fin._]
+
+[Footnote 225: "Semper in republica timendum est ne plurimum valeant
+plurinn."--Cicero.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+
+Abolition of Slavery.--Abridgment of the Apprenticeship.--The East India
+Company's Trade is Thrown Open.--Commencement of Ecclesiastical
+Reforms.--The New Poor-law.--State of Ireland.--Agitation against
+Tithes.--Coercion Bill.--Beginning of Church Reform.--Sir Robert Peel
+becomes Prime-minister.--Variety of Offices held Provisionally by the
+Duke of Wellington.--Sir Robert Peel Retires, and Lord Melbourne Resumes
+the Government.--Sir Robert Peel Proposes a Measure of Church
+Reform.--Municipal Reform.--Measures of Ecclesiastical Reform.
+
+
+Apart from the consideration of the abstract principle, on which the
+advocates of Parliamentary Reform had insisted, of the light of many
+classes hitherto unrepresented to representation, they had also dwelt on
+the practical advantage which might be expected to ensue from the
+greater degree in which public opinion would henceforth be brought to
+bear on the action of the Houses, and, by a natural consequence, on the
+administrative government also. And the bill had hardly passed when this
+result began to show itself, not only in transactions of domestic
+legislation, but in others which affected our most remote dependencies,
+both in the East and West. We have seen in a previous chapter how
+Wilberforce, after twenty years of labor and anxiety, reaped the reward
+of his virtuous exertions in the abolition of the slave-trade. But he
+had not ventured to grapple with the institution which gave birth to
+that trade, the employment of slaves in our West India Islands. Yet it
+was an evil indefensible on every ground that could possibly be alleged.
+It was not only a crime and an injustice, but it was an anomaly, and a
+glaring inconsistency, in any British settlement. The law, as we have
+seen, had been laid down as absolutely settled, that no man within the
+precincts of the United Kingdom could be a slave; that, even had such
+been his previous condition, the moment his foot touched English soil he
+became a free man. By what process of reasoning, then, could it be
+contended that his right to liberty according to English law depended on
+what portion of the British dominion he was in--that what was
+incompatible with his claims as a human being in Kent ceased to be so in
+Jamaica? The sentiment that what was just or unjust in one place was
+just or unjust in every place; that a man's right to freedom did not
+depend on the country of his birth or the color of his skin, had
+naturally and logically been widely diffused and fostered by the
+abolition of the slave-trade. It was but a small step from admitting
+that there could be no justification for making a man a slave, to
+asserting that there was an equal violation of all justice in keeping
+one in slavery; and this conclusion was strengthened by tales, which
+were continually reaching those most interested in the subject, of
+oppression and cruelty practised by the masters, or oftener by their
+agents and overseers, on the unfortunate beings over whom they claimed
+power and right as absolute as any owner could pretend to over any
+description of property. They made so general an impression that, ten
+years before the time at which we have now arrived, a society had been
+formed in London whose object was the immediate extinction of slavery in
+every British settlement; and Canning, then Secretary of State, had
+entered warmly into the general object of the society; not, indeed,
+thinking the instant abolition practicable, but inducing Parliament to
+pass a body of resolutions in favor of at once improving the condition
+of the slaves, as the best and necessary preparation for their entire
+enfranchisement;[226] and the next year, 1824, the subject was
+recommended to the attention of the Houses in the King's speech, and an
+Order in Council was issued enjoining the adoption of a series of
+measures conceived in the spirit of those resolutions, among which one
+was evidently meant as a precursor of the slaves' entire emancipation,
+since it gave the "negro who had acquired sufficient property" a title
+"to purchase his own freedom and that of his wife and family." And it
+was, probably, from regarding it in this light that the planters (as the
+owners of estates in the West Indies were generally called) selected
+that provision as the object of their most vehement remonstrances. But,
+though they were not so open in their remonstrances against the other
+clauses of the order, they did worse, they disregarded them; and the
+stories of the ill-treatment of the slaves were neither less frequent
+nor less revolting than before.
+
+Fresh Orders in Council, avowedly designed as the stepping-stones to
+eventual emancipation, were issued; and one which reached the West
+Indies at the end of 1831 was, unhappily, so misconstrued by the slaves
+in Jamaica, who regarded it as recognizing their right to instant
+liberation, that, when their masters refused to treat it as doing so,
+they broke out into a formidable insurrection, which was not quelled
+without great loss of life and destruction of property. The planters
+were panic-stricken; many of them, indeed, were almost ruined. The
+colonial Legislatures,[227] which had been established in the greater
+part of the islands, addressed the ministers with strong protests
+against the last Order in Council; and the mischief which had
+confessedly been already done, and the farther mischief which was not
+unreasonably dreaded, were so great that the cabinet consented to
+suspend it for a while; and the House of Commons made a practical
+confession that the planters were entitled to sympathy as well as the
+slaves, by voting nearly a million of money to compensate those of
+Jamaica for their recent losses.
+
+But out-of-doors the feeling rather was that the insurrection had been
+caused, not by the unreasoning though natural impatience for freedom
+entertained by the negro--whom Canning had truly described as
+"possessing the form and strength of a man, but the intellect of a
+child"--but by the slackness and supineness of the local Legislature,
+too much under the influence of the timid clamors of the planters to
+listen to the voice of justice and humanity, which demanded to the full
+as emphatically, if somewhat less vociferously, the immediate
+deliverance of the slave. The object, however, thus desired was not so
+free from difficulty as it seemed to those zealous but irresponsible
+advocates of universal freedom; for, in the first place the slaves were
+not the only persons to be considered; the planters also had an
+undoubted right to have their interests protected, since, however
+illegitimate property in human beings might be, it was certain that its
+existence in that portion of the King's dominions had been recognized by
+Parliament and courts of justice for many generations, and that suddenly
+to withdraw a sanction and abrogate a custom thus established, and, as
+it might fairly be believed, almost legalized by time, would be not only
+ruinous to the planters, who would have no other means of cultivating
+their lands, but, as being ruinous to them, would also manifestly be
+most unjust. Even in the interests of the slaves themselves, instant
+emancipation before they were fit for it might prove to them a very
+doubtful blessing. The state, too, and the general interests of the
+kingdom had to be considered, for the shipping employed in the West
+India trade, and the revenue derived by the Imperial Exchequer from it,
+were both of great amount. It was a very complicated question, and
+required very cautious handling; but it was plain that the people were
+greatly excited on the subject. One or two of the ministers themselves
+had deeply pledged themselves to their constituents to labor for the
+cessation of slavery; and eventually, though by no means blind to the
+difficulty of arriving at a thoroughly safe solution of the question,
+the ministry decided that "delay was more perilous than decision," and
+they brought in a bill, in which they endeavored to combine the three
+great objects--justice to the slave, by conferring on him that freedom
+to which he, in common with all mankind, had an inviolable right;
+justice to the slave-owner, by compensating him fairly for the loss of
+what (however originally vicious the practice may have been) he was
+entitled by long usage and more than one positive law to regard as
+property; and a farther justice to the slave, that justice which
+consists in being careful so to confer benefits as to do the greatest
+amount of good to the recipient. The first object was attained by
+enacting that those who had hitherto been slaves should be free; the
+third was arrived at by making the freedom thus given, not
+instantaneous, but by leading them to it, and preparing them for its
+proper and useful enjoyment, by a system of apprenticeship. The slave
+was to be apprenticed to his master for seven years, receiving, partly
+in money and partly in kind, a certain fair amount of wages, and having
+also one-fourth of his time absolutely at his own disposal. And the
+second was secured by granting the planters the magnificent sum of
+twenty millions of money, as compensation for the injury done to them;
+or, in other words, as purchase-money for the property they were
+compelled to surrender. The apprenticeship system did not wholly
+succeed. The slaves were not sufficiently enlightened to appreciate the
+character of the new arrangement; and, as the light in which it appeared
+to them was rather that of deferring than of securing their
+emancipation, it made them impatient rather than thankful. In the
+majority of cases it proved difficult to induce them to work even
+three-fourths of their time, and eventually the planters themselves were
+driven to the conclusion that it was best to abridge the period of
+apprenticeship. By the act of the colonial Legislatures themselves it
+was shortened by two years, and the emancipation was completed on the
+1st of August, 1838.
+
+Still, though on this single point the success of the scheme did not
+fully correspond to the hopes of those who had framed it, it was one
+which did great honor to their ingenuity as well as to their
+philanthropy (Lord Stanley, as Colonial Secretary, being the minister to
+whose department it belonged). And the nation itself is fairly entitled
+to no small credit for its cordial, ungrudging approval of a measure of
+such unprecedented liberality. Indeed, the credit deserved was frankly
+allowed it by foreign countries. To quote the language of an eloquent
+historian of the period, "the generous acquiescence of the people under
+this prodigious increase of their burdens has caused the moralists of
+other nations to declare that the British Act of Emancipation stands
+alone for moral grandeur in the history of the world."[228] And, in
+respect of the personal liberty of the subject, it may be said to have
+completed the British constitution; establishing the glorious principle,
+that freedom is not limited to one part of our sovereign's dominions, to
+these islands alone, but that in no part of the world in which the
+British flag is erected can any sort of slavery exist for a single
+moment.
+
+The abolition of the political authority of the East India Company,
+which took place some years after the time at which we have arrived, and
+which will be mentioned in a subsequent chapter, would make it
+unnecessary to mention the renewal of its charter, which took place at
+this time, were it not that the force of public opinion again made
+itself felt in some important limitations of its previous rights. The
+monopoly of the trade with China which the Company had hitherto enjoyed
+was resented as an injustice by the great body of our merchants and
+ship-owners, who contended that all British subjects had an equal right
+to share in advantages which had been won by British arms. The
+government and Parliament adopted their view, and the renewed charter
+extinguished not only that monopoly, but even the Company's exclusive
+trading privileges in India itself, though these, like the rights of the
+West India planters over their slaves, were purchased of it by an
+annuity for forty years, which was estimated as an equivalent for the
+loss of profit which must result to the proprietors of the Company's
+stock from the sudden alteration. It cannot be said that any
+constitutional principle was involved in what was merely a commercial
+regulation, or relaxation of such regulations. Yet it may not be thought
+inopportune to mention the transaction thus briefly, as one important
+step toward the establishment of free-trade, which, at the end of fifty
+years from the time when Pitt first laid the foundation of it, was
+gradually forcing itself on all our statesmen, as the only sound
+principle of commercial intercourse between nations. The laborious
+historian of Europe during these years finds fault with the arrangements
+now made, but only on the ground that they did not go far enough in that
+direction; that, while "everything was done to promote the commercial
+and manufacturing interests of England, nothing was done for those of
+Hindostan;"[229] that, "while English cotton goods were admitted for a
+nominal duty into India, there was no corresponding advantage thought of
+to the industry of India in supplying the markets of the country." The
+objection was not unfounded; but the system of which it complains was
+too one-sided to be long maintained, and in less than ten years a great
+financial reform had swept away the great mass of import duties, and so
+far had placed the Indian manufacturer on the same level with his
+fellow-subjects of English blood.
+
+The disturbances which agitated the first years of the reign of William
+IV. were not caused solely by the excitement attendant on the passing of
+the Reform Bill. There had been extensive agricultural distress in
+England, which had shown itself in an outbreak of new crimes, the
+burning of ricks in the farm-yards, and the destruction of machinery, to
+which the peasantry were persuaded by designing demagogues to attribute
+the scarcity of employment. But statesmen of both parties were agreed in
+believing that a great deal of the poverty which, especially in the
+agricultural counties, had become the normal condition of the laborer,
+might be ascribed to the pernicious working of the Poor-law, which
+subsisted with scarcely any alteration as it had been originally enacted
+in the reign of Elizabeth. There was even reason to doubt whether the
+slight changes which had been made had been improvements. If they had
+been in the direction of increased liberality to the poor man who needed
+parish relief, and had to some extent lessened his discomforts, they had
+at the same time tended greatly to demoralize both him and his employer,
+by introducing a system of out-door relief, which, coupled with the
+practice of regarding such relief as a legitimate addition to wages, led
+the former to feel no shame at underpaying his workmen, and the workman
+to feel no shame at depending on the parish for a portion of his means
+of subsistence. It was not to be wondered at that under such a system
+the poor-rates gradually rose to the prodigious amount of seven millions
+and a quarter of money; or that the rate-payers began to clamor against
+such a state of things, as imposing on them a burden beyond their power
+to bear. It was evident that it was an evil which imperatively demanded
+a remedy; and accordingly one of the first objects to which Lord Grey's
+Cabinet turned its attention after the completion of the Reform Bill was
+the amendment of the Poor-law.
+
+The scheme which in the spring of 1834 they introduced to Parliament was
+the first instance of the adoption in this country of that system of
+centralization which has long been a favorite with some of the
+Continental statesmen, but which is not equally in harmony with the
+instincts of our people, generally more attached to local government.
+But, if ever centralization could commend itself to the English mind, it
+might well be when a new law and a new principle of action were to be
+introduced, in the carrying out of which uniformity of practice over the
+whole kingdom was especially desirable. Accordingly, the government bill
+proposed the establishment of a Board of Commissioners to whom the
+general administration of the Poor-laws over the whole kingdom was to be
+intrusted. They were to have power to make rules and regulations as to
+the mode or modes of relief to be given, subject to the approval of the
+Secretary of State, that thus the establishment of one uniform system
+over the whole country might be secured. Power was to be given to unite
+several parishes into one union, and to erect large workhouses for the
+several parishes thus massed together;[230] and every union was to be
+under the management of boards of guardians, elected by the rate-payers
+of the different parishes, with the addition of the resident magistrates
+as ex officio guardians. Lord Althorp, who introduced the bill, admitted
+that such extensive powers as he proposed to confer on the Board of
+Commissioners were "an anomaly in the constitution," but pleaded the
+necessity of the case as their justification, since it was indispensable
+to vest a discretionary power somewhere, and the government was too
+fully occupied with the business of the nation, while the local
+magistrates would be destitute of the sources of information requisite
+to form a proper opinion on the subject. The commissioners alone, being
+exclusively devoted to the subject, and being alone in possession of all
+the information that could be collected, were really the only body who
+could fairly be trusted to form correct opinions on it.[231] The fact of
+the creation of such a board being "an anomaly," or, as it might rather
+have been called, a novelty in the constitution, does not seem an
+insuperable objection, unless it were also inconsistent or at variance
+with the fundamental principles of the constitution, and that can hardly
+be alleged in this instance. It is true that local management, whether
+its range were wide or narrow, whether covering the business of a county
+or limited to a single parish, had been the general rule; but, like
+every other arrangement for the conduct of affairs of any kind, that
+local management was inherently subject to the supreme authority and
+interference of Parliament. Nor, as the maintenance of this
+Parliamentary authority, as the supreme referee in the last resource,
+was provided for by the subordination of the commissioners for the
+approval of their regulations to the Secretary of State, does it seem
+that the arrangement now proposed and adopted can be said to have been
+inconsistent with constitutional principle. And the necessity for some
+change of that nature was clearly made out by the abuses which,
+undeniably, had been suffered to grow up under the old system.
+
+If the habitual condition of the Irish peasant were to be taken into
+account, it would be correct to say that there was less distress at this
+time in England than in Ireland; but there was still greater discontent,
+and infinitely more of dangerous disturbance. Catholic Emancipation had
+stimulated the agitators, not pacified them; they regarded it as a
+triumph over the English government; and, being so, as at once a reason
+for demanding, and a means of extorting, farther concessions. But this
+notion of theirs, when inculcated on the peasantry, bore terrible fruit,
+in such an increase of crime as had probably never been known in any
+country in the world. In the provinces of Leinster, Munster, and
+Connaught murders, deeds of arson, and rapine were of far more than
+daily occurrence.[232] Lord Althorp asserted in the House of Commons
+that more lives had been sacrificed in Ireland by murder in the
+preceding year than in one of Wellington's victories. And what was, if
+possible, a still worse symptom of the disposition of the common people,
+was exhibited in the impossibility of bringing the criminals, even when
+well known, to justice. Jurors held back from the assizes, witnesses who
+had seen murders committed refused to give evidence. The Roman Catholic
+prelates, and the higher class of the Roman Catholic clergy--most of
+whom, greatly to their credit, exerted themselves to check this fearful
+progress of wickedness--found their denunciations unheeded; while
+O'Connell, in his place in the House of Commons, used language which to
+an ignorant and ferocious peasantry looked almost like a justification
+of it, affirming it to be caused wholly by the "unjust and ruinous
+policy of the government" in refusing to abolish tithes. It was not the
+first time that the existence of tithe had been alleged as an Irish
+grievance. In the three southern provinces by far the greater portion of
+the tenantry were Roman Catholics, and they had long been complaining
+that they were forced to pay for the support of the Protestant clergyman
+of their parish, whose ministrations they could not attend, as well as
+for the maintenance of their own priest, whose livelihood depended on
+their contributions. According to strict political economy, there could
+be no doubt that the burden of the tithe fell, not on the tenant, but on
+the landlord, in the calculation of whose rent the amount of tithe to
+which each holding was liable was always taken into consideration; and
+that being the true doctrine, it was equally plain that in reality the
+Protestant clergy were paid, not by Roman Catholics, but by Protestants,
+since it was not disputed that by far the greater part of the
+land-owners in every province were Protestants.[233] But an ignorant
+peasant is no student of political economy or of logic; and the fact
+that the payment of the tithe passed through his hands was in his eyes,
+an incontrovertible proof that it came out of his pocket. The discontent
+had gradually begotten an organized resistance to the payment, and the
+mischief of allowing the continuance of such a state of feeling and
+conduct, which was manifestly likely to impair the respect for all law,
+made such an impression on the government that, in the royal speech with
+which he opened the session of 1832, the King recommended the whole
+subject to the consideration of Parliament, urging the Houses to inquire
+"whether it might not be possible to effect improvements in the laws
+respecting this subject."
+
+In compliance with this recommendation, committees were appointed by
+both Houses; and the result of their investigations was a recommendation
+that a new arrangement should be made, under which the tithe should be
+commuted to a rent-charge. Accordingly, the next year the ministers
+proceeded to give effect to this recommendation. But they reasonably
+judged that an alteration of a particular law in compliance with the
+clamor raised against it would be a concession pregnant with mischief to
+the principle of all government, if it were not accompanied, or rather
+preceded, by a vindication of the majesty of all law; and therefore the
+first measure affecting Ireland, which they brought in in 1833, was a
+"Coercion Bill," which empowered the Lord-lieutenant not only to
+suppress the meetings of any assembly or association which he might
+consider dangerous to the public peace, but also to declare by
+proclamation any district in which tumults and outrages were rife to be
+"in a disturbed state;" and in districts thus proclaimed no person was
+to be permitted to be absent from his house from an hour after sunset to
+sunrise. Houses might be searched for arms, martial law was to be
+established, and courts-martial held for the trial of all offences
+except felonies; and the _Habeas Corpus_ Act was suspended for three
+months. O'Connell and his party protested with great vehemence against
+such an enactment, as a violation of every right secured to the subject
+by the constitution. And a bill which suspended the ordinary courts of
+justice must be admitted to have been incompatible with the constitution
+as commonly understood and enjoyed. But if the measure thus proposed was
+extraordinary, the state of affairs which had led to its proposal was so
+also in a far greater degree. The records of no nation had ever
+presented such a fearful catalogue of crimes as was now laid before the
+Parliament, and at such a crisis the statesmen to whom the tranquillity
+of the country and the safety of the citizens were intrusted were
+undoubtedly called upon to go back from the letter of the constitution
+to that which is the primary object of every constitution--the safety of
+those who live under it. _Salus populi suprema lex_. And the argument of
+necessity was regarded, and rightly regarded, by both Houses of
+Parliament as a sufficient and complete justification of even so
+exceptional an enactment.
+
+And concurrently with this enactment, which, however indispensable for
+the repression of crime, no one could deny to be severe, the ministers
+endeavored also to remove the causes of discontent by a large measure of
+Church reform, not confining their aim to settling the tithe question,
+but dealing with the whole question of the Irish Church in such a way as
+to lay down, as an undoubted principle of the constitution, the doctrine
+that the Church existed for the benefit of the nation; that its property
+was bestowed on it for the same object; and that, consequently, the
+nation, or in other words the Parliament, had a perfect right to deal
+with its property and endowments of all kinds, always keeping the same
+end in view, the general advantage of the whole nation. Proceeding on
+these maxims, they introduced a Church Reform Bill, in which, perhaps,
+the most remarkable circumstance of all was, that the evil which had
+been the original cause of their taking up the subject at all was the
+last thing settled, not, indeed, being finally arranged for four years;
+while the principal detail in the way of reform which was completed in
+this first session was one which, however reasonable, had hitherto
+received but little attention, and had certainly provoked no great
+outcry. It could not be denied that the Episcopal Establishment in
+Ireland was out of all proportion to the extent of the country and the
+number of the Protestant population, or of the parishes. The entire
+population in communion with the Church fell short of 900,000. The
+number of parishes scarcely exceeded 1400. But over this comparatively
+scanty flock were set no fewer than eighteen bishops and four
+archbishops; while England, with 12,000 parishes, was contented with
+twenty-four bishops and two archbishops. It was proposed to consolidate
+these bishoprics into ten, the archbishoprics into two, a reduction
+which could hardly fail to commend itself to all. But with this
+reduction was combined a variety of other details relating to the
+Episcopal revenues, to the right of the bishops to grant leases, and
+other matters of finance, which the ministers proposed so to remodel as
+to create a very large fund to be at the disposal of the state. On this
+point the greater part of the ministerial scheme was wrecked for the
+time. They succeeded in carrying that part of it which consolidated the
+bishoprics, and in inducing the House of Commons to grant, first as a
+loan, which was originally turned into a gift, a million of money to be
+divided among the incumbents of the different parishes, who were reduced
+to the greatest distress by the inability to procure payment of their
+tithes, the arrears of which amounted to a far larger sum.
+
+But the assertion that any surplus fund arising from redistribution of
+the Episcopal revenues ought to belong to the state, not only called
+forth a vigorous resistance from the whole of the Tory party at its
+first promulgation, but, when the subject was revived the next year, and
+one of the supporters of the ministry, Mr. Ward, proposed a resolution
+that any such surplus might be legitimately applied to secular purposes,
+it produced a schism in the ministry itself. The resolution was
+cordially accepted by Lord John Russell, but was so offensive to four of
+his colleagues, Mr. Stanley and Sir James Graham being among the number,
+that they at once resigned their offices. The breach thus made was not
+easily healed; and before the end of the session other dissensions of a
+more vexatious and mortifying character led to the retirement of the
+Prime-minister himself. All attempts to deal with the tithe question
+failed for the time, four more years elapsing before it was finally
+settled. But, curtailed as it was, the bill of 1833 still deserves to be
+remembered as a landmark in constitutional legislation, since it
+afforded the first instance of Parliament affirming a right to deal with
+ecclesiastical dignities and endowments, thus setting a precedent which,
+in the next reign, was followed with regard to the Church of England.
+
+Lord Melbourne succeeded Lord Grey at the Treasury; but every one saw
+that the ministry was greatly weakened. The King, too, had become
+greatly dissatisfied both with their general policy, especially in
+regard to the Irish Church--which he took an opportunity of assuring the
+Irish bishops he was unalterably resolved to uphold--and also with the
+language and conduct of one or two individual ministers, to which it is
+not necessary to refer more particularly; and when, on the death of Lord
+Spencer, father of Lord Althorp, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, which
+took place in November, 1834, it became necessary for Lord Melbourne to
+propose to him a re-arrangement of some of the cabinet offices, he at
+once dismissed the whole body of the ministers. It was a somewhat
+singular step to take, for they had not been defeated in Parliament, and
+he did not himself allege any special dissatisfaction with anything
+which they had yet done, though he did apprehend that some of them would
+press upon him measures disadvantageous to "the clergy of the Church of
+England in Ireland," to which he had an insuperable objection; and,
+moreover, that the subject would cause fresh divisions in the ministry,
+and the resignation of one or two more of its most important members. He
+had, indeed, six months before, given a practical proof of his distrust
+of the ability of Lord Melbourne and the colleagues who remained to him
+to carry on the government of the kingdom satisfactorily, by desiring
+the new Prime-minister to enter into communication with the leaders of
+the Opposition, "to endeavor at this crisis to prevail upon them to
+afford their aid and co-operation toward the formation of an
+administration upon an enlarged basis, combining the services of the
+most able and efficient members of each" party.[234] Nor had he
+relinquished the idea of bringing about such a coalition, till he
+learned that both Lord Melbourne and Sir Robert Peel considered the
+differences which divided them to be too deeply founded on principle to
+render their union in one administration either beneficial to the state
+or creditable to themselves. And it may be said that the letter in which
+Lord Melbourne had in November announced to his Majesty the death of
+Lord Spencer, and the necessity for new arrangements which that event
+had created, by the expression that "in these new and altered
+circumstances it was for his Majesty to consider whether it were his
+pleasure to authorize Viscount Melbourne to attempt to make such fresh
+arrangements as might enable his present servants to continue to conduct
+the affairs of the country, or whether his Majesty deemed it advisable
+to adopt any other course," and that "Lord Melbourne earnestly entreated
+that no personal consideration for him might prevent his Majesty from
+taking any measures or seeking any other advice which he might think
+more likely to conduce to his service and to the advantage of the
+country," did not only contemplate, but to a certain degree even
+suggested, the possibility of his Majesty's preferring to have recourse
+to fresh advisers.
+
+The King's subsequent acts and their result, however, certainly took the
+kingdom by surprise. He applied to the Duke of Wellington to undertake
+the formation of a new ministry; and the Duke, explaining to the King
+that "the difficulty of the task consisted in the state of the House of
+Commons, earnestly recommended him to choose a minister in the House of
+Commons," and named Sir Robert Peel as the fittest object for his
+Majesty's choice. Sir Robert was in Italy at the time; but, on receiving
+the royal summons, he at once hastened to England, the Duke of
+Wellington in the mean time accepting the offices of First Lord of the
+Treasury and Secretary of State, as a provisional arrangement, till he
+should arrive in London.
+
+Sir Robert reached England early in December; and though, if "he had
+been consulted beforehand, he would have been inclined to dissuade the
+dismissal of the last ministry as premature and impolitic," he did not
+consider it compatible "with his sense of duty" to decline the charge
+which the King laid upon him, and at once accepted the office of
+Prime-minister, being fully aware that by so doing he "became
+technically, if not morally, responsible for the dissolution of the
+preceding government, though he had not had the remotest concern in
+it."[235] In the formation of his ministry he so far endeavored to carry
+out the views which the King had suggested to Lord Melbourne in the
+summer as to invite the co-operation of Mr. Stanley (who, by the death
+of his grandfather, had recently become Lord Stanley) and Sir J. Graham,
+who, as has been mentioned before, had retired from Lord Grey's cabinet.
+A new name, that of "Conservative," had recently been invented for the
+more moderate section of the old Tory party; and it was one which,
+though Lord Grey had taunted them with it, as betraying a sense of shame
+at adhering to their old colors, Peel was inclined to adopt for himself,
+as characteristic of his feelings and future objects; and perhaps he
+thought it might help to smooth the way for a junction with him of those
+who would flinch from proclaiming so decided a change in their opinions
+as would be implied by their becoming colleagues of one who still
+cherished the name of Tory. But they declined his offers; and
+consequently he was forced to select his cabinet entirely from the party
+of anti-Reformers. He dissolved Parliament, a step as to which it seemed
+to him that the universal expectations of, and even preparation for, a
+dissolution, left him practically scarcely any option;[236] but he soon
+found, as, indeed, he had feared he should find, the attempt to
+establish a Conservative government premature. The party of the late
+ministry, following the example set by Mr. Fox in 1784 with better
+fortune, divided against him in the House of Commons on every occasion,
+defeating him in every division; and at the beginning of April he
+retired, and Lord Melbourne and his former colleagues resumed their
+offices with very little change.
+
+They had, as was natural, not been contented with opposing the
+Conservative ministry in its general policy, but in both Houses they had
+attacked it with great energy. They had begun the battle in both Houses
+in the debate on the address, in which they selected three points in the
+recent transactions for special condemnation, affirming that in every
+one of them the royal prerogative had been unconstitutionally
+exercised--the dismissal of the late ministry, the dissolution of
+Parliament, and the appointment of the Duke of Wellington to a variety
+of offices. In the House of Commons the attack was led by Lord Morpeth
+and Lord John Russell; in the House of Lords by Lord Melbourne himself.
+It was urged that, though the prerogative of the sovereign to dismiss
+his ministers was undoubted and inalienable, yet the Houses had a clear
+right to sit in judgment on any particular exercise of it; and that the
+circumstances of the late ministry having been but recently formed, of
+its possessing in a conspicuous degree the confidence of the great
+majority of the House of Commons, and of its being occupied at the
+moment of its dismissal with matters of high national concern, justified
+the House in calling on the new ministers to show valid reasons for its
+sudden dismissal. As to the dissolution, it was asked what misdemeanor
+the late House of Commons had committed? No difference had occurred
+between it and the other House of Parliament. It had passed no hostile
+vote against any administration. It had been in existence but a very
+short time. All these circumstances, they affirmed, made it reasonable
+for the Houses to express to his Majesty their disapprobation of the
+dissolution. Lord Morpeth argued, moreover, that the right of the House
+of Commons to inquire into such an exercise of the royal prerogative was
+proved by the example of Mr. Pitt, who, in 1784, had introduced into the
+speech from the throne a paragraph inviting Parliament to approve of the
+recent dissolution; and what Parliament could be asked to approve of, it
+manifestly had an equal right to censure. But the most vehement of the
+censures of the Opposition were directed against what Lord Morpeth
+called "the most unseemly huddling of offices in the single person of
+the Duke of Wellington; an unconstitutional concentration of
+responsibility and power, at which there was hardly an old Whig of the
+Rockingham school whose hair did not stand on end." He admitted that in
+the present instance the arrangement had only been provisional and
+temporary, and that "no harm had been done;" but, he asked, "what harm
+might not have been done? If the country had been suddenly obliged to go
+to war, who would have been responsible for the Foreign Department? If
+an insurrection of the negroes had occurred, who was responsible for the
+Colonial Office? If in Ireland any tithe dispute had arisen, who was
+responsible as Home-secretary?" And Lord Melbourne, though a speaker
+generally remarkable for moderation, on this subject went much farther;
+and, after urging that, "if one person held the situation of First Lord
+of the Treasury, and also that of Secretary of State for the Home
+Department, it would not only place in his hands without any control the
+appointment to every great office in the state, but a person so situated
+would also have the pecuniary resources of the state at his disposal
+without check or investigation," he proceeded to assert that "an
+intention to exercise those offices would amount to a treasonable
+misdemeanor." He did not, indeed, go so far as his late
+Attorney-general, Sir J. Campbell, who, in vexation at his loss of
+office, had even threatened the Duke with impeachment; but, though he
+admitted that the Duke had been free from the guilty intention of
+exercising the authority of these offices, he suggested that "the Lords
+ought to pass some resolution calculated to prevent so great a breach of
+the constitution from being drawn into a precedent."
+
+On the first point thus raised, for the dismissal of the late ministry
+without any such cause as is usually furnished by an adverse vote of one
+of the Houses of Parliament, Peel frankly admitted that his acceptance
+of office rendered him constitutionally responsible, though, as he also
+said, it was notorious that in fact he had, and could have had, no
+previous knowledge of it; but he denied that any constitutional question
+whatever was involved in it, since the King's right was denied by no
+one; and he could, therefore, only consent to discuss it as a question
+of policy and expediency. And, looking at it in this light, he regarded
+his defence as easy and complete. He contended that the events of the
+past year, the resignation of several of the subordinate ministers, and
+finally of Lord Grey himself, and the proposal which had been made to
+him (Peel) and several of his friends to coalesce with Lord Melbourne,
+rendered the act by which the late government had been removed perfectly
+justifiable on the part both of the King and of himself; that the King
+was justified in thinking a wholly fresh arrangement preferable to a
+re-arrangement of Lord Melbourne's cabinet; and he himself in obeying
+his sovereign's commands to form a new administration.
+
+The wisdom and propriety of the dissolution, too, could only be examined
+as a question of expediency; but in this instance every consideration
+not only recommended but compelled it. "When he undertook the arduous
+duties now imposed upon him, he did determine that he would leave no
+constitutional effort untried to enable him satisfactorily to discharge
+the trust imposed in him. He did fear that if he had met the late
+Parliament he should have been obstructed in his course, and obstructed
+in a manner and at a season which might have precluded an appeal to the
+people. It was the constant boast of the late government that the late
+Parliament had unbounded confidence in them. And, if that Parliament
+was, as had been constantly asserted, relied upon as ready to condemn
+him without a hearing, could any one be surprised at his appeal to the
+judgment of another, a higher and a fairer tribunal, the public sense of
+the people?" Precedent, too, was in his favor on this point, since,
+"whenever an extensive change of government had occurred, a dissolution
+of Parliament had followed;" and he referred to the year 1784, and to
+1806, when the administration of which Lord Grey was the leading member
+at once dissolved the existing Parliament on coming into office; though
+he believed "the present to be the first occasion on which a House of
+Commons had been invited to express its dissatisfaction at the exercise
+of the prerogative of dissolution."
+
+To the strictures of Lord Melbourne and Lord Morpeth on the Duke of
+Wellington's temporary assumption of a combination of offices, it was
+replied by Sir Robert and the Duke that, though there might be
+inconvenience from the assumption of all those powers by one individual,
+it was so far from being unconstitutional, that it was a common practice
+for the Secretary for one department to act for another during intervals
+of recreation, or periods of ill-health; that there was ample precedent
+for such a proceeding. In the last week of the life of Queen Anne, the
+Duke of Shrewsbury had united three of the greatest posts of the
+kingdom, those of Lord Treasurer, Lord Chamberlain, and Lord-lieutenant
+of Ireland, with the sanction of that great constitutional lawyer, Lord
+Somers. And in 1827 Mr. Canning had retained the seals of the Foreign
+Office for some weeks after his appointment as First Lord of the
+Treasury. Moreover, there was actually a law which provided that when
+the office of Chancellor of the Exchequer is vacant the seals of that
+office shall be delivered to the Chief-justice; and under this rule, in
+the latter part of the reign of George II., Chief-justice Lord Mansfield
+had continued finance-minister for above three months. And, as to the
+practical result of what had been done in the present instance, the Duke
+affirmed, what, indeed, was universally admitted, that the arrangement
+had from the first been understood to be merely temporary; that no
+inconvenience had resulted from it; indeed, that "not a single act had
+been done in any one of the offices which had not been essentially
+necessary for the service of the country."
+
+The first two points on which the ministry was assailed it seems
+superfluous to examine, since it is clear that the position taken up by
+Sir Robert Peel is impregnable: that, on every view of the principles
+and practice of the constitution, there was no doubt of the right of the
+sovereign to dismiss his ministers or to dissolve the Parliament at his
+pleasure; and that those acts can only be judged of by a consideration
+of their expediency. Inexpedient, indeed, the dismissal of the preceding
+ministry is generally considered to have been, even in the interest of
+the Conservatives themselves. But inexpedient the dissolution can hardly
+be pronounced to have been, since, though the new election failed to
+give them a majority in the House of Commons, it beyond all doubt
+greatly strengthened their minority. On the other hand, though it cannot
+be denied that the House of Commons has a perfect right to express its
+disapproval of any or every act of the minister, it is not so clear that
+Lord Morpeth's invitation to it to express its dissatisfaction with this
+particular act of dissolution was, on general principles, expedient or
+safe; since such a vote is making a perilous approach to claiming for
+the House the right of being asked for its consent to its own
+dissolution, a claim the admission of which had been one of the most
+fatal, if not the most fatal, of all the concessions of Charles I.
+
+As to the Duke of Wellington's assumption of a variety of offices, it is
+probable that when he first proposed to the King to confer them on him,
+he anticipated no objection whatever from any quarter, since he had so
+little idea of there being any impropriety in holding two offices, were
+they ever so apparently incongruous, if his Majesty should have directed
+him to do so, that seven years before, when he became Prime-minister, he
+had at first designed permanently to retain the command of the army in
+conjunction with the Treasury, and had only been induced to abandon the
+intention by the urgent remonstrance of Sir Robert Peel; and,
+constitutionally, there does not seem to be any limitation of the
+sovereign's power to confer offices, to unite or to divide them. Indeed,
+the different Secretary-ships of State seem to owe their existence
+entirely to his will, and not to any act of Parliament. He can diminish
+the number, if he should think fit, as he did in 1782, when, on the
+termination of the American war, he forbore to appoint a successor to
+Lord George Germaine, in Lord Rockingham's administration; or he can
+increase the numbers, as he did in 1794, when he revived the third
+Secretaryship, which he had suppressed twelve years before, without any
+act of Parliament being passed to direct either the suspension or the
+revival. He can even leave the most important offices vacant, and
+intrust the performance of their duties to a commission, as was done in
+this very year 1835, when the Great Seal was put in commission, and the
+duties, for above two years, were performed by commissioners, who had
+other duties also to discharge; and these instances may, perhaps,
+warrant the conclusion that the distribution of the different posts in
+what is generally known as the cabinet is dictated by considerations of
+what is practicable and expedient rather than by any positive and
+invariable rule or principle.
+
+Yet it does not follow that, because the constitution was not violated
+or endangered by such an arrangement, the leaders of the Opposition did
+other than their duty in calling attention to it. Unquestionably, it is
+historically true that the liberties of the people owe their
+preservation, growth, and vigor to the jealous watchfulness to check the
+first and slightest appearance of any attempt to encroach upon them,
+which has been constantly exercised from the very earliest times by an
+almost unbroken series of fearless and independent patriots. And in this
+instance the very novelty of such an arrangement as had taken place did
+of itself make criticism a duty; though it may also be thought that the
+critics acted wisely in contenting themselves with calling notice to it,
+and abstaining from asking Parliament to pronounce a formal judgment on
+it, since any express censure would have been unwarranted either by the
+facts of the case or by any inference to be drawn from previous usage,
+while an approval of it would wear the appearance not only of
+sanctioning, but even of inviting a repetition of an arrangement which,
+if ever attempted to be carried out in actual practice, must tend to
+grave inconvenience, if not to discredit.
+
+Lord Melbourne resumed office, and, being strengthened by the manifest
+inability of the opposite party to command the confidence of the House
+of Commons, began to apply himself with vigor to the carrying out of
+several measures of internal reform, some of which involved not only the
+property but the long-established rights of very considerable bodies,
+and, as so doing, have an importance in a constitutional point of view,
+besides that arising from their immediate effects. Peel had been equally
+alive to the desirableness, so cogent as almost to amount to a moral
+necessity, of introducing reforms into more than one old institution,
+such as should bring them more into harmony with the spirit of the age,
+remodelling or terminating some arrangements which were manifest abuses,
+and others which, though, if dispassionately examined and properly
+understood, they, perhaps, were not really grievances, yet in their
+operation caused such discontent and heart-burnings that they were as
+mischievous as many others far more indefensible in theory. And,
+short-lived as his administration had been, he had found time to frame
+and introduce an extensive measure of Church reform, not only dealing
+with the question of tithes, the levy and collection of which in some of
+their details had long been made subjects of bitter complaints by the
+farmers, but including also provision for the creation of two new
+bishoprics, those of Ripon and Manchester. No part of his measure was
+more imperatively called for by the present circumstances of the nation,
+or of greater importance in its future operation. There had been no
+increase in the number of bishops since the reign of Elizabeth; but
+since her time not only had the population of the entire kingdom been
+quadrupled, but some districts which had then been very scantily peopled
+had become exceedingly populous. These districts had hitherto been
+almost destitute of Episcopal supervision, which now was thus to be
+supplied to them. But the new legislation did more. It might be expected
+that the growth of the population would continue, and would in time
+require a farther and corresponding increase of the Episcopate; and the
+erection of these new dioceses was, therefore, not only the supplying of
+a present want, but the foundation of a system for increasing the
+efficiency of the Church which should be capable of gradual progressive
+expansion, as the growth of the population in various districts might be
+found to require additional facilities for supervision. And the judgment
+with which the new arrangement met the requirements of the community may
+be regarded as proved by the circumstance that now, after the lapse of
+nearly half a century, it is maintained in active operation, and is
+admitted by all parties not only to be of the greatest practical
+benefit, but also to have a moral effect scarcely less valuable in the
+degree in which it has stimulated the application of private munificence
+to the great work of Church extension.
+
+But before Lord Grey quitted office his government had also called the
+attention of Parliament to the necessity of a large municipal reform,
+which, indeed, it seemed to them that the Reform Bill had bound them, in
+all consistency, to introduce. In the speech with which the King had
+closed the session of 1833, he had informed the Houses that he had
+"directed commissions to be issued for investigating the state of the
+municipal corporations throughout the United Kingdom, the result of
+whose inquiries would enable them to mature some measure which might
+seem best fitted to place the internal government of corporate cities
+and towns upon a solid foundation in respect of their finances, their
+judicature, and their police." He reminded them that they had recently
+passed acts "for giving constitutions upon sound principles to the royal
+and parliamentary boroughs of Scotland," and warned them that "their
+attention would hereafter be called to the expediency of extending
+similar advantages to the unincorporated towns in England which had now
+acquired the right of returning members to Parliament." The commission
+of which his Majesty thus spoke had now presented its report, strongly
+condemnatory of the existing system in almost every point of view; of
+the constitution and mode of election of the existing corporations, and
+of their government of the towns over which they presided. It declared
+that "even where they existed in their least imperfect form, and were
+most rightfully administered, they were inadequate to the wants of the
+present state of society." But they charged them also with positive
+offences of no venial kind. "They had perverted their powers to
+political ends, sacrificing local interests to party purposes. They had
+diverted from their legitimate use revenues which ought to have been
+applied for the public advantage, wasting them in many instances for the
+benefit of individuals; sometimes even employing for purposes of
+corruption funds originally intended for charitable uses." And they
+asserted that this too common misconduct of these bodies had engendered
+"among a great majority of the inhabitants of the incorporated towns a
+general and just dissatisfaction with their municipal institutions, a
+distrust of the self-elected municipal councils, and of the municipal
+magistracy, tainting with suspicion the local administration of
+justice." And therefore they "felt it their duty to represent to his
+Majesty that the existing municipal corporations of England and Wales
+neither possessed nor deserved the confidence and respect of his
+Majesty's subjects; and that a thorough reform must be effected before
+they could become what they ought to be, useful and efficient
+instruments of local government."
+
+It would be superfluous here to repeat the story of the rise of the
+boroughs, whose gradual acquisition of charters, with privileges and
+powers of various degrees, has been sufficiently investigated by
+Hallam.[237] What the Parliament had now to deal with was the way in
+which the system worked in the nineteenth century; and here it must be
+confessed that the report of the commissioners, severe as it was, did in
+no degree exaggerate the prevailing evils. The corporations had
+gradually become self-elected oligarchies of the worst kind. It must be
+admitted that, in perverting their authority to political purposes, they
+might plead the excuse that they were but following the example set them
+by the ministers of William III., who introduced into their bill for
+restoring the corporations which James II. had suppressed clauses
+manifestly intended to preserve the ascendency of the Whig party, "by
+keeping the Church or Tory faction out of"[238] them. But no such
+palliation (if, indeed, that had any right to be called a palliation)
+could be alleged for their abuse of the trusts committed to them; abuse
+which, if committed by single individuals, would have been branded, and
+perhaps punished, as malversation and fraud of the deepest dye. A
+sufficient specimen of the kind and extent of their misdeeds in one
+branch of their duties was afforded by a single paragraph of Lord John
+Russell's speech, in which he affirmed that, in some of the reports of
+their management of charitable estates committed to their care, it was
+proved that "the property, instead of being employed for the general
+benefit of the town, had been consumed for the partial benefit of a few
+individuals, and not unfrequently in the feastings and entertainments in
+which the mayor and other corporators had been in the habit of
+indulging. In some not very large boroughs these expenses had amounted
+to L500 and L600 a year; and the enjoyment had been confined to freemen
+of only one party." And the perpetuity of this mismanagement was in most
+instances secured by the members of the corporation themselves electing
+their new colleagues on the occasion of any vacancy.
+
+To put an end to this discreditable state of affairs, the government had
+prepared a very sweeping scheme of reform, though that it was not too
+sweeping was proved by the approval with which not only its principle
+but most of its details were received by the greater part of the
+Opposition; the leading principle being, to quote the words of the
+minister in introducing the bill, "that there should be one uniform
+government instituted, applicable to all; one uniform franchise for the
+purpose of election; and a like description of officers in each, with
+the exception of some of the larger places, in which there would be a
+recorder, or some other such magistrate. The first thing to be amended
+was the mode of election to the corporation, which was now to be
+intrusted to all such rate-payers in each borough as had paid poor-rates
+for three years, and resided within seven miles of the place." Lord John
+Russell had considered, he said, "whether this franchise should be
+limited to those paying a certain amount of rates; to the ten-pound
+householders, for instance, to whom the parliamentary franchise was
+confined;" but he decided on proposing to extend it to _all_
+rate-payers, because, according to the established principle, to the
+known and recognized principle of the constitution, it is right that
+those who contribute their money should have a voice in the election of
+the persons by whom the money is expended. The old modes of acquiring
+the freedom of a corporation, such as birth, apprenticeship, etc., were
+to be abolished, as also were all exclusive rights of trade, vested
+rights, however, being preserved. The next point to be decided was the
+composition of the corporation which these rate-payers were to elect,
+and the ministerial proposal was that each corporation should consist of
+a mayor, aldermen, and councillors, possessing a certain amount of
+property as a qualification, and varying in number according to the
+population of the borough; the larger towns being also divided into
+wards, with a certain number of common-councilmen and aldermen to be
+chosen in each ward. The mayor was to be a yearly officer; of the
+aldermen and councillors a certain number were to retire each year,
+being, however, capable of re-election. The mayor was to be elected by
+the councils, and was to be a magistrate during his year of office. And
+the body thus constituted was to have the entire government of the
+borough; of its police, its charities, and generally, and most
+especially, of the raising and expenditure of its funds,[239] which had
+been too often dealt with in a manner not only wasteful, but profligate.
+Cases had been brought forward in which "corporations had been incurring
+debts year by year, while the members were actually dividing among
+themselves the proceeds of the loans they raised." The revenue derived
+from charitable estates had been "no less scandalously mismanaged." And
+the bill provided for the appointment of finance committees, trustees,
+auditors, and a regular publication of all the accounts, as the only
+efficient remedy and preventive of such abuses. The whole police of the
+town and administration of justice was also to be completely under the
+control of the council; and for the appointment of magistrates the
+council was to have the power of recommending to the crown those whom
+they thought fit to receive the commission of the peace; and in the
+large towns it should have power also to provide a salary for
+stipendiary magistrates. Another clause provided that towns which could
+not as yet be included in the bill, since they had never been
+incorporated, might obtain charters of incorporation by petition to the
+Privy Council.
+
+Such were the general provisions of this great measure of reform; a bill
+similar in principle having already been enacted for Scotland, and
+another being shortly after passed, with such variations of detail as
+the differences in the circumstances of the country required, for
+Ireland. Some of the clauses, especially those which preserved the
+vested rights of freemen and their families, and which required a
+certain amount of property or rating qualifications in the town
+councillors, were not originally included in the bill, but were inserted
+as amendments in the House of Lords; and it may be remarked that the
+result of the discussion in that House afforded a proof of the sagacity
+of those peers who, though conscientiously opposed to the Reform Bill,
+preferred allowing it to pass by their own retirement from the final
+divisions to driving the minister to carry his point by a creation of
+peers, since the avoidance of such an addition to their numbers as had
+been threatened enabled them now to force the adoption of these
+amendments on a reluctant minister. And it seems difficult to deny that
+the first was required by justice, and that the second was most
+desirable in the interests of the measure itself. Without it the town
+councillors, from among whom the mayor was to be chosen, might have been
+selected from the poorest, the least educated, and least independent
+class of the rate-payers. In some boroughs, or in some wards of many
+boroughs, it may be regarded as certain that they would have been so
+chosen; and such an admixture of unfit persons would have tended to
+bring some degree of discredit on the whole council, while to the
+successful inauguration of a new system the establishment of a general
+feeling of respect for it and confidence in it was of primary
+importance. The danger, too, of so ill-judged a selection would have
+been greatest in the larger boroughs, those being, at the same time, the
+very places in which the occasional difficulty of maintaining order and
+tranquillity made it even more necessary than in smaller towns that the
+council should enjoy the esteem and confidence of their fellow-citizens.
+
+The principle that every man who contributed to the rates had a right to
+claim a voice in the election of those who were to expend them, which
+the minister laid down as the justification of the clause conferring the
+municipal franchise on all the rate-payers, was strongly contested by
+Sir Robert Peel, though neither he nor those of his party in the Upper
+House proposed any alteration of the bill in this respect; but he
+pointed out that, though Lord John affirmed it to be the known and
+recognized principle of the constitution, he had not acted on it in the
+Reform Bill; and it is certainly open to question whether the adoption
+of some limitation would not have been an improvement on the present
+measure. The doctrine established in this instance by Lord John gave a
+preponderance at every municipal election to mere numbers, since the
+poorest class is everywhere the most numerous, and its admission led
+almost inevitably to a reduction of the parliamentary franchise at some
+future day, though certainly at this time, and for many years afterward,
+Lord John was far from contemplating any alteration of the Reform Bill,
+but, on the contrary, took every opportunity of proclaiming his
+adherence to it as a final solution of the question.
+
+But though in this particular it is possible that the bill might have
+been improved, it must be allowed to have been a measure very creditable
+to its framers. Few reforms have been conceived in a more judicious and
+more moderate spirit; few have been so carefully limited to the removal
+of real and proved abuses, and the prevention of their recurrence, while
+avoiding any concessions to the insidious demands of revolutionists, or
+the ill-regulated fancies of metaphysical theorists. It was a reform
+strictly in accordance with some of the most important principles of the
+constitution, as they have been gradually developed by the practical
+experience of successive generations. It combined with felicitous skill
+representative with local government; it secured uniformity in working,
+and that peculiarly English principle of publicity, without which the
+best-devised system cannot long be preserved from degeneracy.
+
+The Church reforms in England and Ireland, which were carried out about
+the same time, cannot be said to have involved any constitutional
+principle, though one of them greatly extended the principle of
+religious toleration and indulgence to the Dissenters of various sects.
+No alteration had been made in the Marriage Act of 1754, which declared
+it indispensable to the validity of a marriage that it should be
+performed in a church and by a clergyman of the Established Church. And
+it was not strange that this should be felt as a grievance by those who
+were not in communion with that Church. But some of the Dissenting sects
+had an additional cause of discontent in the words of the marriage
+service, which gave a religious character to the ceremony, while they
+regarded it as a civil contract. In his short administration Sir Robert
+Peel had recognized the validity of the arguments against the unmodified
+maintenance of the existing law, and had framed a measure calculated, in
+his view, to give the Dissenters the relief their title to which could
+not be denied. But his bill had been extinguished by his retirement. And
+Lord John Russell now availed himself of the machinery of another
+measure, which he introduced at the same time, to make the relief
+somewhat wider and more effective.
+
+Hitherto there was no record of births and marriages beyond that which
+was preserved in the registers of different parishes, which in former
+years had in many instances been carelessly and inaccurately kept. But
+at the beginning of 1836, the ministers, justly urging that it was
+important, in a national point of view, both with regard to the security
+of titles to property, and to that knowledge of the state of population
+the value of which was recognized by the establishment of the practice
+of taking a decennial census, that there should be a general register of
+all such occurrences, introduced a bill to establish a registry and
+registrar in every Poor-law union, with a farther registry for each
+county, and a chief or still more general one in London for the whole
+kingdom, subject to the authority of the Poor-law Commissioners. And by
+a second bill they farther proposed that the registries to be thus
+established should be offices at which those who desired to do so might
+contract purely civil marriages. Previous clauses in it provided that
+members of any sect of Protestant Dissenters might be married in their
+own chapels, and by ministers of their own persuasion. After enactments
+removing all the civil disabilities under which Nonconformists had
+labored for one hundred and fifty years had been placed on the
+statute-book, it was clearly inconsistent in the highest degree to
+retain still more offensive and unreasonable religious disabilities, and
+to deny to them the right of being married by their own ministers,
+according to the rites most agreeable to their consciences or
+prejudices. And though some of the details of the ministerial measure
+were objected to and slightly altered in its passage through Parliament,
+the general principle was admitted by the warmest friends and most
+recognized champions of the Established Church, who wisely felt that a
+bulwark which is too ill-placed or too unsubstantial to be defended, is
+often a treacherous source of weakness rather than strength, and that a
+temperate recognition of the validity of claims founded on justice was
+the best protection against others which had no such foundation, and
+that measures such as these adopted in a spirit of generous conciliation
+could only strengthen the Church by taking at least one weapon from the
+hands of its enemies.
+
+Another of the measures relating to the Church, of which Peel had
+prepared a sketch, had for its object the removal of a grievance of
+which the members of the Church itself had long been complaining, the
+mode of the collection of tithe. It would be superfluous here to
+endeavor to trace the origin of tithes, or the purposes beyond the
+sustentation of the clergymen to which they were originally
+applied.[240] They had undoubtedly been established in England some time
+before the Conquest, and the principle that the land should support the
+National Church was admitted by a large majority of the population; it
+may probably be said with something nearly approaching unanimity on the
+part of those who really paid it, namely, the land-owners. The objection
+to the tithe system was founded rather on the way in which it worked,
+operating, as Lord John Russell described it, as "a discouragement to
+industry; a penalty on agricultural skill; a heavy mulct on those who
+expended the most capital and displayed the greatest skill in the
+cultivation of the land." The present mode of levying the tithes forced
+the clergy to forbearance at the expense of what they deemed to be their
+rights, or led them to enforce them at the expense of the influence
+which they ought to possess with their parishioners, compelling them to
+lose either their income by their indulgence, or their proper weight and
+popularity in the parish by the exaction of what the law gave them for
+"the support of themselves and their families." And this dilemma was
+felt so keenly by the clergy themselves, that it had become a very
+general feeling with them that, "if any sort of commutation could be
+devised, they would be delighted to be delivered from this objectionable
+mode of payment." Indeed, Sir Robert Peel, whose measure of the
+preceding year had been chiefly directed to the encouragement of
+voluntary commutations, had stated to the House that there were already
+two thousand parishes in the kingdom in which a commutation between the
+clergyman and his parishioners had been agreed upon, and established as
+a durable settlement by separate acts of Parliament. Indeed,
+arrangements of this kind existed very generally; the parishes in which
+the tithe was taken in kind being comparatively few, and the plan
+usually adopted being for the occupier of land to pay the incumbent a
+fixed annual sum bearing a certain proportion to his rent. But
+arrangements which were optional were, of course, liable to be
+rescinded; and Peel desired to establish a system which should be
+universal and permanent. And with this view he had designed the
+appointment of a temporary commission, one member of which should be
+nominated by the Primate, as the representative of the Church, under
+whose supervision the tithes of every parish in the kingdom should be
+commuted into a rent-charge, regulated partly by the composition which
+had hitherto been paid, and partly by the average price of grain--wheat,
+barley, and oats. It was no new idea, since as far back as 1791 Pitt had
+proposed a general commutation of tithes for a corn rent, and had
+submitted a plan with that object to the Primate, though circumstances
+of which we have no accurate knowledge prevented him from proceeding
+with it.[241] Objections[242] were taken to this last part of the
+arrangement, chiefly because it would render perpetual the terms of
+existing compositions, the extreme augmentation of them which was
+provided for in the bill being only ten per cent., while it was
+notorious that the majority of incumbents had shown such liberality in
+these matters that the compositions rarely amounted to two-thirds of the
+sum to which they were legally entitled. And it was hardly denied that
+the measure did involve some sacrifice of the extreme legal rights of
+the clergy; but it was urged and generally felt by the most judicious
+friends of the Church that the peace and harmony which might be expected
+to be the fruit of the measure was worth some sacrifice, and the bill
+was passed with very general approval; a bill on similar principles,
+with such variations as were required by the differences between the two
+countries, being also passed for Ireland.
+
+The last measure on ecclesiastical subjects was also chiefly of a
+financial character, though its details were calculated, some directly,
+others indirectly, to produce benefits of a still more important nature.
+The condition of the property of the bishops and the ecclesiastical
+chapters had long been a subject of censorious remark. The various
+dioceses differed greatly in extent, as did, therefore, the labors of
+the diocesans. Some sees contained above 1000, one (London) even above
+1200 parishes; others contained under 150. The revenues of some were
+very large, in one or two instances approaching L20,000 a year, while
+those of others scarcely exceeded L1000 or L1500 a year, thus affording
+incomes palpably inadequate to the support of the Episcopal dignity; so
+inadequate, indeed, that they were generally supplemented by the
+addition of some better endowed deanery or canonry. It was universally
+felt that such a deficiency and such a mode of supplying it were in
+themselves a scandal, which was greatly augmented by the system of
+translations to which it had given birth. The poorer bishoprics would
+hardly have been accepted at all had they not been regarded as
+stepping-stones to others of greater value; and the hope of such
+promotion had in some cases the not unnatural, however deplorable,
+effect of making the bishop anxious to please the minister of the day,
+to whom alone he could look for translation, by parliamentary
+subservience; and the still more mischievous result (if possible) of
+rendering the whole Bench liable to the same degrading suspicion; while
+the canonries and prebends in the different chapters, whose revenues
+also varied greatly, were in every diocese so numerous that they had
+become nearly sinecures, the duties rarely exceeding residence for a
+month, or, at the outside, six weeks in a year.
+
+These abuses (for such they could not be denied to be) had attracted the
+attention of Sir Robert Peel, who had appointed a commission, of which
+many of the highest dignitaries of the Church were members, and who,
+after very careful investigation and deliberation, presented a series of
+reports on which the ministry framed its measure. They proposed, as has
+already been mentioned in connection with the labors of Sir Robert Peel,
+an amalgamation of four of the smaller bishoprics at their next vacancy,
+in order hereafter to provide for the addition of two new ones at
+Manchester, or Lancaster, and Ripon, without augmenting the number of
+bishops. Lord Melbourne apparently feared to provoke the hostility of
+some of the extreme Reformers, who had recently proposed to deprive the
+bishops of their seats in the House of Lords, if he should attempt to
+increase the number of the spiritual peers; though, as their number had
+been stationary ever since the Reformation, while that of the lay peers
+had been quadrupled, such an objection hardly seemed entitled to so much
+consideration. Another clause was directed toward the establishment of
+greater equality between the revenues of the different bishoprics, a
+step which, besides its inherent reasonableness and equity, would
+extinguish the desire of promotion by translation, except in a few
+specified instances. Various reasons, sufficiently obvious and
+notorious, rendered the two archbishoprics, and the bishoprics of
+London, Durham, and Winchester, more costly to the occupants than the
+other dioceses; and these were, therefore, left in possession of larger
+revenues than the rest, proportionate to their wider duties or heavier
+charges. But all the others were to be nearly equal, none exceeding
+L5500, and none falling below L4500; while the five richer sees were
+also the only ones to which a prelate could be translated from another
+diocese. It followed, almost as a matter of course, that the practice of
+allowing a bishop to hold any other preferment was to cease with the
+cessation of the cause that had led to such an abuse.
+
+Another part of the bill provided for the suppression of such canonries
+or prebends as might fairly be considered superfluous. Four were
+considered sufficient for the proper performance of the duties of each
+cathedral; and the extinction (after the lives of the present holders)
+of the rest was designed to form a large fund, to be at the disposal of
+the Ecclesiastical Commissioners,[243] and to be applied by them chiefly
+to meet the wants of the more populous parishes in different large
+towns, for which it had hitherto been difficult to make any
+provision,[244] by contributing to the erection of additional churches,
+by increasing the incomes of the incumbents in cases where it was
+insufficient, or in any other way which the practical experience of the
+members of the commission might suggest. One very important reform of a
+different kind was also provided for in the abolition of pluralities,
+the bill prohibiting the holding of two livings by the same person
+except they were within ten miles of each other. The measure was
+objected to by Sir Robert Inglis, who had represented Oxford as the
+peculiar champion of Protestant and Church principles ever since 1829,
+and by a party which shared his views, as one calculated to be "fatal to
+the best interests of the Church." They looked on the property of the
+Church and everything connected with it as invested with so peculiar a
+character, that they not only contested the right of Parliament to take
+any step to diminish its revenues or to change the employment of them,
+but they even "disputed its right to deprive one class of the clergy of
+any portion of their revenues for the purpose of distributing it among
+another." But the distinction thus made between Church property and that
+of any other public body seems one which can hardly be supported. The
+purposes for which ecclesiastical chapters or officials have been
+endowed with possessions and revenues are undoubtedly of a more sacred
+character than the duties imposed on lay corporations; but that
+consideration cannot be regarded as affecting the tenure of those
+possessions, or as inconsistent with the doctrine that they are national
+property, bestowed by the nation on the Church for the service and
+advantage of the people; deeply interested not only in the maintenance
+of an Established Church, but in that Church being in the highest
+possible degree efficient for its holy objects. Being so bestowed and
+appropriated, that property must, on every principle of the
+constitution, be subject to the control of the national Parliament. And
+surely that control could never be more legitimately exerted than in
+carrying out the recommendations of a commission which numbered among
+its members several of the prelates of the Church, whose profession and
+position were a guarantee for their anxiety to preserve all the rights
+of the Church which contributed to its credit or efficiency; while their
+matured experience enabled them better than any other men to judge how
+to reconcile the maintenance of its dignity with the extension of its
+usefulness.
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 226: The second resolution affirmed that "this House looks
+forward to a progressive improvement in the character of the slave
+population, such as may prepare them for a participation in those civil
+rights and privileges which are enjoyed by other classes of his
+Majesty's subjects." (Stapleton's "Life of Canning," iii., 98, where
+also large extracts from the minister's speech are given.)]
+
+[Footnote 227: Trinidad, St. Lucia, and Demerara were the only British
+islands which had not separate Legislatures.]
+
+[Footnote 228: Miss Martineau. "History of the Thirty Years' Peace,"
+book iv., c. viii.]
+
+[Footnote 229: Alison, "History of Europe," 2d series, c. xxxi., sec.
+74.]
+
+[Footnote 230: In the debate on the Registration Bill, in 1836, Lord
+John Russell stated that two hundred and twenty eight unions had already
+been formed in England and Wales, and that it might be calculated that
+when the whole country was divided into unions the entire number would
+amount to something more than eight hundred.]
+
+[Footnote 231: See Lord Althorp's speech, of parts of which an abstract
+is given in the text.--_Parliamentary Debates_, xxii., April 17.]
+
+[Footnote 232: Lord Althorp made the following frightful statement of
+the crimes committed in the province of Leinster alone in the last three
+months of 1832 and the first three of 1833: 207 murders, 271 cases of
+arson. The assaults attended with grievous personal injury were above
+1000; burglaries and robberies, above 3000.]
+
+[Footnote 233: It was often asserted that fourteen-fifteenths of the
+land in Ireland belonged to Protestants, but this estimate was,
+probably, an exaggeration.]
+
+[Footnote 234: "Memoirs of Sir Robert Peel," ii., 3, 19.]
+
+[Footnote 235: "Memoirs of Sir Robert Peel," pp. 31, 32.]
+
+[Footnote 236: "One important question I found practically, and perhaps
+unavoidably, decided before my arrival, namely, the dissolution of the
+existing Parliament. Every one seemed to have taken it for granted that
+the Parliament must be dissolved, and preparations had accordingly been
+made almost universally for the coming contest."--_Peel's Memoirs_, ii.,
+43.]
+
+[Footnote 237: "Middle Ages," ii., 31 _seq_. See also Stubbs,
+"Constitutional History," i., 82-92 _et seq._]
+
+[Footnote 238: See Hallam's "Constitutional History," ii., 155.]
+
+[Footnote 239: This was a matter of no small importance. The number of
+boroughs included in the bill was 183, having a population of about two
+millions. Their annual income was stated by Lord John Russell to be as
+nearly as possible L2000 a year for each, being L367,000; but their
+annual expenditure exceeded that amount by L10,000, being L377,000;
+"besides which there was a debt of L2,000,000 owing by these bodies."]
+
+[Footnote 240: See Hallam, "Middle Ages," ii., 205-207.]
+
+[Footnote 241: "Life of Pitt," ii., 131. Lord Stanhope imagines that the
+plan was relinquished in consequence of discouraging comments by the
+Archbishop (Dr. Moore).]
+
+[Footnote 242: These objections were founded on the following
+calculations, or something similar to them. The tithe was the tenth of
+the produce. In letting estates it was estimated that a farm ought to
+produce three rents; in other words, that a farm let at L1 an acre ought
+to produce yearly L3 an acre. One-tenth of three pounds, or 6s.,
+therefore, was what the clergyman was entitled to claim. Out of this,
+however, he had to defray the cost of collection, which might, perhaps,
+be one shilling, leaving him five shillings. But the average of
+compositions over the whole kingdom was under 2s. 9d., or
+eleven-twentieths of what he was entitled to; and if augmented by ten
+per cent., it would not exceed three shillings.]
+
+[Footnote 243: The fund so created was expected to amount to L130,000 a
+year.]
+
+[Footnote 244: As instances of the want of church-room in such towns,
+Lord John cited the dioceses of London, Chester, York, Lichfield, and
+Coventry, containing a population of 2,590,000 persons, with church
+accommodation for only 276,000, or one-ninth of the population; the
+Commissioners, from whose report he was quoting, reckoning that
+church-room ought to be provided for one-third.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+
+Death of William IV., and Accession of Queen Victoria.--Rise of the
+Chartists.--Resignation of Lord Melbourne in 1839, and his Resumption of
+Office.--Marriage of the Queen, and Consequent Arrangements.--The
+Precedence of the Prince, etc.--Post-office Reform.--War in
+Afghanistan.--Discontent in Jamaica.--Insurrection in Canada.--New
+Constitution for Canada and other Colonies.--Case of Stockdale and
+Hansard.
+
+
+The reforms mentioned in the preceding chapter were the last measures of
+the reign of William IV. In the summer of the next year, 1837, he died,
+and was succeeded in his British, though not in his Hanoverian,
+dominions by our present gracious sovereign, who had only just arrived
+at the age which entitled her to exercise the full authority of the
+crown. The change was calculated to strengthen the crown, by enlisting
+the chivalrous feelings of all that was best in the nation in the
+support of a youthful Queen, and in a lesser degree it for a time
+strengthened the ministry also; but, with respect to the latter, the
+feeling did not last long. For the next three years the summers were
+very unfavorable to the farmer; the harvests were bad; the inevitable
+accompaniment of a rise in prices had caused severe and general
+distress, and distress had produced clamorous discontent, and in some
+districts formidable riots. It had been greatly aggravated in the
+manufacturing counties by the operations of the trades-unions, which had
+gradually put forth pretensions to regulate the wages and other
+conditions of work, and had enforced them with such tyrannical violence,
+not flinching from the foulest crimes, that in many instances they had
+driven the masters to close their factories rather than submit to their
+mandates; and in others had compelled the workmen themselves to
+discontinue their labors, thus spreading destitution among thousands
+whose earnings, if they had been allowed to consult their own wishes,
+would have been amply sufficient for the support of their families;[245]
+and the evil had grown to such a height, that in 1838 a committee was
+appointed by the House of Commons to investigate the whole subject of
+trade combinations. But the turbulent spirit excited by this distress
+did not now confine itself to single outbreaks of violence, but, under
+the guidance of some demagogues of a more methodical turn of mind than
+usual, developed itself in a systematic organization having for its
+object what they called "the people's charter," which aimed at a total
+revolution of the existing parliamentary system, with the avowed design
+that, when adopted, it should eventually lead to an entire
+reconstruction of the government. The Chartists, as they called
+themselves, had advocates even in Parliament, who presented their
+petitions to the House of Commons, and tried, though unsuccessfully, to
+give them importance by the appointment of a committee to investigate
+the character of the reforms which they demanded. They were not,
+however, contented with peaceful modes of pressing their demands, but,
+in the course of the summer of 1839, broke out in formidable riots in
+different parts of the country. At Birmingham they set fire to different
+parts of the town, carrying on their work of pillage and destruction to
+such a pitch that the Duke of Wellington compared the condition of the
+town to one taken by storm in regular warfare; and at Newport, in
+Monmouthshire, they even planned and carried out an attack on the troops
+quartered in the district. But this violence led for a time to the
+suppression of the movement, the leaders in the Newport riots being
+convicted of high-treason; and, though the government forbore to put the
+extreme severities of the law in force against them, those who remained
+unconvicted had been taught by their example the danger which they
+incurred by such proceedings; and some years elapsed before a series of
+revolutionary troubles on the Continent again gave a momentary
+encouragement to those in this country who sympathized with the
+revolutionists, and prompted them to another attempt to force their
+views upon the government and the people.
+
+It had nearly, however, been another ministry on whom the task of
+quelling these riots had fallen. Though, as has been already said, Lord
+Melbourne's cabinet derived a momentary strength from the accession of a
+young Queen, the support it thus acquired did not last; and in May,
+1839, having been defeated on a measure of colonial policy, which will
+be mentioned hereafter, the cabinet resigned. The Queen intrusted the
+task of forming a new administration to Sir Robert Peel, who undertook
+it with a reasonable confidence that he should be able to hold his
+ground better than formerly, now that the retirement of his predecessors
+was their own act, and admitted by them to have been caused by a
+consciousness of the divisions among their supporters and their own
+consequent weakness. He had the greater reason for such confidence,
+since two of the colleagues of Lord Grey who had refused his offers in
+1834, Lord Stanley and Sir James Graham, were now willing to unite with
+him; and he had almost completed his arrangements, when he was stopped
+by an unexpected, though not altogether unprecedented, impediment. It
+will be recollected that, in 1812, some of the arrangements for the
+formation of a new administration on the death of Mr. Perceval were
+impeded by a doubt which was felt in some quarters whether the new
+ministers would be allowed to remove one or two officers of the
+household, to whom the Regent was generally understood to be greatly
+attached, but who were hostile to the party which hoped to come into
+power, though it was afterward known that these officers had felt
+themselves bound to retire as soon as the arrangements in contemplation
+should be completed.[246] Sir Robert Peel was now met by a difficulty of
+the same kind, but one which the retiring ministers had the address to
+convert into a real obstacle. The Queen, who had warm affections, but
+who could not possibly have yet acquired any great knowledge of
+business, had become attached to the ladies whom Lord Melbourne had
+appointed to the chief places in her household. It had never occurred to
+her to regard their offices in a political light; and, consequently,
+when she found that Sir Robert considered it indispensable that some
+changes should be made in those appointments, she at once refused her
+consent, terming his proposal one "contrary to usage and repugnant to
+her feelings." Sir Robert, however, felt bound to adhere to his request
+for the removal of some of the ladies in question; for, in fact, they
+were the wives and sisters of his predecessors, and a continuance of
+their daily intercourse with the Queen might reasonably be expected to
+have some influence over her Majesty's judgment of the measures which he
+might feel it his duty to propose. Such a difficulty could not have
+arisen under a male sovereign; but Lord Melbourne himself had departed
+from the ordinary practice when he surrounded his royal mistress with
+ladies so closely identified with his cabinet. It is very possible that
+he had originally made the appointments without any such design, from
+the careless indifference which was his most marked characteristic; but
+he cannot be so easily acquitted when, in reply to the Queen's
+application to him for advice on the subject, he, being joined in his
+assertion by Lord John Russell, assured her that Sir Robert Peel's
+demand was unjustifiable and unprecedented. Supported by the positive
+dictum of the ministers on whose judgment she had hitherto been bound to
+rely, the Queen naturally adhered to her decision of refusing to permit
+the removal of the ladies in question, and the result was that Sir
+Robert Peel declined to take office under circumstances of difficulty
+beyond those to which every new minister must of necessity be exposed,
+and Lord Melbourne and his colleagues resumed their posts. The
+transaction was, of course, canvassed in both Houses of Parliament. Sir
+Robert Peel and the Duke of Wellington, who was the spokesman of the
+party in the House of Lords, defended their refusal to undertake the
+government on any other condition than that for which they had
+stipulated, on the ground that the authority to make such changes in the
+household as they had proposed was indispensable, as a proof of their
+possession of her Majesty's confidence; while Lord Melbourne, with a
+strange exaggeration, defended the advice which he had given her Majesty
+by the assertion that to have complied with Sir Robert Peel's proposal
+would have been "inconsistent with her personal honor." Other arguments
+on the same side were based on the alleged cruelty of separating her
+Majesty "from the society of her earliest friends, her old and constant
+companions;" an argument which was disposed of by Lord Brougham's
+remark, that till she had become Queen (not yet two years before) she
+had had no acquaintance with them whatever.[247]
+
+But it is needless to dwell at any length on the case, in which all
+subsequent historians and political critics, however generally
+prepossessed in favor of the Liberal ministers, have given up their
+position as untenable. Her Majesty herself kept strictly on the path of
+the constitution in guiding herself by the counsels of those who, till
+their successors were appointed, were still her responsible advisers.
+But the course which they recommended was absolutely irreconcilable with
+one fundamental principle of the constitution--the universal
+responsibility of the ministers. In denying the right of the incoming
+ministers to remodel the household (or any other body of offices) in
+whatever degree they might consider requisite, they were clearly
+limiting the ministerial authority. To limit the ministerial authority
+is to limit the ministerial responsibility; to limit the ministerial
+responsibility is to impose some portion of responsibility (that portion
+from which it relieves the minister) on the sovereign himself, a
+dangerous consequence from which the constitution most carefully
+protects him. In fact, that the advice Lord Melbourne gave was
+indefensible was tacitly confessed by himself, when, on the recurrence
+of the same emergency two years later, he was compelled to recommend a
+different course;[248] and the ladies whom Sir Robert had considered it
+necessary to remove anticipated their dismissal by voluntary
+resignation. It may be added that, at the close of this same year, Lord
+Melbourne himself insisted on nominating the private secretary to the
+Prince whom the Queen was about to marry, though no one could pretend
+that offices in his household were as important as those in that of the
+sovereign; and though, if there was any post in which the Prince might
+have been supposed to have a right to an unfettered choice, that might
+have been supposed to have been the office of his private
+secretary.[249]
+
+Her Majesty's marriage with Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg, her first
+cousin--one tending as greatly to the happiness of herself and the
+advantage of the nation as any royal marriage recorded in history--took
+place in the beginning of 1840; and in the preparatory arrangements--
+matters of far greater consequence to the Queen's feelings than any
+appointments in the household--the ministry, by singular mismanagement,
+contrived to force the consideration of other constitutional questions
+on Parliament in such a way that the conclusions which were adopted,
+however inevitable, could hardly fail to be mortifying and vexatious to
+her Majesty, in whose cup of happiness at such a moment special care
+ought rather to have been taken to prevent the admixture of any such
+alloy. In the matter of the annuity to be settled on the young Prince,
+the Opposition must, indeed, share the blame with the minister. If it
+was unpardonable carelessness in the latter to omit the usual practice
+of previously consulting the leaders of the Opposition on the amount of
+the grant to be proposed, it was not the less impolitic and unworthy of
+such men as the Duke and Sir Robert Peel to show their disapproval of
+the inattention by a curtailment of the grant. The sum proposed, L50,000
+a year, was fairly justified by the fact of its being the same which
+twenty-four years before had been settled on the Prince's uncle,
+Leopold, on his marriage with the Princess Charlotte. Indeed, if there
+were to be any difference, the circumstances might have been regarded as
+warranting an increase rather than a diminution of it. Money was
+certainly more plentiful in 1840 than in 1816, and the husband of an
+actual Queen occupied, beyond all question, a higher position than the
+husband of the heiress-presumptive, who might never become Queen, and
+who, in fact, never did. We cannot think, therefore, that the reduction
+of L20,000, which Sir Robert Peel proposed and carried, was reasonable
+or becoming, but regard it as neither called for by the circumstances of
+the kingdom, nor as befitting its liberality, nor as in harmony with its
+practice.
+
+But on the two other questions--one immediately affecting the
+constitution, and the other not absolutely unconnected with it--no
+defence of the minister seems available. At the opening of Parliament in
+1840, her Majesty commenced her speech by the announcement of her
+intended marriage, describing the bridegroom simply as "the Prince of
+Saxe-Coburg and Gotha," the same expression which she had used in
+addressing the Privy Council a few weeks before. That description of him
+had at once struck her uncle, Leopold--who, since the death of his
+English wife, the Princess Charlotte, had become King of Belgium--as so
+imperfect and insufficient, that, on reading her address to the Privy
+Council, he at once wrote to her to point out that it would have been
+desirable to mention the fact of the Prince being a Protestant,[250] and
+that the omission would inevitably cause discontent. But, in spite of
+this warning, Lord Melbourne refused to advise the Queen to insert a
+statement of the Prince's religion in her speech, though it was by no
+means superfluous on such an occasion, since, if he were a Roman
+Catholic, a marriage with him would have incurred a forfeiture of the
+crown. The Duke of Wellington, on the other hand, regarded it as a
+positive duty to require that the fact of the Prince being a Protestant
+should be mentioned, so as to show the care of Parliament to prevent any
+constitutional precautions from being overlooked, such statement having,
+indeed, been usually made on similar occasions. When he, therefore,
+moved an amendment to insert the word "Protestant" in the description of
+the Prince, Lord Melbourne did not venture to divide the House against
+it; but still his management gave an ungracious appearance to the
+transaction, as if there had been in any quarter an unwillingness to
+recognize the fact of the Prince's Protestantism till the recognition
+was forced on the government by the action of the Parliament.
+
+The third question, as affecting the relative ranks and positions of the
+different members of the royal family, cannot be said to have been
+wholly unconnected with the provisions of the constitution; and the
+mismanagement of the minister was, perhaps, even more sure to attract
+notice in this case than in the other, since to introduce into a bill a
+clause which had no connection whatever with its title had something of
+the appearance of a deliberate slight to the two Houses. A bill to
+naturalize the Prince was, of course, indispensable. But into it the
+ministers, without any notice, had introduced a clause enabling him
+"during his life to take precedence in rank after her Majesty in
+Parliament and elsewhere as her Majesty might think fit and proper, any
+law, statute, or custom to the contrary notwithstanding." It was
+admitted that no such precedence had been given to Prince George of
+Denmark, nor to Prince Leopold. And there were obvious difficulties in
+the way of conferring such a life-long precedence, because, as Lord
+Brougham had pointed out, it was possible that the Queen might die
+without issue, in which case the King of Hanover would become King of
+England also, and his son the Prince of Wales; and it would have been an
+inconceivable anomaly that a foreign naturalized prince should take
+precedence of the Prince of Wales, whose special rank and importance was
+recognized in many acts of Parliament. This objection was so clearly
+insuperable, that Lord Melbourne consented to alter the clause so as to
+give the Prince precedence only "after the heir-apparent." But even this
+concession failed to satisfy the objectors, the King of Hanover, among
+others, positively refusing to waive his precedence over any foreign
+prince. And eventually the minister withdrew the clause altogether, and
+the bill, as it was passed, was confined to the naturalization of the
+Prince. Lord Melbourne had thus contrived to make the Queen and Prince
+appear as if they were desirous to induce the two Houses by a sort of
+trick to confer on the Prince a precedence and dignity to which he was
+not entitled, and to render the refusal of Parliament to be so cajoled a
+fresh cause of mortification to the royal pair. The course that was
+eventually adopted is understood to have been suggested by the Duke of
+Wellington--to withdraw the affair altogether from the cognizance of
+Parliament, and to leave it to the Queen to confer on the Prince
+whatever precedence she might choose, as it was certainly within her
+right to do. And so, a few days after the bill had passed, she did by
+letters-patent give him precedence next to herself "on all occasions and
+in all meetings, except when otherwise provided by act of Parliament,"
+as, seventeen years later, she, in the same way, with the cordial
+approval of the whole nation, conferred on him the title of Prince
+Consort. And apart from its convenience, as avoiding all unseemly
+discussions, this would seem to have been the most natural and proper
+mode of settling such a matter. The Queen is the fountain of honor in
+this kingdom, and at her own court she can certainly confer on any of
+her own subjects whatever precedence she may think fit, while it may be
+doubted whether any act of a British Parliament could give precedence at
+a foreign court. It was, probably, not in his character of Duke of
+Cumberland, but as an independent sovereign, that the King of Hanover
+maintained his claim to superior precedence; and it was plain that the
+most illustrious subject could not possibly at any court be allowed to
+rank above a king. With reference to its possible effect on the
+subsequent relations of Peel and his followers with the court, it was,
+perhaps, well that a few months later they had the opportunity of
+proving that no personal objection to the Prince himself had influenced
+their course in these transactions, by giving a cordial assent to the
+ministerial proposal of conferring the Regency on him in the event of
+the Queen giving an heir to the throne, and dying while he was still a
+minor. The principle was the same as that which had guided the
+arrangements for a Regency ten years before; but it was not
+inconceivable that Parliament might have hesitated to intrust so large
+an authority to so very young a man, and him a comparative stranger,
+such as the Prince still was, had the leaders of the Opposition given
+the slightest countenance to such an objection.
+
+Lord Melbourne's ministry was hardly strengthened by the circumstances
+under which it resumed office. Yet the close of the same year witnessed
+a reform of which it is hardly too much to say that no single measure of
+this century has contributed more to the comfort of the whole mass of
+the people, with which it has also combined solid commercial benefits.
+Hitherto the Post-office had been managed in a singular manner, and the
+profit derived from it had been treated as something distinct from the
+ordinary revenue of the kingdom. In the reign of Charles II. it had been
+given to the Duke of York, and the grant was regarded as conferring on
+him such extensive rights, that when, some years afterward, an
+enterprising citizen set up a penny post for the delivery of letters in
+the City and its precincts, the Duke complained of the scheme as an
+infraction of his monopoly, and the courts of law decided in his favor.
+That grant ceased, as a matter of course, on the Duke's accession to the
+throne; and in the reign of Queen Anne a portion of the Post-office
+proceeds was appropriated, with the general consent of a grateful
+country, to reward the great achievements of the Duke of Malborough, a
+perpetual charge on it of L5000 a year being annexed to the dukedom. In
+those days the postage of a letter was twopence for short distances, and
+threepence for any distance beyond eighty miles.[251] But those charges
+had been gradually increased; about the middle of the century the lowest
+charge was fixed at fourpence, rising in proportion to the distance,
+till the conveyance of a single letter from one extremity of the kingdom
+to the other cost eighteen-pence. Such a rate could not fail to be very
+profitable; and by the beginning of the present reign the yearly profit
+exceeded a million and a half of money. The heaviness of the charge,
+however, had latterly attracted attention, and had been the cause of
+many complaints, as being a great discouragement, and, in the case of
+the poorer classes, a complete obstacle to communication. However,
+neither the ministers nor the Parliament had succeeded in devising any
+remedy, since a system affording so large a return was not a thing
+lightly to tamper with, when those who complained suddenly found a
+practical leader in Mr. Rowland Hill, who published a pamphlet on the
+subject, in which he affirmed the cost of the conveyance of each letter
+even for such a distance as from London to Edinburgh to be infinitely
+less than a farthing; and that, consequently, all the rest of the
+postage was a tax for the purposes of revenue. When this fact was once
+established, it needed no argument to prove that to increase the tax
+paid by each recipient of a letter in proportion to the distance at
+which he lived from the writer was an indefensible unfairness; and,
+after much investigation and discussion, Mr. Hill succeeded in
+converting the ministers to his view. Accordingly, the Budget for 1839,
+introduced by Mr. Spring Rice, then Chancellor of the Exchequer,
+contained a clause which reduced the postage for every letter weighing
+less than an ounce to a uniform charge of a penny, to be prepaid by
+means of a stamp to be affixed to each letter by the sender. It was not
+without plainly-expressed reluctance that the scheme was consented to by
+the Opposition; nor can their hesitation be considered as unreasonable,
+in the very unsatisfactory condition of the finances of the kingdom at
+the time. The balance-sheet of the preceding year showed a considerable
+deficiency. There was a large unfunded debt; and even Mr. Hill's most
+sanguine calculations admitted a probable loss to the Post-office of
+L1,200,000 for the first year or two; though he expressed his confidence
+that eventually the correspondence of the kingdom would be found to
+increase so largely as to make up for the greater part, if not the
+whole, of the deficiency. His anticipations were far outran by the
+reality.
+
+In 1839 the Postmaster-general estimated the number of letters sent
+yearly by the post at less than twenty-five millions. They are now
+upward of a thousand millions, a number the conveyance of which (with
+the addition of newspapers, whose circulation had also been greatly
+augmented by a recent reduction of the tax to a penny) would have
+severely taxed the whole carrying power of the kingdom before the
+introduction of railroads. Nor have the benefits of the new system been
+confined to ourselves. Foreign nations have followed our example, though
+not quite in the same degree, till an international postage is at length
+established throughout the whole of the civilized world. And it has not
+been only the happiness of private individuals that has been augmented
+by this facility of communication. In its gradual development it has
+largely promoted the extension of trade of every kind, and, by
+facilitating a commercial intercourse between nations, it cannot but
+contribute to the maintenance of friendship and peace.
+
+The full advantages of this reform could not be seen at first; but, even
+had it been appreciated as fully as we appreciate it now, no approval of
+it could have counterbalanced the general dissatisfaction with which the
+ministry was regarded. At home the finances were falling into great
+disorder, the expenditure of the year greatly exceeding the income;
+while the feeling that their Irish policy was dictated by a wish to
+purchase at any price the support of O'Connell, was still more injurious
+to them, for he was already beginning to renew agitation in Ireland,
+inaugurating a new association, which, though its purposes were faintly
+veiled for a time under the title of the Precursor Association, was
+understood to point at a repeal of the Union; while the ministers,
+though they denounced such a measure as ruinous to every part of the
+kingdom, seemed willing to give it practical encouragement by a bill
+which they introduced, which bore the name of a Registration Act for
+Ireland, but which was not confined to that object. On the contrary, it
+contained a provision for lowering the qualification for the franchise
+by one-half; so that it was, in fact, a new Reform Bill for
+Ireland,[252] calculated greatly to increase his influence by the number
+of voters of the poorer classes whom it would create. The bill was
+defeated, but the odium of having proposed it remained.
+
+But, besides these home difficulties, there were troubles abroad, both
+in the East and in the West. In the East, the complications inseparable
+from a dominion like that of ours in India, where constant expansion
+seemed to have become a law of its existence, had involved us in a war
+with a new enemy, the warlike Afghan nation; in the West, both Jamaica
+and Canada were in a state threatening insurrection. Indeed, the
+troubles in Jamaica had been the immediate cause of that resignation of
+the ministry in 1839 which has already been mentioned. Measures adopted
+in the English Parliament with reference to the termination of that
+apprenticeship system which, as we have seen, formed a part of the bill
+for the abolition of slavery, and another for the regulation of the
+prisons in the island, had given such offence to the colonial Assembly,
+never very manageable, that the members passed a resolution that their
+legislative rights had been violated, and that they would abstain from
+all exercise of their legislative functions, except such as might be
+necessary "to preserve inviolate the faith of the island with the public
+creditor, until" (by the rescinding of the resolutions, etc., of which
+they complained) "they should be left to the free exercise of their
+inherent rights as British subjects." And this resolution was seconded
+by an insulting protest, in which they drew an offensive comparison
+between the state of crime in the island and that which prevailed in
+Great Britain, taunting the British Parliament with the murders and acts
+of incendiarism which terrified Ireland night and day, with the murders
+of Burke and Hare in Scotland, with the law of divorce and _crim. con._
+trials in England, and "a Poor-law which has taken millions from the
+necessities of the destitute to add to the luxuries of the wealthy." The
+Governor dissolved the Assembly, but that which succeeded re-adopted the
+resolutions of its predecessor, and the ministers, in consequence,
+brought in a bill "to suspend the existing constitution of the island
+for a limited number of years, and to provide that during that interval
+its legislative functions should not be exercised by a Governor, a
+Council, and a House of Assembly, but should reside in the Governor and
+Council alone." The emergency was too great and undeniable, the remedy
+proposed was also too unprecedented in its stringency, to be dealt with
+without the gravest deliberation; and the House of Commons accordingly
+gave the matter the patient consideration which became both it and
+themselves. They allowed the island to appear by counsel against the
+bill, and listened for many hours to an elaborate defence of the conduct
+of the Assembly, which if it failed to change the intention of the
+ministers, convinced Sir Robert Peel and his party that their measure
+was doubtful in its justification and impolitic in its severity. He
+pointed out that "the bill was neither more nor less than one for the
+establishment of a complete despotism--one which would establish the
+most unqualified, unchecked, unmitigated power that was ever yet applied
+to the government of any community, in place of that liberal system
+which had prevailed for upward of one hundred and fifty years." And,
+though he did not for a moment question the power of Parliament to pass
+such a measure, he greatly doubted the policy of such an exertion of it.
+A somewhat similar measure affecting Canada they had been compelled to
+enact in the preceding year, and he feared lest "it might seem to be
+coming to be a practice of Parliament to suspend a constitution every
+session." And he quoted a speech of Canning, delivered fifteen years
+before, in which that eloquent statesman, a man by no means inclined to
+a timorous policy, had declared that "no feeling of wounded pride, no
+motive of questionable expediency, nothing short of real and
+demonstrable necessity, should ever induce him to moot the awful
+question of the transcendental power of Parliament over every dependency
+of the British crown. That transcendental power was an ordinance of
+empire, which ought to be kept back within the penetralia of the
+constitution. It exists, but it should be veiled. It should not be
+produced on trifling occasions, or in cases of petty refractoriness or
+temporary misconduct."
+
+And Sir Robert, "looking at all the papers before the House, could not
+say that there was here any vindication for bringing forward this
+transcendental power." He asked whether "they had ever treated with so
+much severity a conquered colony amid the first heat of animosity after
+the contest." And he traced the history of our government of the island
+back to the time of Charles II., pointing out (as Burke had formerly
+argued with respect to our Colonies in North America) that "Jamaica owed
+its colonization by British subjects to the conquest that was made of it
+by the arms of Cromwell; that its first English population was composed
+of those who, disgusted with the excesses of the civil wars, there found
+a refuge," and who had carried with them that attachment to liberty
+which, as early as 1678, had led them successfully to repel the attacks
+made on the privileges of their House of Assembly by the ministers of
+Charles II. He warned the House, also, that if this measure were passed,
+"a sympathy for the people of Jamaica would be excited throughout the
+other West Indian possessions of the crown." And, while fully admitting
+that the conduct of the Assembly had been "foolish and unjustifiable,"
+he still recommended that it should be treated in a conciliatory spirit,
+which as yet had not been shown toward it.
+
+The government carried their proposal by a majority of no more than five
+in a very full house, a success which they regarded as a defeat, and, as
+has been already mentioned, resigned. But as the state of the question
+and of the island did not admit of delay, on their resumption of their
+offices they introduced a fresh measure, which the Conservatives again
+curtailed of its most severe clauses, and which, in the form in which it
+was eventually passed, gave the Assembly time to reconsider its conduct,
+and, without the humiliation of confessing itself guilty, to give a
+practical recantation of their offensive resolutions, by resuming its
+work of legislation, any farther delay of which would on many subjects
+be very mischievous to the island itself. The distinct assertion by both
+parties of the power of the Parliament to inflict even the severest
+penalty enabled the Houses to take this conciliatory course without loss
+of dignity; while the stern disapproval of the conduct of the Assembly
+which the Conservative leader had expressed, even when pleading for a
+milder treatment of it, convinced the colonists that any protracted
+contumacy would be dangerous, and would deprive them for the future of
+all title to even the modified protection which on this occasion had
+saved them.
+
+In the discussion of these transactions, Peel, as we have seen, had
+alluded to the affairs of Canada, which had been of a still more serious
+complexion; since there the discontent of the colonists in the Lower
+Province had developed into armed insurrection. We have seen that, from
+the first moment after the country had passed into our possession, there
+had been almost constant dissensions between the old French colonists
+and the English immigrants who crossed over both from England and from
+the colonies on the southern side of the St. Lawrence in the early part
+of the reign of George III. The desire of terminating these divisions,
+which had their root in a difference of religion as well as of race, the
+French settlers being Roman Catholics, had been one of the chief motives
+which had led Pitt in 1791 to divide the country into two
+provinces.[253] And for many years the scheme was fairly successful;
+but, toward the end of the reign of George IV., the political excitement
+caused by the agitation in England of the question of Catholic
+Emancipation, and subsequently of Reform, spread across the Atlantic to
+the Canadas; and the French portion of the colonists, who almost
+monopolized the representation in Lower Canada, began to urge the
+adoption of changes utterly inconsistent with the existing constitution
+of the colony. In the hope of compelling the compliance of the home
+government with their demands, in 1832 and the following years they
+refused to vote the necessary supplies; and, gaining courage, as it
+were, from the contemplation of their own violence, and under the
+guidance of a leader of French extraction, a M. Papineau, who scarcely
+concealed his hope of effecting the complete severance of the Lower
+Province from the British dominion, they proceeded to put forth farther
+demands, which they regarded as plausible from the apparent resemblance
+of the changes which they required to the system of the English
+constitution, but which, to use the words in which Sir Robert Peel
+described them, would have established "a French republic." The most
+important of them were that the Upper or Legislative Council should,
+like the Assembly, be rendered elective, instead of, as had hitherto
+been the case, being nominated by the crown. And another asked that the
+Executive Council should be made responsible to the Assembly, in the
+same manner as in England the ministers of the crown were responsible to
+Parliament. As it was at once shown that the ministry at home had no
+intention of granting these demands, Papineau collected a band of
+malcontents in arms, with whom he took possession of one or two small
+towns, and ventured even to measure his strength with the
+Commander-in-chief of the province, Sir John Colborne, one of the most
+distinguished of Wellington's comrades and pupils. His force was utterly
+routed, and he himself fled across the frontier to New York. A similar
+outbreak, excited in the Upper Province by a newspaper editor, was
+crushed with equal ease and rapidity.[254] And the next year, 1838, Lord
+John Russell brought forward a bill to suspend the constitution of the
+colony, and to confer on a new Governor, who was at once to proceed
+thither, very ample powers for remodelling the government of the
+province, subject, of course, to the sanction of the home government. In
+the previous year he had succeeded in carrying some resolutions
+announcing the determination of Parliament not to concede the demands of
+the Assembly of the Lower Province, which have been already mentioned.
+And the reasons which he gave for this course are worth preserving, as
+expressing the view recognized by Parliament of the relations properly
+existing between the mother country and a colony. It was on a proper
+understanding of them that he based his refusal to make the Executive
+Council in Canada responsible to the Assembly. He held such a step to be
+"entirely incompatible with those relations. Those relations require
+that his Majesty should be represented, not by a person removable by the
+House of Assembly, but by a Governor sent out by the King, responsible
+to the King, and responsible to the Parliament of Great Britain. This is
+the necessary constitution of a colony; and if we have not these
+relations existing between the mother country and the colony, we shall
+soon have an end of these relations altogether." And he pointed out the
+practical difficulties which might reasonably be apprehended if such a
+change as was asked were conceded. "The person sent out by the King as
+Governor, and those ministers in whom the Assembly confided, might
+differ in opinion, and there would be at once a collision between the
+measures of the King and the conduct of the representatives of the
+colony."
+
+The plan of sending out a new Governor free from any previous
+association with either of the parties, or any of the recent
+transactions in the colony, was, probably, the wisest that could have
+been adopted. Unfortunately, it was in some degree marred by the choice
+of the statesman sent out, Lord Durham, a man of unquestioned ability,
+but of an extraordinarily self-willed and overbearing temper. He drew up
+a most able report of the state of the provinces, combined with
+recommendations of the course to be pursued toward them in future, so
+judicious that subsequent ministers, though widely differing from his
+views of general politics, saw no better plan than that which he had
+suggested; but, unhappily, the measures which he himself adopted,
+especially with respect to the treatment of those who had been leaders
+in the late rebellion, were such manifest violations of law, that the
+government at home had no alternative but that of disallowing some of
+them, and carrying a bill of indemnity for others. He took such offence
+at their treatment of him, though it was quite inevitable, that he at
+once resigned his appointment and returned home. But the next year the
+Queen sent down a message to the Houses recommending a union of the two
+provinces (a measure which had been the most important, and the very
+foundation, of his suggestions), and Lord John Russell introduced a bill
+which, as he described its object, he hoped would "lay the foundation of
+a permanent settlement of the affairs of the entire colony." The main
+feature of the government policy was the formation of "a legislative
+union of the two provinces on the principles of a free and
+representative government," and the establishment of such a system of
+local government as amounted to a practical recognition of the principle
+so earnestly repudiated, as we have seen, by Lord John Russell a year or
+two before. It was not, perhaps, fully carried out at first. Lord
+Sydenham, who had succeeded Lord Durham, reported to the home
+government, as the result of a tour which he had taken through a great
+part of the country, that in the whole of the Upper Province, and among
+the British settlers of the Lower Province, "an excellent spirit
+prevailed, and that he had found everywhere a determination to forget
+past differences, and to unite in an endeavor to obtain under the union
+those practical measures for the improvement of the country which had
+been too long neglected in the struggle for party and personal objects."
+But of the French Canadians he could not give so favorable a report.
+Efforts were still made by some of the old Papineau party to mislead the
+people; but he was satisfied they would not again be able to induce the
+peasantry to support any attempt at disturbance. It was natural that
+that party should still feel some soreness at the utter failure of their
+recent attempts and the disappointment of their hopes; and affairs took
+the longer time in being brought into perfect order and harmony through
+a strange mortality which took place among the first Governors-general.
+Lord Sydenham died the next year of lockjaw, brought on by a fall from
+his horse; Sir Charles Bagot was forced to retire in a state of hopeless
+bad health after an administration equally brief; two years later, Sir
+Charles Metcalfe, who succeeded him, returned home only to die; and it
+was not till a fourth Governor, Lord Elgin, succeeded to the government
+that it could be said that the new system, though established five years
+before, had a fair trial.
+
+Fortunately, he was a man admirably qualified by largeness of
+statesman-like views and a most conciliatory disposition for such a post
+at such a time; and he strictly carried out the scheme which was implied
+by the bill of Lord John Russell, and to a certain extent inaugurated by
+Lord Sydenham, selecting his advisers from the party which had the
+confidence of the Legislative Assembly, and generally directing his
+policy in harmony with their counsels; so that under his government the
+working of the colonial constitution was a nearly faithful reproduction
+of the parliamentary constitution at home. Such a policy was in reality
+only a development of the principle laid down by Pitt half a century
+before, and warmly approved by his great rival, that "the only method of
+retaining distant colonies with advantage is to enable them to govern
+themselves."[255] And since that day similar constitutions have been
+established in our other distant dependencies as they have become ripe
+for them--in New Zealand, the Cape, and the Australian colonies--almost
+the only powers reserved to the home government in those colonies in
+which such constitutions have been established being that of appointing
+the governors; that of ratifying or, if necessary, disallowing measures
+adopted by the colonial government; and, in cases of necessity, that of
+prescribing measures for the adoption of the local Legislatures, and
+even of compelling such adoption, in the event of any persevering
+opposition. The act of 1850, which established a constitution in
+Victoria, went even farther in the privileges it conferred on the
+colonists, inasmuch as it gave power to the Legislative Council to alter
+some of its provisions, and even to remodel the Legislative Council and
+Assembly. It may be doubted whether this last concession did not go too
+far, since in more than one important instance the government of that
+great colony has availed itself of it so liberally as to render it
+necessary to pass a fresh act of Parliament to enable her Majesty to
+give her royal assent to some of the changes which the Assembly had
+enacted.[256] Indeed, it cannot be said that the system has worked in
+every part or on every occasion quite as well as might have been hoped;
+nor can it be denied that the colonies have occasionally claimed a power
+of independent action in opposition to the home Parliament in a way to
+try severely the patience of the home government. After the British
+Parliament had adopted the policy and system of free-trade, the Canadian
+Assembly adhered to the doctrine of protection so obstinately that it
+actually established a tariff of import duties injurious to the commerce
+of the mother country, and apparently intended as a condemnation of its
+principles. But its contumacy showed how wholly different was the spirit
+of the British government from that which had prevailed in the last
+century; for though the home government had unquestionably the right of
+disallowing the offensive tariff, it forbore to exercise it; and,
+probably, by this striking proof that it considered a complete
+recognition of the principle of local self-government more important
+than any trifling financial or commercial advantage, contributed greatly
+to implant in Canada and all the colonies that confidence in the
+affectionate moderation of the home government which must be the
+strongest, if not the only indissoluble, bond of union.
+
+On the whole, it is hardly too much to say that no more statesman-like,
+and (if sentiment may be allowed a share in influencing the conduct of
+governments) no more amiable spirit animates any act of our modern
+legislation than is displayed in these arrangements for the management
+of our colonies. They are a practical exemplification of the idea
+embodied in the expression, "the mother country." A hundred years ago,
+Burke sought to impress on the existing ministers and Parliament the
+conviction that, "so long as our Colonies kept the idea of their civil
+rights associated with our government, they would cling and grapple to
+us, and no force under heaven would be of power to tear them from their
+allegiance." In the case of which he was speaking his warning, as we
+have seen, fell on deaf ears; but the policy of the present reign is a
+willing and full adoption of them, on a far larger scale than even his
+farseeing vision could then contemplate. Within the century which has
+elapsed since his time the enterprise of Britain has sent forth her sons
+to people another hemisphere; and they, her children still, cling to the
+parent state with filial affection, because they feel that, though
+parted from her by thousands of miles and more than one ocean, they are
+still indissolubly united to her by their participation in all the
+blessings of her constitution, her generous toleration, her equal laws,
+her universal freedom.
+
+On one transaction of these years the leaders of the Opposition were
+found acting in close agreement with the ministers. We have seen how, in
+the early part of the reign of George III., the House of Commons threw
+the sheriffs of London into prison, on account of their performance of
+what they conceived to be their duty as magistrates; and in 1840 it
+subjected the same officials to the same treatment on a question of the
+same character--the extent of the privilege of the House of Commons to
+overrule the authority of the courts of law. The question was in
+appearance complicated by the institution of several suits at law, and
+by the fact that the House was not consistent in its conduct, but
+allowed its servants to plead to the first action, and refused the same
+permission in the second, when the result of the first trial had proved
+adverse to them. The case was this: some inspectors of prisons has
+presented a report to Parliament, in which they alleged that they had
+found in Newgate a book of disgusting and obscene character, published
+by a London publisher named Stockdale. The House of Commons had ordered
+the report to be printed and sold by Messrs. Hansard, the Parliamentary
+publishers, and Stockdale brought an action against Messrs. Hansard for
+libel. Chief-justice Denman charged the jury that "the fact of the House
+of Commons having directed Messrs. Hansard to publish their reports was
+no justification to them for publishing a Parliamentary report
+containing a libel;" and Stockdale obtained damages, which were duly
+paid. Stockdale, encouraged by this success, when, in spite of the
+result of the late trial, Hansard continued to sell the report, brought
+a fresh action; but now the House forbade the publishers to plead to it;
+and, as they obeyed the prohibition, and forbore to plead, the case
+eventually came before the Sheriff's Court; fresh damages were given,
+and, in obedience to the writ of the Queen's Bench, the sheriffs seized
+Hansard's goods, and sold them to satisfy the judgment. Lord John
+Russell, as leader of the House, moved to bring to the Bar of the House
+all the parties concerned in the action--the plaintiff, his attorney,
+the sheriffs, and the under-sheriffs. He was opposed by nearly all the
+legal members of the House except the crown lawyers, Sir Edward Sugden
+especially warning the House that "a resolution of the House was of no
+avail in a court of justice;" while others taunted the House with want
+of courage in not proceeding against the judges themselves, rather than
+against their officers, which in this case the sheriffs were.
+
+There could be no doubt of the importance of the question, since it was
+no less, as the Attorney-general, Sir J. Campbell, put it, than a
+question whether Parliament or the courts of law had the superiority;
+and now Sir Robert Peel, as leader of the Opposition, came to the
+support of Lord John Russell, declaring his opinion to be, first, that
+"the House possessed every privilege necessary for the proper and
+effectual discharge of its functions;" secondly, that "the publication
+of evidence which had led the House to adopt any course was frequently
+essential to justify that course to the nation;" and thirdly, that "to
+judge of the extent of their privileges, and to vindicate them by their
+own laws, belonged to the House alone." And he pressed strongly on the
+House that it was "the duty of the House to fight the battle to the
+last," though he confessed that "it was with pain that he had come to
+the determination of entering into a contest with the courts of law." On
+one point the judges agreed with the House of Commons. The House
+committed the sheriffs; but, when they sued out their _habeas corpus_,
+the judges decided that the return of the Sergeant-at-arms that they
+were committed by the House for breach of privilege was a sufficient
+return. Stockdale brought fresh actions. But meantime the case was
+arousing a strong excitement in the country.[257] The singular hardship
+of the position of the sheriffs excited general sympathy: if they obeyed
+the House of Commons, which prohibited them from paying over to
+Stockdale the damages which they had received for him, the Court of
+Queen's Bench would be bound to attach them for disobedience to its
+order. If they obeyed the Queen's Bench, the House would imprison them
+for breach of privilege. And the national feeling is always in favor of
+the strictly defined authority of the courts of law, rather than of the
+somewhat indefinite claims of Parliament to interpret, and even to make,
+privilege. Another consideration, probably, weighed a little with the
+champions of the House--that their power of imprisonment ended with the
+session. As matters went on, it was found that even the Attorney and
+Solicitor-general differed as to the course to be pursued; and
+eventually Lord John Russell consented to adopt the advice which had
+been given by a former Attorney-general, Sir F. Pollock, and to bring in
+a bill to legalize all similar proceedings of Parliament in future, by
+enacting that a certificate that the publication of any document had
+been ordered by either House should be a sufficient defence against any
+action. The introduction of such a bill was in some degree an
+acknowledgment of defeat; but it can hardly be denied to have been not
+only a judicious step, but the only one practicable, if the contest
+between Parliament and the courts of law were not to be everlasting; and
+it met with general approval. If it was a compromise, it was one that
+satisfied both parties and both ends. It upheld the authority of the
+courts of law, and at the same time it practically asserted the
+reasonableness of the claim advanced by the House of Commons, by giving
+it for the future the power which it had claimed. Nor were people in
+this day inclined to be jealous of the privileges of Parliament, so long
+as they were accurately defined. They felt that it was for the advantage
+and dignity of the nation that its powers and privileges should be
+large; what they regarded with distrust was, a claim of power of which
+no one knew the precise bounds, and which might, therefore, be expanded
+as the occasion served.
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 245: Fifty-two mills and 30,000 persons were thrown out of
+employment for ten weeks at Ashton in 1830 by the turning out of 3000
+"coarse spinners," who could clear at the time from 28s. to 31s. per
+week. The following passage is extracted from an oath said to have been
+administered by the combined spinners in Scotland in 1823: "I, A B, do
+voluntarily swear, in the awful presence of God Almighty, and before
+these witnesses, that I will execute with zeal and alacrity, as far as
+in me lies, every task or injunction which the majority of my brethren
+shall impose upon me in furtherance of our common welfare, as the
+chastisement of _knobs_, the assassination of oppressive and tyrannical
+masters, or the demolition of shops that shall be deemed
+incorrigible."--_Annual Register_, 1838, pp. 204-207.]
+
+[Footnote 246: See page 221.]
+
+[Footnote 247: The question was examined with great minuteness by Lord
+Brougham a fortnight after the ministerial explanation. See
+"Parliamentary Debates," 3d series, xlvii., 1164.]
+
+[Footnote 248: It is stated on good authority that Lord Melbourne, in
+private conversation, justified or explained the line he had taken by
+his consideration for his friends, scores of whom would have had their
+hopes blighted by his retirement.]
+
+[Footnote 249: See "Life of the Prince Consort," i., 55.]
+
+[Footnote 250: "Life of the Prince Consort," i., 57.]
+
+[Footnote 251: Macaulay's "History of England," i., 386.]
+
+[Footnote 252: This is the name which the Liberal historian of the time,
+Miss Martineau, gives it. "The so-called Registration Bill was, in fact,
+an unannounced new Reform Bill for Ireland."--_History of the Peace_,
+book v., c. vi.]
+
+[Footnote 253: See _ante_, p. 127.]
+
+[Footnote 254: In one instance the rebels were aided by a party of
+citizens of the United States, who, without any sanction from their own
+government, seized an island on the St. Lawrence belonging to us, and
+attacked some of the Canadian villages. And this led to the discussion
+of a question of international combined with constitutional law, which
+Lord Campbell thus describes: "'Whether, if the subjects or citizens of
+a foreign state with which we are at peace, without commission or
+authority from their own or any other government, invade the English
+territory in a hostile manner, and levy war against the Queen in her
+realm, we are entitled to treat them as traitors?' The Canadian courts
+held that we could not, as they had never acknowledged even a temporary
+allegiance to our sovereign. And of this opinion was Sir William
+Follett. But, after reading all that is to be found on the subject, I
+come to the conclusion that they owed allegiance when, as private
+individuals, they voluntarily crossed the English frontier; that it was
+no defence for them to say that they then had arms in their hands and
+intended to murder the Queen's subjects."--_Life of Lord Campbell_,
+ii.,119. It certainly would have been no _defence_; but would it not
+have taken their conduct from under the definition of _treason_, and
+made it an act of _piracy_?]
+
+[Footnote 255: See Fox's words, quoted by Lord Stanhope.--_Life of
+Pitt_, ii., 90.]
+
+[Footnote 256: A couple of years after the period which is the boundary
+of the present work, this Canadian constitution of 1841 was superseded
+by a measure uniting Canada, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick in one
+federal government, with, as the act recites, "a constitution similar in
+principle to that of the United Kingdom." The act farther provided for
+the admission of other dependencies of the crown in North America,
+Newfoundland, Prince Edward Island, British Columbia, and Rupert's Land
+into the union, and established as the constitution of the whole one
+scarcely differing from that of 1841, with the exception that both the
+Houses of the Legislature--called in the act the Senate and the House of
+Commons--were to be representative bodies, and that powers were
+conferred on them so absolutely free and independent, that it was
+thought necessary to add a clause providing that their "privileges,
+immunities, and powers were never to exceed those at the passing of the
+act held, enjoyed, and exercised by the Commons House of Parliament of
+the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, and by the members
+thereof."]
+
+[Footnote 257: Lord Campbell, in his autobiography, puts the
+transaction, in the phase at which it had now arrived, in a very serious
+light: "Next came a proceeding which placed me in a most difficult
+position; and the public never knew the danger which then existed of a
+convulsion unexampled in our history. The sheriffs sued out a writ of
+_habeas corpus_, directed to the Sergeant-at-arms, commanding him to
+produce before the Court of Queen's Bench the sheriffs of Middlesex,
+alleged to be illegally in custody, with the cause of their detention.
+Wilde, the Solicitor-general, was strong for refusing to make any return
+to the writ, and for setting the Court of Queen's Bench at defiance. Had
+I concurred in this opinion it would certainty have been acted on. The
+consequences would have been that the Sergeant-at-arms, even with the
+mace in his hand, would have been sent to Newgate by the Court of
+Queen's Bench. The House must have retaliated by committing the judges.
+The crown would then have had to determine on which side the army should
+be employed, and for a time we must have lived under a military
+government" (ii., 129). The noble and learned autobiographer does not
+explain why it should have been indispensable to employ the army on
+either side.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+
+Sir Robert Peel becomes Prime-minister.--Commercial Reforms.--
+Free-trade.--Religious Toleration.--Maynooth.--The Queen's
+University.--Post-office Regulations.--The Opening of Letters.--
+Naturalization of Aliens.--Recall of Lord Ellenborough.--Reversal of the
+Vote on the Sugar Duties.--Refusal of the Crown to Sanction a Bill.--The
+Question of Increase in the Number of Spiritual Peers.--Repeal of the
+Corn-laws.--Revolution in France, and Agitation on the Continent.--Death
+of Sir Robert Peel.--Indifference of the Country to Reform.--Repeal of
+the Navigation Laws.--Resolutions in Favor of Free-trade.--The Great
+Exhibition of 1851.
+
+
+The transactions mentioned in the last chapter were among the last
+events of Lord Melbourne's ministry. He had for some time been aware of
+his impending defeat in the House of Commons, and, greatly to his
+credit, had endeavored to make the return to office easier to his
+successors by the friendly counsels he had given to the Queen on the
+subject.[258] A dissolution of Parliament in the summer of 1841 only
+weakened his party, and in September he resigned, and was succeeded by
+Sir Robert Peel, who, comparatively short as was his tenure of
+office,[259] found it long enough to establish for himself a reputation
+as the greatest financier of Europe since the days of Pitt. It may be
+worth remarking that, in the "Memoirs of the Prince Consort," it is
+mentioned that in the course of his administration Peel found reason to
+change his judgment on the question of which House of Parliament it was
+the more desirable for the Prime-minister to be a member. Canning had
+more than once asserted his conviction that the public business would be
+more satisfactorily conducted when the Prime-minister was a commoner,
+founding his opinion chiefly on the paramount importance of financial
+questions, the discussion of which is almost confined to the House of
+Commons, and conceiving it to be supported by the history of the
+administration of Pitt, from whom, indeed, he had imbibed the idea; and
+in former years Peel had more than once expressed his concurrence with
+that view of the subject. But, from papers which were intrusted to him
+for the execution of his great work, Sir Theodore Martin learned that
+Peel had subsequently found reason to come to the opposite conclusion,
+not from any change in his view of the relative importance of the
+different departments of administration, but solely because "the amount
+of work imposed upon the first minister in the House of Commons, in
+addition to what he had to go through elsewhere, was too great for any
+human strength. In the House of Lords the Prime-minister would escape
+the necessity for being in a position to vindicate all the details of
+administration, and to answer the multiplicity of questions on all sorts
+of subjects, the putting of which has almost degenerated into a vice. He
+had, therefore, come to the conclusion that it was there he ought to
+be."[260] And, indeed, the subjects which demanded the care of the
+minister, and attracted the attention of Parliament, were constantly
+increasing in number, variety, and importance to the very end of his
+administration. Not only were the financial difficulties of the country,
+the depressed state of agriculture and commerce (the result of a
+succession of bad harvests), sufficient causes for grave anxiety, but
+the terrible war, of which mention has already been made, which we had
+now been carrying on for nearly three years in Afghanistan, and which,
+before the end of this very year, was about to be signalized by a
+disaster such as had never before befallen a British army, threatened to
+kindle the flames of war in Europe also, from the share which the
+intrigues of Russia had had in fomenting the quarrel; and the same
+danger was more than once in the course of the next five years imminent,
+from the irritation with which France regarded us, and which, commencing
+in Syria, while Lord Melbourne was still at the helm, lost no
+opportunity of displaying itself, whether in transactions in the remote
+Pacific Ocean or the old battle-field of the two nations, the Spanish
+peninsula; and finally, these embarrassing perplexities were crowned by
+the appalling visitation of famine, which, at the end of the fourth year
+of the administration, fell upon Ireland with a severity surpassing any
+similar event in modern history.
+
+With all these multiform difficulties the new minister grappled with
+unflinching courage, and with conspicuous success. Peace was preserved
+abroad, and financial prosperity was restored at home. Into the details
+of his measures devised for this last-mentioned object, though the
+leading features of his administration, and those on which his fame
+chiefly rests, it would be beside the purpose of the present work to
+enter. It is sufficient to say here that, in the spirit of Pitt's great
+financial reform of 1787, he revised the whole of the import duties of
+our commercial tariff, especially reducing the duties on raw
+material;[261] making up the deficiency so caused by an income tax,
+which he described as a temporary imposition, since he doubted not that
+the great increase of lawful trade, which would be the consequence of
+the reduction of duties, would soon enable the revenue to dispense with
+a tax to the objections of which he was not blind. In recommending this
+great change to the House, he laid down as the soundest maxim of
+financial legislation, in which "all were now agreed, the principle that
+we should buy in the cheapest market and sell in the dearest," a
+doctrine which, when more fully carried out, as it was sure to be, led
+almost inevitably to the great measure for which his administration is
+most celebrated, the repeal of the Corn-laws. There could be no doubt
+that, in the most modified application of it, it struck at the root of
+the principle of protection, which had hitherto been the fundamental
+principle of our finance, and made a farther extension of it inevitable.
+
+And, as he had been one of the leading members of the ministry which
+carried Catholic Emancipation, so he now proceeded on the same path of
+religious toleration; and, in the session of 1844, successfully
+recommended to the House of Commons a bill which had already been passed
+by the Lords, repealing a number of penal acts affecting the Roman
+Catholics, which, though they had long been practically obsolete, still
+encumbered, and it may be said disgraced, the statute book, and were, so
+to say, a standing degradation of and insult to the Roman Catholic body.
+One of them, passed in the reign of William and Mary, still forbade any
+Roman Catholic to come within ten miles of London, to have either sword
+or pistol in his house, or to possess a horse worth more than five
+pounds. Another, enacted under Elizabeth, still made every Roman
+Catholic who omitted to take certain oaths guilty of high-treason,
+though no attempt to administer those oaths had been made since the
+Revolution. Another, of the time of Charles I., deprived any Roman
+Catholic who should send his son to a foreign school of all protection
+of the law; he could neither sue nor defend an action. It may fairly be
+said that the credit of Parliament and of the nation was concerned in
+the abrogation of laws so ridiculously oppressive, and not the less
+obnoxious for being practically invalid. And in the same spirit another
+measure was framed and carried by the Lord Chancellor, whose object was
+the confirmation of religious endowments belonging to different sects of
+Protestant Dissenters, and their protection from vexatious and unjust
+litigation, by making a continued possession of any kind of endowment or
+property for twenty years a valid title.
+
+These enactments may be regarded as indispensable supplements to the
+repeal of the Test Act and Catholic Emancipation. They were the
+coping-stone of the great edifice of religious toleration, of which the
+former acts had laid the foundation. And the next year Peel carried out
+still farther the same principle, by a measure which could not fail to
+be regarded as an especial boon in Ireland, since the great majority of
+the population of that kingdom were of the Roman Catholic persuasion. It
+has been seen that when the troubled state into which the Continent was
+thrown by the French Revolution threw hinderances in the way of the
+Irish students designed for the Roman Catholic priesthood going to one
+of the great Continental colleges, such as St. Omer or Salamanca, for
+their education, Pitt established for them a college at Maynooth, for
+the endowment of which Parliament was annually asked for a grant of
+about L9000. The sum had long been felt to be altogether inadequate to
+the requirements of the foundation. As early as the year 1807, Lord
+Liverpool, then Home-secretary, had contemplated a large increase of the
+grant, though the weakness of the government, then presided over by the
+Duke of Portland, prevented him from carrying out that and other
+measures which he had conceived in a kindred spirit. Moreover, the grant
+was rarely proposed without giving rise to a warm debate raised by a
+party whose too tender consciences forbade them to sanction any measure
+appearing to foster a religion from which they dissented. And to remedy
+the two evils (the one arising from the want of a sufficient provision,
+the other from the spirit of religious controversy, for which the House
+of Commons was certainly very ill-calculated), Peel, in 1845, proposed
+to treble the grant, so as to put the college on a more satisfactory
+footing, by providing sufficient incomes for the professors, and a
+revenue adequate to the respectable maintenance of an increased number
+of pupils; and also to place the charge for the future on the
+Consolidated Fund, by which step its yearly discussion in Parliament
+would be altogether avoided. The measure was vigorously resisted, partly
+on the religious ground already mentioned, and partly by an argument,
+urged with some plausibility, that the design with which the college had
+originally been founded had not been realized; that, in fact, it had not
+proved a benefit to the country, but rather the reverse, by tempting
+into the service of the Roman Catholic Church a humbler and poorer class
+of students than could devote themselves to it when the preliminary
+education involved the expense of a protracted residence in a foreign
+country. But the obvious advantages of the change prevailed over these
+considerations, and the bill was carried by large majorities.[262]
+
+And now that the long cessation of controversy on the subject--which,
+indeed, has been not the least beneficial fruit of this bill of
+1845--permits a candid consideration of it in all its bearings, it will
+probably be thought that Parliament had not often come to a wiser
+decision, one more dictated by judicious liberality of sentiment, and
+more imperatively required on every ground of statesman-like policy. If
+the countervailing objections and advantages be calmly weighed, it may
+almost be said that there was no alternative between enlarging the
+endowment and putting it on a new footing, or suppressing the college
+altogether. In its existing condition it was notoriously inadequate to
+fulfil the design of its founder; and any establishment visibly
+inadequate to its design tends to bring the design itself into some
+degree of contempt. Yet even if it should be granted that there might
+have been no fair ground of complaint if the college had never been
+founded, to close it after its benefits, however scanty, had been
+enjoyed for half a century, could not fail to have been regarded as an
+unpardonable injustice and injury. The other alternative, therefore, was
+practically the only one that remained; and in embracing it Peel was but
+carrying out the original principle on which the college was founded. It
+had been intended to be efficient; through lack of means it had proved
+inefficient. The obvious and just remedy was to supply such increased
+means as to create or bestow the efficiency originally aimed at. And it
+was a felicitous idea to place the charge for the future on such a
+footing as to combine with such an increase an avoidance of the
+irritation which its yearly discussion had never failed to excite.
+
+And at the same time, to carry still farther the principle of religious
+toleration, or rather of religious equality, he induced the Parliament
+to found a new university, consisting of three colleges, one in each of
+the three provinces of Ulster, Munster and Connaught (Leinster, as
+having Trinity College and Maynooth, being regarded as already
+sufficiently provided with university education), which should be open
+to students of every religious denomination, and at which, while every
+kind of secular education, both literary and scientific, should be
+given, the stirring up of religious controversy and animosity should be
+guarded against, by the absence of any theological professorships. He
+did not, indeed, design that the still greater benefits of religious
+education should be withheld from the pupils, but he proposed to provide
+for that object by confiding their religious education to the care of
+the clergy of each persuasion, some of whom in each town which was the
+seat of a college--Belfast, Cork, and Galway--might be trusted for
+willingness to superintend it. It was hoped that one fruit of this
+scheme, and that by no means its least valuable result, would be that
+the association of pupils of various creeds in their studies and
+amusements from an early age would lead them to maintain, in their more
+mature years, the harmony of which the foundation had thus been laid in
+their youth; and that thus the religious animosities which were the
+principal obstacle to the prosperity of the country would be softened,
+and in time extinguished. And this object has been achieved to a great
+extent, though the disfavor with which the Roman Catholic Church regards
+any educational system which is not under the superintendence of its
+priesthood has prevented the scheme from attaining the full development
+which was hoped for. The number of students of each of the principal
+sects--the Church of Ireland, the Roman Catholics, and the
+Presbyterians--steadily increases.[263] Members of each religious body
+are among the professors in each college, and all accounts represent the
+most perfect harmony and cordiality as existing throughout the whole
+body.
+
+Yet, important as was the principle contained in these measures, none of
+them, perhaps, caused such excitement at the moment as an exercise by
+the government of what was, in point of fact, one of its most ancient,
+as well as most essential, powers: the occasional opening of letters
+which passed through the post, in compliance with a warrant of the
+Secretary of State. England had at all times been the refuge of those
+unquiet spirits who, in pursuit of their schemes of rebellion and
+revolution, had incurred the displeasure of their own governments, and
+had too easily found accomplices here. And in the course of the summer
+some notorious offenders of this class found a member of the House of
+Commons to present a petition, in which they complained that some
+letters which they had posted had been stopped and opened by the
+officers of the Post-office. The member who presented the petition
+appears to have fancied it an unprecedented and wholly unlawful exercise
+of authority; but Sir James Graham, the Home-secretary, not only at once
+avowed that the statement was true, and that he had issued his warrant
+for the opening of the letters mentioned, but also showed that the power
+to issue such an order was reserved to the Secretary of State in all the
+statutes which regulated the proceedings of the Post-office. The clause
+in the act which conferred the power had been originally framed by Lord
+Somers, a statesman certainly as little open as any of his time to the
+suspicion of desiring to encroach on the rightful liberty of the
+subject; and it had been exercised from time to time in every reign
+since the Revolution. It was a power intrusted to the Secretaries of
+State for the public safety, and exercised by them on their own
+responsibility. The practice and its justification were assailed in both
+Houses of Parliament by members of the extreme Liberal party; but,
+though no distinct motion on the subject was made, the general feeling
+of both Houses was plainly evinced, that it was a power which might at
+times be highly useful for the prevention of crime, or for the
+hinderance of conspiracies which might be dangerous to the general
+welfare and tranquillity, and that the constitutional responsibility
+attaching to every minister for every official act was a sufficient
+security against its being improperly used.[264]
+
+And it will, probably, be generally admitted that this was the
+statesman-like view of the subject. There is no doubt that the practice
+in question does infringe the great constitutional right of every
+individual in these kingdoms to absolute freedom of communication with
+his friends. But the most important and the most cherished
+constitutional rights must possess something of elasticity. It must be
+necessary at times to go back to the original object for which those
+rights have been conferred and secured. That original object is the
+safety and welfare of the whole body corporate--of the entire nation.
+And if that safety and welfare at times require the sacrifice, a wise
+ruler will not hesitate to demand it of the people, or to impose it on
+them for their own good. So another principle of the constitution is the
+absolute freedom of action for all the subjects of the sovereign; yet
+that principle is infringed by more than one statute: Factory Acts,
+which limit the hours of even voluntary labor; Education Acts, which
+compel the parent to a certain line of conduct toward his children; each
+in their way substitute another rule for that entire freedom of action
+which, as has been said before, is the fundamental principle of the
+constitution; but they make the substitution on the reasonable ground
+that the course of action which they compel is for the benefit, not only
+of the individual constrained, but of the whole community of which he is
+a member, and for whose welfare all laws and constitutions exist.
+
+One of the grounds of complaint against the exercise of this power,
+which had been alleged by some of the opponents of the government, had
+been that Sir James Graham's conduct had been dictated by an unworthy
+subservience to some of the despotic sovereigns of the Continent. The
+fact was indignantly denied in the House of Lords by the Duke of
+Wellington; and in the course of the session a remarkable proof was
+afforded how little influence such motives had on the decisions of our
+government, when they acquiesced in the passing of a bill which was a
+virtual repeal of the Alien Act, which had existed for more than half a
+century, and of which more than one Continental sovereign would
+certainly have desired the retention. Of late, indeed, it had been so
+modified, that practically it had become little more than a dead letter;
+and now, in 1844, without being formally repealed, it was virtually
+abrogated by an act which enabled all foreigners to obtain letters of
+naturalization, which conferred on them every right of British subjects,
+except those of becoming members of Parliament,[265] or of the Privy
+Council.
+
+Generally speaking, few governments had enjoyed more of the confidence
+of the nation than Peel's did in 1844; yet in this year it was exposed
+to two remarkable mortifications. The charter of the East India Company,
+as framed by Pitt in subsequent events, which has led to the entire
+extinction of the political power of the Company, makes anything beyond
+this brief mention of the transaction superfluous at the present time.
+
+The other mortification of the ministry to which allusion has been made
+fell upon it at home in the Parliamentary discussion of the
+Prime-minister's financial measures, on which his judgment was usually
+regarded as pre-eminent, and on which a large majority of the House was
+generally disposed implicitly to follow his guidance. Sir Robert was
+not, indeed, himself Chancellor of the Exchequer, that office being
+filled by Mr. Goulburn, but it was certain that the Budget was inspired
+by a deference to the Prime-minister's views. And, among the
+arrangements which it proposed, one consisted of a relaxation of the
+sugar-duties, which was regarded with dread by those interested in the
+West Indies, as a farther step in the direction of free-trade, and as
+depriving them of the modified protection which they were as yet
+enjoying. To preserve that protection to them, Mr. Miles, the member for
+Bristol, proposed an amendment which, after an animated debate, was
+carried by a majority of twenty. Three months before, on the Factory
+Bill and the question whether the hours of labor should be limited to
+ten or to twelve, the minister had also found himself defeated, though
+by a much smaller majority; but in that case the defeat had been the
+less pronounced from the inconsistency of the votes on the different
+limits.[266] And he extricated himself from that difficulty by
+abandoning the bill altogether, and introducing a new one, not without
+angry resistance on the part of Lord John Russell and other members of
+the Opposition. They denounced such a manoeuvre as alike
+unconstitutional and unparliamentary; while he, on the contrary,
+insisted that the House had always jealously retained the right of
+reconsidering its own decisions. In that instance, however, the
+introduction of a new bill might have been regarded as the simplest mode
+of harmonizing the variety of views which had been represented by the
+discussion of and votes on the ministerial proposal and the amendments;
+but no such expedient was practicable in this case, that of the
+sugar-duties. A defeat on an important clause in the Budget by a
+majority of twenty was a far more serious matter; it was such a blow as
+had generally been reckoned sufficient to require a resignation of a
+ministry. But on this occasion Peel did not feel himself called on to
+take that step; nor was he inclined to dissolve Parliament, which some
+regarded as his only legitimate alternative, though he had little doubt
+that, if he did so, he should be supported by the confidence of the
+country. After careful reflection, the course on which he eventually
+decided was to adhere to the principle of a relaxation of duties, but to
+consent to a moderate variation from his original proposal as to the
+amount. And in pursuit of this plan, on the next discussion of the
+Budget, he proposed an amendment to that effect, making the adoption of
+it by the House a test of its confidence in the administration. Lord
+John Russell opposed the amendment with great vehemence, pronouncing the
+acceptance of it, if it should be accepted, and the House should thus
+consent "to retract its previous vote, a lamentable proof of
+subserviency, which would disgrace it with the country." What Sir Robert
+now asked was, substantially, that they should now declare that to be
+expedient which they had declared to be inexpedient only three nights
+ago; and Lord Palmerston insisted that the proper course to be taken by
+the government was to resign; while Mr. Labouchere, who had also been a
+member of Lord Melbourne's cabinet,[267] though he admitted that there
+might be "circumstances under which a minister might without impropriety
+ask the House to reconsider a vote," denied that the present was such a
+case, and especially denounced the importation of the question of
+confidence or no confidence in the ministry into the discussion as
+"dangerous and unconstitutional." Another section of the Opposition
+agreed in taking the same line; Mr. Disraeli (then beginning to lay the
+foundations of his reputation and influence) strongly denouncing the
+conduct of the minister, as degrading both to his own supporters and
+still more to the whole House, and recommending him to say frankly to
+both, "We have gauged your independence, and you may have a semblance of
+parliamentary freedom as far as this point, but the moment you go
+farther, you must either submit to public disgrace, or we must submit to
+private life." The end of the discussion was, that the minister
+prevailed by a majority a trifle larger than that which had defeated him
+before. This is not the place to discuss the difference between one
+principle of taxation and another; but the question whether a minister
+when defeated is justified in asking either House of Parliament to
+reconsider its vote, seems one that could only have been raised in a
+House under the influence of unusual excitement of some kind. The charge
+that such a request was unconstitutional only serves to show how loosely
+the words "constitution" and "unconstitutional" are often used even by
+those from whom precision of language might most be expected; for Sir
+Robert Peel's proposal that the House should retract its vote was not
+unprecedented, the very same demand having been made in 1833 by Lord
+Althorp, then Chancellor of the Exchequer of Lord Grey's ministry, of
+which those very men were members who were now loudest in denouncing the
+conduct of the present government. And on that occasion it is worth
+remarking that, though Lord Althorp's demand was resisted in one or two
+quarters, he was vigorously supported by Sir Robert Peel, on the ground
+that, though to rescind one night a vote passed on a former one might be
+not altogether free from objection, it would be a far greater evil that
+questions of importance should be held to be in all cases finally
+decided by a single vote, passed, it might be, in a thin House, or in
+obedience to some sudden impulse.
+
+And this seems to be the view of the case commended not only by
+constitutional and parliamentary practice, but by common-sense. It would
+be strange, indeed, when the questions submitted to the British
+Parliament and the decisions of that Parliament on them are so often of
+paramount importance to the whole world, if the Parliament should be the
+only body in the world denied the right of revising its own judgments,
+the only one whose first resolution is so irrevocable that even itself
+may not change or modify it. To rescind a recent vote is, no doubt, as
+Sir Robert Peel said, a step not wholly free from objection. It should
+be an exceptional act, as one which, if often repeated, would give an
+appearance of capricious fickleness and instability to the opinions of
+Parliament, calculated to impair that respect for it which the whole
+state and nation are deeply concerned in upholding; but to refuse, under
+any circumstances, to confess a change of judgment, would lay the
+Parliament open to an imputation at least equally dangerous to that
+respect--that of an obstinacy which refuses to confess the possibility
+of being mistaken, or to hear reason. It would not be well, therefore,
+that the abrogation of a previous vote should become an ordinary
+practice; but it would be equally undesirable that any fixed or
+unchangeable rule should be interposed to prevent a second discussion of
+an important question, with the possibility of its leading to a reversal
+of the opinion first expressed.
+
+In the same year (1844) the ministers felt compelled to raise a
+constitutional point of singular refinement, which had the effect of
+arresting the progress of a bill, in which one part of the kingdom took
+a lively interest, which a division in its favor proved to be fully
+shared by the House of Lords.[268] It has been already mentioned that in
+the last year of the preceding reign a bill had passed for creating,
+when opportunity offered by the sees affected becoming vacant, two new
+bishoprics at Ripon and Manchester, the incomes of which were to be
+provided by the union of some of the smaller existing bishoprics,
+Gloucester with Bristol, St. Asaph with Bangor. But the Welsh regarded
+with great disapproval any reduction of the number of bishoprics in the
+principality, and Lord Powis now brought in a bill to repeal so much of
+the act as provided for the union of two Welsh sees, urging not only
+their great extent, which he stated at 3000 square miles of very
+mountainous country, but the fact that the population of North Wales was
+steadily and largely increasing. The bill, as has been intimated, was
+favorably received by the Lords, who passed the second reading by a
+majority of twelve; but, before it could be read a third time, the Duke
+of Wellington, as leader of the ministry in that House, announced that
+the bill was one which touched the prerogative of the crown, and
+therefore could not be proceeded with without the consent of her
+Majesty, which he was not authorized to express.
+
+As the matter was explained by the Chancellor, Lord Lyndhurst, the
+manner in which the bill touched the royal prerogative was this: as,
+during the vacancy of any see, its temporalities belonged to the crown,
+any alterations in a see affected the direct pecuniary interests of the
+crown, and he, as Speaker of the House, doubted whether he should be
+justified in putting a question which so touched the royal prerogative
+without the sovereign's consent. A committee which was appointed to
+investigate the case fully confirmed the view thus taken by the
+ministers, and the bill was dropped.
+
+It was, however, an exercise of the royal prerogative which was received
+by the House in general with great dissatisfaction. Certainly, since the
+Civil List and royal income had been placed on their present footing, it
+was only by a very forced construction that the pecuniary interests of
+the sovereign could be said to be affected. And it seemed a very
+insufficient plea for evoking the exercise of a power which, as it was
+said, had certainly never been exerted before since the accession of the
+Hanoverian dynasty. Nor was it made more acceptable by the explanation
+of Lord Brougham, who on this occasion came to the support of the
+minister, that the refusal of the crown's consent at this stage was "a
+warning, as it were, a polite and courteous communication between the
+sovereign, as guardian of the privileges of the crown, and the two
+Houses of Parliament, that if they passed a certain bill it would not
+receive the royal assent;" for, though the right to refuse the royal
+assent to any bill was incontestable, it had not been exercised since
+the time of William III., and to put it in force for the protection of
+an imaginary interest of the crown itself would have been so unpopular
+an exercise of it that no administration could have ventured to advise
+it.
+
+One of the arguments which the Duke of Wellington brought forward in the
+discussion, and which, probably, contributed to induce him thus to
+strangle Lord Powis's bill, has had an influence on subsequent
+legislation. He urged that its adoption--since the resolution to
+establish bishoprics at Manchester and Ripon was one which every one
+desired to carry out--would increase the number of bishops, "and thus
+make an organic change in the constitution of the House of Lords." It is
+not very clear how the addition of a single spiritual peer could have
+that effect. But the Duke had dwelt upon the same argument before in the
+debate on the proposed union of the sees affected, urging that there was
+such a jealousy of the Church in many quarters, and especially in some
+of the large towns, that it would be very undesirable to pass any
+measure the effect of which would be to increase the number of Episcopal
+peers. Even if there was any general reluctance at that time to see such
+an increase (a fact which was by no means ascertained), it may be
+doubted whether it was founded on any sufficient reason. It is not easy
+to see why, when there is no limit to the augmentation of the number of
+lay peers, it should be judged impolitic or unjust to make even so small
+an addition to the number of spiritual peers. At the Restoration the
+spiritual peers were, probably, more than a fifth of the entire House.
+From the great number of subsequent creations of lay peers they were now
+less than a sixteenth, so that there could be no ground for apprehending
+that a slight re-enforcement of the Episcopal bench would disturb the
+balance, or give the Church an undue preponderating weight in the
+decisions of the House. The difficulty, however, such as it appeared to
+the Duke then, has had such weight with subsequent administrations, that
+a new principle has been established of creating bishoprics which shall
+not at first confer seats in the Upper House till their holders become
+entitled to them by seniority. As they are peers from the moment of
+their consecration, it may be doubted whether this creation of peers,
+without seats in Parliament, does not deserve the name of "an organic
+change in the constitution," far more than the addition of one or two
+ecclesiastical peers to the Episcopal bench; and also whether it has not
+established a dangerous principle and precedent; the disconnection of
+bishoprics from seats in Parliament, in even a single instance, seeming
+to furnish an argument in favor of the exclusion of the whole order, a
+measure which, if unjust and injurious to the Church, would be at least
+equally injurious to Parliament itself, and to the whole state.
+
+But all questions of this kind were presently lost sight of in the
+excitement produced by the measure which more than any other has stamped
+Sir Robert Peel's administration with a lasting character, the repeal of
+the Corn-laws. Many statesmen, even of those who were most in favor of
+free-trade in other articles of commerce, made an exception in the case
+of corn, partly from a feeling of the necessity of encouraging
+agriculture, and partly from a conviction of the danger of in any way
+contributing to create or increase a dependence on foreign countries for
+the food of the people. Both Whigs and Tories were generally thus agreed
+on the necessity of maintaining the principle of protection; the dispute
+between the two parties being whether it were best achieved by a fixed
+duty on imported corn, or by what was commonly known as a sliding scale:
+a scale, that is, which varied inversely with the price of the grain
+itself, rising as the price in the home market fell, and falling as it
+rose. In the manufacturing districts a different feeling had prevailed
+for some years. In the first years of the present reign severe distress
+in Manchester and others of the chief manufacturing towns had led to the
+formation of an association whose chief object was sufficiently
+indicated by its title of the Anti-Corn-law League. At first Mr.
+Villiers, the member for Wolverhampton, was its principal spokesman in
+the House of Commons, but at subsequent elections two manufacturers of
+great eloquence obtained seats, and year after year urged the entire
+repeal of all duties on corn with great earnestness, though for some
+time their arguments made but little impression on the House. Their
+motions were rejected in 1842 by a majority of 300; in 1843 by one
+exceeding 250; in 1844 by above 200; and in 1845 by one of more than 130
+in a much smaller House. But this last division had scarcely been taken
+when an unprecedented calamity--the almost entire failure of the potato
+crop, which was attacked in nearly every part of both islands by a new
+disease, the cause of which is not to this day fully ascertained--
+suddenly changed the aspect of the subject. To the English farmer and
+laborer it was a severe loss; to the Irish farmer it was ruin; to the
+Irish peasant famine. The grain harvest, too, was generally deficient.
+And it was evident that rigorous measures, promptly taken, were
+indispensable, if a large portion of the peasantry in the southern and
+western provinces of Ireland were not to be left to perish of actual
+starvation. In the face of so terrible an emergency Peel acted with
+great decision. On his own responsibility he authorized the purchase of
+a large supply of Indian corn from the United States, hoping, among
+other indirect effects of such a step, to accustom the Irish to the use
+of other kinds of food besides the root on which hitherto they had too
+exclusively relied.[269] And he laid before his colleagues in the
+cabinet a proposal to suspend the existing Corn-law "for a limited
+period," a measure which all saw must lead to its eventual repeal. It
+would be superfluous now to recapitulate the discussions which took
+place, the various alternative proposals which were suggested, or the
+dissensions in the cabinet to which his proposal gave birth; the
+resignation of the ministry, and its subsequent resumption of office,
+when Lord Stanley and Lord John Russell had found it impossible to form
+an administration. It is sufficient to say that, as soon as Parliament
+met, Sir Robert brought forward a bill to reduce the duty on corn to
+four shillings, a price only half of the lowest fixed duty that had ever
+been proposed before, that reduction, too, being a stepping-stone to the
+abolition of all duties, at the end of three years, beyond a shilling a
+quarter, which was to be retained, in order to acquire an accurate
+knowledge of the quantity of grain imported. The diminution, however, of
+this duty was not the whole object of his new measure. It included other
+arrangements which would serve as a compensation to the agriculturists,
+by relieving them from some of the peculiar burdens to which the land
+was subjected; and it contained, farther, a reduction or abolition of
+import duties hitherto levied on many other articles, especially on such
+as "formed the clothing of the country," on the fair ground that if the
+removal of protection from the agriculturist were "a sacrifice for the
+common good," the commercial and manufacturing interests might justly be
+required to make a similar sacrifice for the same patriotic object.
+
+Though opposed in both Houses with unusual bitterness, the ministry
+carried their measure, which, indeed, in all probability, even if the
+destruction of the potato crop had not come to accelerate the movement,
+could not have been long delayed, the continual and rapid increase of
+the population adding yearly strength to the arguments of those who
+denounced the imposition of any tax which had the effect of increasing
+the price of the people's food. But, however inevitable it may have
+been, we are not the less compelled to regard it as indirectly bringing
+about a great constitutional change, or rather as consummating that
+which had been commenced by the Reform Bill. Till the year 1832 the
+territorial aristocracy had exerted a predominating influence in the
+government of the state. The Reform Bill, which deprived the wealthier
+land-owners of the greater part of their power at elections, struck the
+first blow at that influence. The abolition of the Corn-laws inflicted
+on it a still more decisive wound, by its extinction of the doctrine
+that there was any such peculiar sacredness about the land and its
+produce as entitled them to protection beyond that enjoyed by other
+kinds of property. Placing in that respect the commercial and
+manufacturing interest on a level with the landed interest, it made us,
+in a farther and a somewhat different sense from that in which Napoleon
+had used the phrase, a nation of shopkeepers.[270]
+
+The repeal of the Corn-laws had another result: it divided the
+Conservative party, and, as a necessary consequence, led to the downfall
+of the ministry. The same session which witnessed its success in
+carrying that repeal witnessed also its defeat on a coercion bill, which
+they regarded as indispensable for the "protection of life in Ireland,"
+where actual murders had reached the appalling amount of nearly three
+hundred in two years. The ministry at once resigned, and Lord John
+Russell had no difficulty in forming an administration, now that the
+question of the Corn-laws was finally settled. It was, however, no bed
+of roses to which the new ministry succeeded; the famine in Ireland
+exceeded the worst anticipations; and, though prodigious efforts were
+made by the government and Parliament to relieve it, though large sums
+were placed at the disposal of the Lord-lieutenant, aided by
+contributions from private sources in England to an enormous amount;
+though the small remnant of the import duty on corn which had been left
+on it by the measure of the preceding year was taken off, and the
+navigation laws suspended, in order that no obstacle interposed to the
+acquisition of food from every available quarter, it was estimated that
+more than half a million of people perished through actual famine or the
+diseases which scarcity brought in its train.[271] A severe monetary
+crisis was one not unnatural result of this distress, so severe that the
+Funds fell to a price below any that had been quoted for many years, and
+the reserve in the Bank of England to an amount lower than it had been
+at any period since 1828. And these difficulties had hardly been
+surmounted when a new revolution in France overturned the dynasty of
+Louis Philippe and established a republic. The revolutionary contagion
+spread to Italy, where, indeed, the movement had begun. The Pope--Pius
+IX.--who had but lately succeeded to the tiara, was forced to flee from
+Rome in the disguise of a foreign courier, after his Prime-minister had
+been murdered by the mob. Germany was scarcely less disturbed. The
+administration of Metternich, who had governed Austria with authority
+little less than absolute for nearly forty years, was overthrown in a
+tumult in which he himself escaped with difficulty from the violence of
+the populace; dangerous riots took place at Munich, at Berlin, and at
+the capitals of most of the smaller principalities, and for some time
+everything seemed to portend the outbreak of a general war, likely to be
+the more formidable as being a war of the revolutionary and republican
+against the monarchical principle. Happily, that danger was averted. The
+only war which broke out between different nations was a brief contest
+in the north of Italy, which the superior numbers of the Austrian armies
+and the skill of Marshal Radetsky, a veteran who had learned the art of
+war under Suvarof nearly sixty years before, decided in favor of
+Austria, and which in the spring of 1849 was terminated by a peace on
+less unfavorable terms to Sardinia than she could well have expected.
+And in the same season tranquillity was re-established even at Rome,
+which, from the peculiar character of the Papal power, contained special
+elements of provocation and danger.
+
+But, though peace was thus generally maintained, these various events
+had produced a ferment of spirits which required some time to calm down,
+and so greatly embarrassed the government, that in the spring of 1852
+Lord John Russell's administration was dissolved, and a new ministry was
+formed by Lord Derby[272]. But the causes which had overthrown his
+predecessor remained to weaken him; so that for some time it seemed
+impossible to form a ministry which afforded any promise of stability.
+Such a rapid succession of changes as ensued had had no parallel since
+the first years of George III. Between February, 1852, and February,
+1855, the country had no fewer than four different Prime-ministers, a
+fact which was at once both the proof and the parent of weakness in
+every administration. Lord John Russell had attempted to procure a
+factitious support in the country by stimulating a fresh demand for
+parliamentary reform. A year or two before, he had provoked the
+dissatisfaction of the "Advanced Liberals," as they called themselves,
+by insisting on the finality of the Reform Bill of 1832, and by advising
+his followers "to rest and be thankful" for what had been then obtained.
+But now he began to advance an opinion that that act required "some
+amendments to carry into more complete effect the principles on which it
+was founded." He inserted an intimation of that doctrine in the Queen's
+speech; and endeavored to give effect to it by bringing in a bill to
+lower the franchise, having, it seems, persuaded himself that a
+five-pound franchise would create a more Conservative class of
+voters.[273] He had scarcely introduced it when the fall of his ministry
+led to its abandonment; but, though it was coldly received by the House
+of Commons, the idea was taken up by the other political parties, who
+can hardly be acquitted of having used the question merely as an
+instrument of party warfare, trying, with an unstatesmanlike
+indifference to the danger of re-awakening the old frenzy on the
+subject, to rouse the nation to take an interest in it; but trying in
+vain. The nation was no longer in the same temper as it had displayed
+twenty years before. The Reform Bill of 1832 had been demanded and
+carried with a frantic vehemence of enthusiasm such as could only have
+been excited by real defects and grievances. But those grievances had
+been removed and redressed. And the bulk of the people could take no
+interest in schemes whose sole end seemed to be either to satisfy the
+theories of some political doctrinaires or to embarrass an adversary;
+till at last, as Reform Bill after Reform Bill was framed, brought in,
+and defeated, or dropped, it became plain, "as the Prince Consort noted
+in a private memorandum at the end of 1859, that what the country
+wanted, in fact, was not reform, but a bill to stop the question of
+Reform."[274] And, at last, the prevalence of this feeling Lord John
+Russell could not conceal even from himself, but confessed to Lord
+Palmerston, then Prime-minister, who had always silently discouraged the
+movement, that "the apathy of the country was undeniable; nor was it a
+transient humor. It seemed rather a confirmed habit of mind. Four Reform
+Bills had been introduced of late years by four different governments,
+and for not one of them had there been the least enthusiasm. The
+conclusion to which he had come was, that the advisers of the crown of
+all parties having offered to the country various measures of reform,
+and the country having shown itself indifferent to them all, the best
+course which could now be taken was to wait till the country should show
+a manifest desire for an amendment of the representation."[275]
+
+There was, however, in these years one subject in which the country did
+take a real interest; that was the development and extension of the
+principles of free-trade. On that the national view had become so
+decided that in 1848 the Parliament even abolished the navigation laws,
+which had subsisted so long, the first act on the subject dating from
+the reign of Richard II., that the adherence to the principle contained
+in them of confining both the export and the import trade of the
+kingdom, with but few exceptions, to British shipping, seemed almost an
+essential article of the constitution. It was the dearer, too, to the
+national prejudices, from the sense universally entertained of the
+paramount importance of maintaining the pre-eminence of our navy, and
+from the belief that the commercial marine was a nursery for the royal
+fleets, with which they could not dispense. But latterly the laws had
+become unpopular even with some of those who had formerly been supposed
+to derive the greatest benefit from them. Many of our colonies had
+complained of their operation, and several of the ablest of our colonial
+governors had recommended their repeal. They had been found, too, to
+present frequent and considerable difficulties in our commercial
+negotiations with other countries, and many naval officers of large
+experience and sound judgment expressed a decided belief that they were
+of no practical use to the naval service. The result of a long and able
+debate was that the laws were repealed, with the exception of that
+portion of them which preserved the monopoly of the coasting trade to
+our own seamen and vessels, that exception being chiefly dictated by
+considerations connected with the prevention of smuggling.
+
+The ground on which the ministers relied in proposing this repeal of
+laws so ancient was that, when protection had been removed from every
+other trade, those concerned in these different trades had an
+irresistible claim for its removal from the shipping. And on general
+principles, both of commerce and statesmanship, the claim was, as they
+urged, irresistible, unless some object of greater importance still than
+uniformity of legislation--namely, the national safety, bound up as it
+unquestionably was in the perpetual pre-eminence of the national
+navy--required an exception to be made. But for the maintenance of our
+maritime supremacy it was, as Burke had preached three-quarters of a
+century before, better to trust to the spirit of the people, to their
+attachment to their government, and to their innate aptitude for
+seamanship, which they seem to have inherited from the hardy rovers of
+the dark ages, and which no other nation shares with them in an equal
+degree. And if that may safely be trusted, as undoubtedly it may, to
+maintain the supremacy of our warlike fleets, the preponderance of
+argument seemed greatly on the side of those who contended that our
+commercial fleets needed no such protection; to which it may be added
+that exceptions to a general rule and principle are in themselves so
+questionable, that the burden of proof seems to lie upon those who would
+establish or maintain them. But the advocates of free-trade were not
+content even with this triumph, though it might have been thought a
+crowning one, and in the course of the next year they succeeded in
+carrying a resolution which (though Lord Derby and the opponents of the
+act of 1846 were now in office) was not resisted even by the ministry,
+being, in fact, the result of a compromise between the different
+parties; and which asserted that "the improved condition of the country,
+and especially of the industrious classes, was mainly the result of
+recent legislation, which had established the principle of unrestricted
+competition, ... and that it was the opinion of the House that this
+policy, firmly maintained and prudently extended, would, without
+inflicting injury on any important interest, best enable the industry of
+the country to bear its own burdens, and would thereby most surely
+promote the welfare and contentment of the people." Such a resolution
+was, in fact, the adoption of free-trade as the permanent ruling
+principle of all future commercial legislation. And even before the
+adoption of this resolution, the feeling in favor of free-trade had been
+greatly strengthened by the Great Exhibition, which not only delighted
+the world for six months with a spectacle of such varied and surpassing
+beauty as even its original projector, the Prince Consort, had not
+pictured to himself, but which had also the farther and more important
+effect of instructing the British workman in every branch of
+manufacture, by bringing before his eyes the workmanship of other
+nations; and, as we may well believe (though such a result is not so
+easily tested), of improving the mutual good-will between rival nations,
+from the respect for each which the experience of their skill and
+usefulness could not fail to excite.
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 258: On the 20th of February, 1840, Baron Stockmar writes:
+"Melbourne told me that he had already expressed his opinion to the
+Prince that the Court ought to take advantage of the present movement to
+treat all parties, especially the Tories, in the spirit of a general
+amnesty." To the Queen his language was the same: "You should now hold
+out the olive-branch a little."--_Life of the Prince Consort_, i., 83.]
+
+[Footnote 259: He became Prime-minister in September, 1841, and retired
+in June, 1846--four years and three-quarters afterward.]
+
+[Footnote 260: "Life of the Prince Consort," i., 266. It may be remarked
+that, in spite of the opinion thus expressed by Sir Robert Peel, of
+those who, since his retirement in 1846, have held the same office, the
+majority have been members of the House of Commons. The peers who have
+since been Prime-ministers have been Lord Aberdeen and Lord Derby; the
+members of the House of Commons have been Lord John Russell, Lord
+Palmerston, Mr. Disraeli, and Mr. Gladstone; though it may be thought
+that in his second ministry Mr. Disraeli showed his concurrence in Sir
+Robert Peel's latest view, by becoming a peer in the third year of his
+administration.]
+
+[Footnote 261: Lord Stanhope tells us "the remedial resolutions moved by
+Pitt in the House of Commons, as abolishing the old duties and
+substituting new ones in a simpler form, amounted in number to no less
+than 2537."--_Life of Pitt_, i., 330. Peel, in his speech, March 21,
+1842, states that he reduces or takes off altogether (wherever the duty
+is trifling, but is practicable) the duty on 750 articles of import.]
+
+[Footnote 262: In the Commons by 307 to 184; in the Lords by 226 to 69.]
+
+[Footnote 263: The following statements of the members of colleges and
+of the three denominations for 1879, 1874, and 1869 appear in the last
+_Queen's University Calendar_:
+
+                         1879. 1874. 1869.
+Church of Ireland ....... 201   189   211
+Roman Catholics   ....... 223   188   161
+Presbyterians  .......... 388   249   227
+Other denominations......  88    87    83
+                          ---   ---   ---
+                          900   713   682]
+
+[Footnote 264: In the course of the session, in order to tranquillize
+the public mind on the subject, secret committees were appointed by both
+Houses of Parliament to investigate the subject, from whose inquiries it
+appeared that, since the days when the government was endangered by the
+plots of the Jacobites, the power had been very sparingly used. The most
+conspicuous instance of its employment had been in the case of Bishop
+Atterbury, several of whose letters had been opened, and were produced
+in Parliament to justify the bill of "pains and penalties" which was
+passed against him. The power had been confined to Great Britain till
+the latter part of the last century, when it was judged desirable to
+extend it also to the Lord-lieutenant of Ireland. But, since the Peace
+of Amiens, the number of letters opened in a year had not, on an
+average, exceeded eight; nor was there the least ground for suspecting
+that a single one had been opened except on such information as fully
+warranted suspicion.
+
+The practice, however, was not confined to our own government. In the
+second volume of the "Life of Bishop Wilberforce" a page is given of his
+diary, dated July 18, 1854, which records a conversation in which the
+Duke of Newcastle and Lord John Russell took part, and in which it is
+mentioned that the French government, under the administration of M.
+Guizot, opened letters, and that the practice was not confined to
+monarchical or absolute governments, for "the American government opens
+most freely all letters." And, with reference to this particular case,
+the Duke of Newcastle said that "Sir James Graham really opened
+Mazzini's letters on information which led to a belief that a great act
+of violence and bloodshed might be prevented by it."--_Life of Bishop
+Wilberforce_, ii., 247.]
+
+[Footnote 265: A subsequent act, passed since the date at which the
+present history closes, has repealed even this exception. By the 33d
+Victoria, c. 14 ("Law Reports," p. 169), it is enacted that "an alien,
+to whom a certificate of naturalization is granted, shall in the United
+Kingdom be entitled to all political and other rights, powers, and
+privileges, and be subject to all obligations to which a natural born
+British subject is entitled as subject in the United Kingdom," etc.; and
+at the general election of 1880 the Baron de Ferrieres, a Belgian
+nobleman, who had been naturalized in 1867, was elected M.P. for
+Cheltenham.]
+
+[Footnote 266: In one instance--on the question whether twelve should be
+the number of hours, as proposed by the Government--the majority against
+that number was 186 to 183. But immediately afterward a majority of 188
+to 184 decided against Lord Ashley's alternative proposal of ten hours.]
+
+[Footnote 267: As President of the Board of Trade. He afterward was
+raised to the Peerage as Lord Taunton.]
+
+[Footnote 268: The second reading was carried in the House of Lords by
+49 to 37.]
+
+[Footnote 269: See "Peel's Memoirs," ii., 173.]
+
+[Footnote 270: It has been observed that till the Corn-laws were
+repealed there had been no instance whatever of any person who had been
+engaged in trade becoming a cabinet minister. Since that time there have
+been several, some of whom only relinquished their share in houses of
+business on receiving their appointments, and some who are generally
+understood to have continued to participate in the profits of trade
+while members of an administration.]
+
+[Footnote 271: Alison, quoting the General Report of the Census
+Commissioners, estimates the deaths caused by famine and the diseases
+engendered by it at the appalling number of 590,000, and states the sums
+advanced under different acts of Parliament to meet the emergency at
+L7,132,268.--_History of Europe_, vii., 274, 276, 2d series.]
+
+[Footnote 272: The same statesman who has previously been mentioned as
+Lord Stanley, and whom the death of his father had recently raised to
+the House of Peers.]
+
+[Footnote 273: In 1853 he said to Lord Clarendon, speaking of a new bill
+which he was pressing on Lord Aberdeen, then Prime-minister, "I am for
+making it as Conservative as possible, and that by a large extension of
+the suffrage. The Radicals are the ten-pound holders. The five-pound
+holders will be Conservative, as they are more easily acted
+upon."--_Life of the Prince Consort_, ii., 503. It was the same idea
+that inspired some of the details of the Reform Bill subsequently passed
+by Lord Derby's third ministry.]
+
+[Footnote 274: "Life of the Prince Consort," iv., 395.]
+
+[Footnote 275: "Life of the Prince Consort," v., 56.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+
+Dismissal of Lord Palmerston.--Theory of the Relation between the
+Sovereign and the Cabinet.--Correspondence of the Sovereign with French
+Princes.--Russian War.--Abolition of the Tax on Newspapers.--Life
+Peerages.--Resignation of two Bishops.--Indian Mutiny.--Abolition of the
+Sovereign Power of the Company.--Visit of the Prince of Wales to
+India.--Conspiracy Bill.--Rise of the Volunteers.--National
+Fortifications.--The Lords Reject the Measure for the Repeal of the
+Paper-duties.--Lord Palmerston's Resolutions.--Character of the Changes
+during the last Century.
+
+
+The frequency of ministerial changes at this time has already been
+mentioned, and the first of them took place at the beginning of 1852,
+under circumstances which throw some light on a question which has never
+been exactly defined--the duty of the different members of a cabinet to
+one another, to the Prime-minister, and to the sovereign.
+
+Queen Victoria had a high idea of her duties and responsibilities. From
+any legal responsibility she was aware that she was exempt; but she did
+not the less consider that a moral responsibility rested on her not to
+be content to give her royal sanction as a mere matter of form to every
+scheme or measure which might be submitted to her, but to examine every
+case for herself, to form her own opinion, and, if it differed from that
+of her ministers, to lay her objections and views fairly before them,
+though prepared, as the constitution required, to act on their decision
+rather than on her own, if, in spite of her arguments, they adhered to
+their judgment. And in carrying out this notion of her duty she was
+singularly aided by the Prince, her husband, a man of perfectly upright
+character, of great general ability, and who, from the first moment of
+his married life, regulated his views of every question, domestic and
+foreign, by its bearing on English interests and English feelings, to
+which he early acclimatized himself with a remarkable readiness of
+appreciation.
+
+In the administration of Lord John Russell, Lord Palmerston was Foreign
+Secretary, and during its latter years foreign affairs occupied more of
+the attention of the country than matters of domestic policy.
+
+The revolution of 1848, which overthrew the Orleans dynasty, had
+produced in France a state of affairs but little removed from anarchy,
+which was scarcely mitigated by the election of Prince Louis Napoleon to
+the Presidency of the new republic for four years, so constant was the
+opposition which the Republican party in the Assembly offered to every
+part of his policy. They even carried their opposition so far as to form
+a deliberate plan for the impeachment of his minister and himself, and
+for his arrest and imprisonment at Vincennes. But he was well-informed
+of all these dangers, and on the morning of the 2d of December, 1851
+(the day, as was commonly believed, having been selected by him as being
+the anniversary of his uncle's great victory of Austerlitz), he
+anticipated them by the arrest of all the leading malcontents in their
+beds; which he followed up by an appeal to the people to adopt a new
+constitution which he set before them, the chief article of which was
+the appointment of a President for ten years.
+
+No one could avoid seeing that what was aimed at was the
+re-establishment of the Empire in his own person. And so arbitrary a
+deed, as was inevitable, produced great excitement in England and
+anxious deliberations in the cabinet. Their decision, in strict
+uniformity with the principle that rules our conduct toward foreign
+nations, was to instruct our ambassador in Paris, Lord Normanby, to
+avoid any act or word which could wear the appearance of an act of
+interference of any kind in the internal affairs of France. But, on Lord
+Normanby reporting these instructions to the French Foreign Secretary,
+M. Guizot, he learned, to his surprise and perplexity, that Lord
+Palmerston had interfered already by expressing to the French ambassador
+in London, M. de Walewski, his warm approval of the President's
+conduct;[276] and Lord Normanby, greatly annoyed at being directed to
+hold one language in Paris, while the head of his department was taking
+a widely different tone in Downing Street--a complication which
+inevitably "subjected him to misrepresentation and suspicion"--naturally
+complained to the Prime-minister of being placed in so embarrassing a
+situation.
+
+Both the Queen and the Prime-minister had for some time been
+discontented at the independent manner in which Lord Palmerston
+apparently considered himself entitled to transact the business of his
+department, carrying it so far as even to claim a right to send out
+despatches without giving them any intimation of either their contents
+or their objects. And the Queen, in consequence, above a year
+before,[277] had drawn up a memorandum, in which she expressed with
+great distinctness her desire to have every step which the Foreign
+Secretary might recommend to be taken laid clearly before her, with
+sufficient time for consideration, "that she might know distinctly to
+what she had given her royal sanction;" and "to be kept informed of what
+passed between him and the Foreign Ministers before important decisions
+are taken," etc., etc. And, after such an intimation of her wish, she
+not unnaturally felt great annoyance at learning that in a transaction
+so important as this coup d'etat (to give it the name by which from the
+first it was described in every country) Lord Palmerston had taken upon
+himself to hold language to the French Ambassador "in complete
+contradiction to the line of strict neutrality and passiveness which she
+had expressed her desire to see followed with regard to the late
+convulsions at Paris, and which was approved by the cabinet."[278] The
+Prime-minister seems to have taken the same view of the act, and
+remonstrated with Lord Palmerston, who treated the matter very lightly,
+and justified his right to hold such a conversation, which he
+characterized as "unofficial," in such a tone and on such grounds that
+Lord John considered he left him no alternative "but to advise the Queen
+to place the Foreign Office in other hands."
+
+A careful and generally impartial political critic has recently
+expressed an opinion "that Lord Palmerston made good his case;"[279] but
+his argument on the transaction seems to overlook the most material
+point in it. Lord Palmerston's own defence of his conduct was, that "his
+conversation with Walewski was of an unofficial description; that he had
+said nothing to him which would in any degree or way fetter the action
+of the government; and that, if it was to be held that a Secretary of
+State could never express any opinion to a foreign minister on passing
+events except as the organ of a previously consulted cabinet, there
+would be an end of that easy and familiar intercourse which tends
+essentially to promote good understanding between ministers and
+government;" and he even added, as a personal justification of himself
+as against the Prime-minister, that three days afterward Lord John
+Russell himself, Lord Lansdowne (the President of the Council), and Sir
+Charles Wood (the Chancellor of the Exchequer) had all discussed the
+transaction with M. de Walewski at a dinner-party, "and their opinions
+were, if anything, rather more strongly favorable than his had been."
+
+This personal aspect of the case it is impossible to discuss, since
+there are no means of knowing whether the ministers mentioned would have
+admitted the correctness of this report of their language. If it were
+confessed to be accurate, it would only show them to have been guilty of
+equal impropriety, and to a great extent justify him as against the
+Prime-minister, whose condemnation of his language, if he were conscious
+that he had held the same himself, would be inexplicable. But it
+certainly does not justify him in respect of her Majesty or the cabinet
+collectively, since the Queen's complaint was, not that he held
+unofficial conversations as a private individual, and not as "the organ
+of a previously consulted cabinet," but that the tenor of the
+conversation which he had held was in direct contradiction to the tone
+which the cabinet had decided should be taken on the subject; that his
+language was calculated to draw the government into a course of action
+which it had been deliberately resolved to avoid. And, in spite of the
+deference due to Lord Palmerston's great experience, it is hard to see
+how a conversation between our Foreign Secretary and the French
+Ambassador on an action, the result of which is as yet undecided, can be
+wholly unofficial, in the sense of having no influence on the conduct of
+affairs, or, as he expressed it, "in no degree or way fettering the
+action of the government."
+
+The result was, as has been mentioned before, that the Prime-minister
+recommended the removal of Lord Palmerston from his office, and that he
+was removed accordingly. And this conclusion of the case seems to show
+that the statement of the position of the Prime-minister in the cabinet
+is rather understated by Mr. Gladstone in one of his essays,[280] where
+he says: "The head of the British government is not a Grand Vizier. He
+has no powers, properly so called, over his colleagues; on the rare
+occasions when a cabinet determines its course by the votes of its
+members, his vote only counts as one of theirs." He admits at the same
+time that "they are appointed and dismissed by the sovereign on his
+advice." And surely to have the right of giving this advice is to have
+the greatest possible power over his colleagues; not power, perhaps, to
+change their opinions (though it possibly at times has had power to
+prevent the expression of them), but power to compass their immediate
+removal from the administration, as was exercised in this instance, and
+as had been exercised by Pitt with regard to Lord Thurlow. That a
+difference of opinion, even on an important subject, is not always
+regarded as a sufficient cause for such a dismissal; that a
+Prime-minister, especially if conscious of his strength, occasionally
+consents to retain colleagues who differ from him on some one subject,
+the same work to which we are partly indebted for our knowledge of the
+details of this affair--the "Life of the Prince Consort"--furnishes two
+remarkable instances in which the Prime-minister, then Lord Palmerston
+himself, submitted to be overruled. We read there that on one occasion,
+when "Count Persigny sought the active intervention of England by the
+way of 'moral support' to a demand" which France proposed to address to
+Austria, "Lord Palmerston and Lord John Russell (then Foreign Secretary)
+were disposed to accede; but a different view was taken both by her
+Majesty and by the cabinet, and Count Persigny's request was accordingly
+declined."[281] On this occasion, it is true, he was yielding to an
+overwhelming majority of his colleagues (her Majesty's approval must, of
+course, have been expressed subsequently to their decision). But in
+another instance we find the same Prime-minister consenting to the
+introduction of a bill by one of his colleagues, Mr. Gladstone, then
+Chancellor of the Exchequer, of which he disapproved so highly that,
+after it had been passed by a very slender majority of the House of
+Commons,[282] he expressed to the Queen a hope that the closeness of the
+division "might encourage the House of Lords to throw out the bill when
+it should come to their House, and that he was bound in duty to say
+that, if they should do so, they would perform a good public service;"
+and after they had rejected it by a majority of eighty-nine, he
+pronounced that "they had done a right and useful thing," reporting to
+her Majesty, as a corroboration of this opinion, and as a proof that it
+was largely shared by the public out-of-doors, that "the people in the
+gallery of the House of Lords are said to have joined in the cheers
+which broke out when the numbers of the division were announced."[283]
+And on a third occasion also he bore with the same colleague's
+opposition to a measure which he and all the rest of the cabinet justly
+thought of vital importance to the best interests of the country, the
+fortification of our great seaports, allowing him to object for a time
+in private, and even to threaten public opposition to it the next year,
+since he felt assured that his opposition, if carried out, which he
+doubted, would be wholly ineffectual.[284]
+
+The personal interest in politics which this laudable habit of judging
+of everything for herself naturally engendered in the Queen's mind led,
+however, to the adoption by her Majesty, in more than one instance, of a
+course at variance not only with all historical precedent, but, with
+deference be it said, with constitutional principle, sanctioned though
+it was by more than one ministry. When the First Napoleon, after his
+elevation to the head of the French government as First Consul,
+proposed, by an autograph letter to George III., to treat with that
+sovereign for the conclusion of peace between the two nations, Pitt, to
+whom his Majesty communicated the letter, had no difficulty in deciding
+that it would be unseasonable for the King "to depart from the forms
+long established in Europe for transacting business with foreign
+states,"[285] and, under his guidance, the cabinet instructed Lord
+Grenville, as Foreign Secretary, to address the reply to the First
+Consul's letter to the French Foreign Secretary, M. de Talleyrand.
+
+But this reign has witnessed several departures from the old and
+convenient rule. Its violation was not begun by her Majesty, but by the
+Emperor Nicholas of Russia in the year preceding the Crimean war. He
+wrote to the Queen herself to discuss some of the points in dispute, and
+she answered his letter with her own hand.[286] The outbreak of war
+which soon ensued prevented any continuation of that correspondence; but
+the close alliance which that war for a time produced between England
+and France, strengthened as it was by an interchange of visits between
+the royal and imperial families, which led to the establishment of a
+strong mutual friendliness and regard, led also to an occasional
+interchange of letters on some of the gravest questions affecting the
+policy of the two nations. The correspondence was sanctioned by
+successive English cabinets, every letter which the Queen either
+received from, or sent to, any foreign prince on political affairs being
+invariably communicated by her either to the Prime-minister or to the
+Foreign Secretary; and they, in one instance, even suggesting to her
+Majesty to write to Louis Napoleon[287] with an object so delicate as
+that of influencing the language with which he was about to open his
+Chambers.
+
+But we must think the line recommended by Pitt to George III. both more
+constitutional and more safe. A letter from one sovereign to another on
+political subjects cannot be divested of the character of a state-paper,
+and for every state-paper some one must be responsible. The sovereign
+cannot be, but for every one of his actions the ministers are. And it
+follows, therefore, that they are thus made responsible for documents of
+which they have not been the original authors; of which, were it not for
+the courtesy of the sovereign, they might by possibility be wholly
+ignorant; and with parts of which, even with the knowledge which that
+courtesy has afforded them, they may not fully coincide, since they
+could hardly venture to subject a composition of their royal mistress to
+a vigorous criticism. Such a correspondence, therefore, places them so
+far in a false position, and it runs the risk of placing the sovereign
+himself in one equally false and unpleasant, since, if the opinions
+expressed or the advice given fail of their effect, the adviser is so
+far lowered in the eyes of his correspondent and of the world.
+
+As has been incidentally mentioned, in the spring of 1854 war broke out
+with Russia, nominally on account of the Sultan's refusal to concede
+some of the Czar's demands concerning the condition of the Greek Church
+in Palestine, but more really because, believing the Turkish empire to
+be in the last stage of decay, he hoped by hastening its destruction to
+obtain the lion's share of its spoils. And for the first time for two
+centuries an English and French army stood together in a field of battle
+as allies. In the field our armies were invariably victorious,
+inflicting severe defeats on the enemy at Alma and Inkerman, and
+wresting from them the mighty fortress of Sebastopol, in the Crimea,
+which hitherto they had believed to be absolutely impregnable. Our fleet
+was, if possible, still more triumphant, destroying Bomarsund and
+Sweaborg, in the Baltic, without the Russian ships daring to fire a
+single gun in their defence, while their Black Sea fleet was even sunk
+by its own admiral, as the only expedient to save it from capture. And
+in the spring of 1856 the war was terminated by a treaty of peace, in
+which, for the first time since the days of Peter the Great, Russia was
+compelled to submit to a cession of territory. But (it may almost be
+said) to the credit of the nation these successes, glorious and
+substantial as they were, made at the time scarcely so great an
+impression on the people as the hardships which, in the first winter of
+the war, our troops suffered from the defective organization of our
+commissariat. Want of shelter and want of food proved more destructive
+than the Russian cannon; presently our gallant soldiers were reported to
+be perishing by hundreds for lack of common necessaries; and the news
+awakened so clamorous a discontent throughout the whole of the United
+Kingdom as led to another change of ministry, and Lord Aberdeen was
+succeeded by Lord Palmerston. While a war on so large a scale was being
+waged there was but little time to spare for the work of the legislator,
+though it is not foreign to our subject to relate that in 1855 the last
+of those taxes which the political economists denounced as taxes on
+knowledge, the tax on newspapers, was abolished. Originally it had been
+fourpence; in 1836 Mr. Spring Rice, Chancellor of the Exchequer in Lord
+Melbourne's ministry, had reduced it to a penny; and now, with a very
+general acquiescence, it was abolished altogether.
+
+The entire abolition of a tax is not properly to be called a financial
+measure, that epithet belonging rather to those which aim at an
+augmentation of revenue by an increase in the number of contributors to
+a tax, while lessening the amount paid by each. But the abandonment of
+the tax in question should rather be regarded as a sacrifice of revenue
+for the instruction of the people in political knowledge; a price paid
+to enable and induce the poorer classes to take a well-instructed
+interest in the affairs of the state and the general condition of the
+country. And, viewed in this light, the abolition of this tax must be
+allowed to have been a political measure of great importance, and to
+have contributed greatly to the end which was aimed at. Till 1836 a
+daily paper, costing sevenpence, was the luxury of the few; and the sale
+even of those which had the largest circulation was necessarily limited.
+But the removal of the tax at once gave birth to a host of penny
+newspapers, conducted for the most part with great ability, and soon
+attaining a circulation which reached down to all but the very poorest
+class; so that the working-man has now an opportunity of seeing the most
+important questions of the day discussed from every point of view, and
+of thus acquiring information and forming a judgment on them which the
+subsequent extension of the franchise makes it more than ever desirable
+that he should be able to form for himself. Every movement in that
+direction renders it the more necessary to raise the intelligence of the
+great mass of the people to a level which may enable them to make a safe
+and salutary use of the power placed in their hands. And no mode of
+implanting a wholesome political feeling in the masses can equal candid
+political discussion: discussion one ruling principle of which shall be
+to teach that the greatest differences of opinion may be honestly
+entertained; that, with scarcely an exception, the leading men of each
+party, those who have any title to the name of statesman, are animated
+with an honest, patriotic desire to promote the best interests of the
+nation; and that the elucidation of truth is not aided by unreasoning
+invective and the undeserved imputation of base motives.
+
+One of the last topics discussed by Mr. Hallam was the introduction of a
+bill to limit for the future the prerogative of the crown in a field in
+which its exercise had previously been unrestrained, the creation of
+peers;[288] and among the last which we shall have to examine was one of
+an exactly opposite character, though relating to the same subject, the
+creation of a life peerage. In the winter of 1855 Sir James Parke, one
+of the Barons of the Exchequer, was created Lord Wenslydale, by
+letters-patent which conferred the title limiting it also to the new
+peer's own life. The professed object of the measure was to strengthen
+the judicial power of the House of Lords. But it was not denied that the
+limitation of the peerage conferred on him for his own life (a
+limitation which made no practical difference to Sir James himself,
+since he had no children) was intended to raise the question whether the
+crown could or could not create a life peerage with a seat in the House
+of Lords. A creation so limited was so novel, or at all events so long
+disused a proceeding, that it inevitably provoked examination and
+discussion. And, as it was found that the lawyers in general regarded it
+as indefensible, at the beginning of the session of 1856 Lord Lyndhurst
+brought the matter before the House of Lords by a motion for the
+appointment of a committee of privileges to investigate and report upon
+it. There were two aspects of the case which naturally came to be
+considered in the debates on it which ensued: the advantages or
+disadvantages, in other words, the political expediency, of such a form
+of letters-patent, and their legal or constitutional propriety. It was,
+of course, with the latter alone that the committee of privileges had to
+deal. And this part of the question was examined with great legal and
+antiquarian learning, though, as was almost inevitable, it was argued as
+a party question, except, indeed, by the lawyers. They, with the
+exception of the Chancellor, Lord Cranworth, who had advised the
+measure, were unanimous in their condemnation of it; the Whig peers,
+Lord Brougham and Lord Campbell, then Chief-justice, being as positive
+in their denial of the right so to exercise the prerogative as those on
+the Opposition side of the House, Lord Lyndhurst or Lord St.
+Leonards.[289]
+
+The arguments against the measure were chiefly these: The objectors drew
+a distinction between what was legal according to the strict letter of
+the law, and what was constitutional; contending that there might be
+exercises of the prerogative which could not be affirmed to be illegal,
+but which no one would deny to be altogether inconsistent with the
+principles and practice of the constitution, since a great part of the
+constitution rested on unwritten law, on long-continued usage, _Lex et
+consuetudo Parliamenti_. And they affirmed that this measure was so
+opposed to that usage, that "no instance had occurred within a period of
+four hundred years in which a commoner had been raised to a seat in the
+House of Lords by a patent of peerage containing only an estate for
+life;"[290] one most essential, if not the most essential character of
+the peerage being that it was an hereditary dignity, and one which
+combined with its rank an hereditary seat in the House of Lords. That
+one or two instances of life peerages were to be found in the annals of
+the Plantagenet kings was not denied, though none exactly similar in
+character.[291] But Lord Lyndhurst argued that precedents which had
+occurred "at a time when the constitution of the country was neither
+understood nor fully formed" were entitled to but little respect; and
+Lord Derby, limiting the age of valid precedents a little more strictly,
+"said frankly that he had no respect for any precedent affecting the
+prerogatives of the crown that dated farther back than the year 1688."
+And since that time, or indeed since the time of Henry VIII., it was
+certain that no life peerage had ever been granted, except by Charles
+II., James II., and George I. and II., to some of their mistresses,
+instances wholly beside the present case, since, of course, none of
+those ladies could claim seats in the House of Lords. Indeed, it was
+believed that both Mr. Pitt, at the time of the Union, and Lord Grey, in
+1832, had considered the question, and had both decided against the
+propriety of advising a creation of life peerages.
+
+In defence of the measure Lord Granville refused to admit the
+distinction between what was legal and what was constitutional; if a
+measure were both legal, that is, warranted by the letter of the law,
+and also expedient, these two concurrent qualities, he contended, made
+it constitutional. He denied, also, that any legal prerogatives of the
+crown could be held to have lapsed through disuse; _nullum tempus
+occurrit Regi_; and he challenged any peer to assert that the sovereign
+had lost the right of refusing his royal assent to a measure passed by
+the two Houses, merely because no sovereign since William III. had so
+exercised his royal prerogative. And against the authority of Mr. Pitt
+and Lord Grey he quoted that of Lord John Russell, who, in 1851, had
+offered a life peerage to an eminent judge, who, though he had declined
+the offer, had been influenced in his refusal by no doubt of the right
+of the crown to make it.
+
+On the expediency of the measure its opponents had urged that it would
+effect a remodelling of the House of Peers, a total change of its
+constitution, by the introduction of a second and distinct class of
+peerages; and Lord Campbell, with a not unbecoming jealousy for what he
+regarded as the interests of his brother lawyers, argued that it would
+"henceforth prevent any lawyer, however eminent he might have been as an
+advocate, whatever services he might have rendered to the state in the
+House of Commons, whatever fame or fortune he might have acquired, from
+aspiring to an hereditary peerage, or to becoming the founder of a
+family, since, to make a distinction between the Chancellor and the
+Chief-justice, between one Chancellor or Chief-justice and another, when
+coming into the Upper House, as to the tenure of their honors, would be
+intolerable; all must be under the same rule, 'no son of theirs
+succeeding.'" And Lord Lyndhurst closed his argument by drawing a
+comparison between the House of Lords and the French Senate: "It was but
+a few weeks since he had read an official comment in the _Moniteur_,
+coming from the highest source, on the inefficiency, the want of
+patriotism, energy, and the backwardness to fulfil the high destinies to
+which they were called, that characterized that illustrious body, the
+Senate of France. He had no disposition to cut down our tribunal to that
+life interest on which the Senate of France is based, as he believed the
+hereditary character of the House of Lords to be one from which great
+and important advantages are derived.... The hereditary principle," he
+added, "is intwined in every part of our constitution; we in this House
+enjoy our hereditary rights in common with the crown; we mutually
+support and assist each other, and we form a barrier and defence to
+protect both those branches of the constitution against any by whom they
+may be assailed."
+
+As Lord Granville had made the expediency of any measure the quality
+which, combined with legality, was sufficient to establish its
+constitutional character, he naturally labored this point with especial
+diligence. He dwelt upon the great importance of strengthening the
+judicial element in the House, since it was the great ultimate court of
+appeal. He produced a letter of the great Chancellor, Lord Eldon, which
+quoted instances in which various administrations had found difficulties
+in the way of introducing eminent lawyers into the House, because their
+want of adequate fortune to support the rank had disinclined them to
+encumber their descendants with an hereditary peerage. He showed also
+that that difficulty had made so great an impression on their own
+Chairman of Committees, Lord Redesdale, that on one occasion he had
+intimated a feeling in favor of allowing "the Law, in the same way as
+the Church, to be, to a certain extent, represented in the House by the
+holders of certain offices, who should be admitted to that House as
+Peers of Parliament during the continuance of holding such office" (to
+which argument Earl Grey added another, that the instance of bishops,
+who were but life peers, proved that the holders of life peerages were
+not considered inferior to hereditary peers).
+
+He dwelt, too, on the evil consequence of the Lords "placing themselves
+before the country as seeking to limit the prerogative of the crown,
+when that prerogative was exercised with a view to remedy something that
+was weak, and to remove a certain imminent danger." What the danger was
+he certainly did not explain. But Lord Grey, in supporting him, took
+wider ground, and, applying the argument derived from Lord Eldon's
+letter to other professions, extolled the idea of instituting life
+peerages as one whose effect would be "more easily to open the doors of
+the House to men whom it was desirable should be admitted--to
+distinguished officers; to eminent writers; to members of the House of
+Commons, who in their different lines might have rendered good service
+to the state, but who, though possessing means amply sufficient to
+support their rank during their own life, yet, from having only a life
+income, or a numerous family to be provided for, might be unable to
+accept an hereditary peerage without injury to their family. In such
+instances," he contended, "it would be most desirable to grant peerages
+for life only. Such a proceeding would, he was convinced, by no means
+disincline others in different circumstances to accept hereditary
+titles, nor indispose the ministry to confer them. Nor did he see any
+reason for fearing that the practice of creating life peerages would be
+more likely to be abused for the purpose of increasing the power of the
+minister than the creation of hereditary peerages."
+
+The committee of privileges was appointed, and reported it as the
+opinion of the members that "neither the letters-patent by themselves,
+or with, the addition of the usual writ of summons, could entitle the
+grantee to sit and vote in Parliament." And the House, by a majority of
+ninety-two to fifty-seven, adopted their report. The ministers yielded
+to its judgment, and ennobled Lord Wenslydale by a new patent in the
+usual form, as Lord Derby had suggested. But Lord Derby desired to show
+that his objection had been founded on principle only; and, as he was
+willing to admit that, apart from the principle involved, "some
+advantages in certain cases, and under certain modifications, might
+arise from peerages for life," he proposed the appointment of a select
+committee "to consider the expediency of making provision for the more
+efficient discharge of the duties of the House as a court of appeal."
+The committee was appointed, and, after careful consideration,
+recommended the creation of two new offices, to be held by two law
+lords, as "Deputy Speakers of the House of Lords," who should be judges
+of at least five years' standing, and should be enabled "by authority of
+Parliament to sit and vote in the House, and enjoy all the rights and
+privileges of a peer of Parliament under a patent conferring a peerage
+for life only, if the crown may have granted or shall grant the same to
+such persons in preference to an hereditary peerage, provided always
+that not more than four persons shall have seats in the House at one
+time as peers for life." Such an arrangement would have introduced a new
+practice, but not a new principle, since the annexation of a seat in the
+House of Lords to certain offices had existed from time immemorial in
+the case of the bishops. And the bill was carried in the House of Lords,
+but defeated in the Commons by a motion to refer it to a committee,
+which was adopted by a small majority, in a not very full House,[292]
+toward the end of the session.
+
+Those who look at the question apart from all preference of one minister
+or one party to another will, probably, be of opinion that the decision
+of the committee, that a life peerage thus created by the crown could
+not confer a seat in Parliament, was conformable to the most legitimate
+view of the constitution. It was, indeed, matter of history that in the
+Middle Ages the crown had exercised its prerogative in many ways which
+it had since abandoned. Boroughs had been enfranchised, and again
+disfranchised, apparently from no motive but pure caprice; writs of
+summons had been withheld from peers.[293] But no one would have
+justified the repetition of such acts now. And common-sense, as well as
+recognized usage, favored the doctrine that long disuse was a sufficient
+and lawful barrier against their revival. That the power of conferring
+life peerages with a seat in Parliament--of which, perhaps, the only
+undeniable instances were the cases of the brothers of Henry V., whose
+royal blood would in those days, probably, have been held to warrant an
+exception in their favor--had not been exercised for full four hundred
+years, was admitted; and the assumption that so long a disuse of a power
+was tantamount to a tacit renunciation of it, is quite compatible with a
+loyal and due zeal for the maintenance of other parts of the prerogative
+which have suffered no such abatement.
+
+If, however, we consider the expediency of the measure, or, in other
+words, the possible advantage that might ensue from the existence of a
+power to create life peerages with a seat in Parliament, opinions will
+probably be more divided. We have seen that Lord Derby allowed that
+there might be advantages in such an exercise of power under certain
+limitations; and the existing system does, undoubtedly, appear open to
+improvement in certain cases. At present the only mode of rewarding
+naval or military commanders who have performed brilliant and useful
+service, or a Speaker of the House of Commons, whose public career,
+though less showy and glorious, may at times have been scarcely less
+valuable, and has certainly been by far more irksome, is the grant of a
+peerage with a pension for lives. Without the peerage they cannot have
+the pension.[294] And, consequently, many most distinguished officers,
+whose conspicuous merits well deserved conspicuous honors, have gone
+unrewarded except by some promotion of knighthood, which carries with it
+no substantial benefit; while the descendants of some of those who have
+been ennobled have openly lamented that the only mode which could be
+found of honoring their fathers proves a punishment to their heirs, by
+encumbering them with an empty title, which they are unable adequately
+to support, and practically closing against them avenues to possible
+wealth and distinction which custom pronounces derogatory to their rank.
+So, not to mention the names of living worthies, no reward could be
+found for Sir W. Parker, that brave and skilful seaman who conducted a
+British fleet two hundred miles up a Chinese river, and crowned his
+exploits by the capture of a mighty city, which had never before beheld
+a European flag; nor for Inglis, who, when the safety of our Indian
+Empire hung upon his gallantry, successfully sustained a siege whose
+hardships and dangers are surpassed by none in ancient or modern
+history. Many will, probably, be of opinion that it is not for the honor
+of England that such services should want due recognition; and that for
+men like those life peerages with liberal pensions would be an
+appropriate recompense. It would, of course, be impossible to limit the
+number of them beforehand, but it would also be needless, since the
+nature of the services by which alone they could be deserved would act
+of itself as a sufficient limitation.
+
+One of the expedients which had been mentioned in this discussion had
+been the annexation of peerages to certain offices, to which it had been
+regarded as an unanswerable objection that this would be the creation of
+an absolutely unheard-of tenure, the peer thus created being able at
+pleasure to lay down his peerage, or even, it might be, being removable.
+But before the end of the session an emergency arose which induced
+Parliament to sanction the principle, novel though it was, that an
+official peerage, if a bishopric may be so called, might be laid down
+with the sanction of Parliament when the holder was no longer able to
+discharge its duties. Two of the most eminent members of the Episcopal
+bench, Dr. Blomfield, Bishop of London, and Dr. Maltby, Bishop of
+Durham, had become wholly incapable of discharging their duties, the one
+having been struck down by paralysis, and the other being almost blind.
+And they now proposed to the Prime-minister that he should make some
+arrangement by which they might be allowed to relinquish their offices,
+retaining a certain portion of the income of their sees as a retiring
+pension. There was no precedent for such an arrangement, but the
+necessity of the two cases was so manifest, the injury which the Church
+must suffer if the superintendence of two such important dioceses were
+to be neglected, was so palpable, and the conditions of the retiring
+pensions asked were so moderate and equitable, that Lord Palmerston had
+no hesitation in sanctioning the introduction of a bill to give effect
+to the arrangement proposed.
+
+It did not pass without vigorous resistance from more than one quarter.
+The Bishop of Exeter complained of it as incompatible with the great
+Church principle, that a bishop could only resign his office to the
+archbishop of his province; others opposed it as a violation of the
+common law, which forbids any bargain being made for the resignation of
+an office; while some, referring to the prohibition of simony (a word,
+perhaps, as much misunderstood and as often misapplied as any in the
+language), denounced the arrangement that the retiring prelates were to
+have pensions as simoniacal.[295] The most reasonable objection made to
+the proceeding was, that such exceptional legislation to meet an
+isolated case tended to establish a dangerous precedent, and that, as
+there were other men of great age on the bench, it would be better to
+effect the end now aimed at by a large general measure providing means
+for the retirement of all clergymen, those of inferior rank as well as
+bishops, whom age or infirmity might incapacitate. But the general
+feeling was against delay. The bill passed, and served in some degree as
+a model for that general measure which was soon afterward introduced,
+and which, as was suggested on this occasion, provided for an
+arrangement similar in principle being carried out whenever a priest
+holding any kind of ecclesiastical preferment should become disabled for
+the performance of its duties.
+
+There can be no doubt that such legislation was absolutely necessary in
+the interests of the Church, taking that expression to include, not the
+clergy alone, but the whole congregation of Churchmen. But it introduced
+a remarkable change into the system of ecclesiastical peerages, and, so
+far, into the constitution of the House of Lords. What was resigned by
+the two prelates was not the peerage (they had still the right to be
+styled "my lord"), but the seat in the House of Lords, which was a part,
+and which had hitherto been regarded as an inseparable part of it, or,
+at least (as it should, perhaps, rather be said, since the recent
+regulation that the junior bishop should not have a seat was a clear
+violation of that principle), which hitherto no one had been able to
+dissociate from the peerage after it had been once enjoyed.
+
+The treaties which terminated the war with Russia were not concluded
+till the spring of 1856; and it was well, indeed, that the country had
+no longer a foreign war on her hands, for a twelvemonth had scarcely
+elapsed when the very continuation of her existence as a great Eastern
+power was suddenly imperilled by what, regarded in one aspect, was a
+mutiny of her troops on a most extensive scale; in another, a civil war,
+waged by a combination of native princes, Hindoo as well as
+Mohammedan,[296] for the total extinction of our power, and the
+expulsion of the British race from Bengal. As early as the first week of
+February several commanders of regiments and other authorities received
+warnings of the organization of a wide conspiracy against our power; and
+in the second week of May the troops at Meerut broke into open mutiny,
+set fire to the public buildings, murdered their officers, and even
+their wives and children, and then marched off to Delhi, where the
+garrison was prepared to receive them with open arms, and to imitate
+their atrocities. The contagion spread, and in a few weeks nearly all
+Bengal was in arms. In one or two instances the native chiefs stood by
+us, but the greater number joined the insurgents, some from the desire
+to throw off our yoke, but others, probably, from constraint and through
+fear. Whatever were their motives, before the end of June nearly all the
+principal cities and fortresses of Bengal, up to the very gates of
+Calcutta, were in the hands of the insurgents, the chief exception being
+at the great city of Lucknow, where, though the mutineers got possession
+of the city, a British garrison held the Residency, in the centre; and,
+maintaining themselves with heroic fortitude, unsurpassed in all the
+history of war, for nearly nine months, contributed more than any other
+body of men to the final suppression of the revolt. It would be beside
+our purpose here to dwell upon the great deeds by which in that terrible
+year our army, in all its branches, maintained its old renown; upon the
+recapture of Delhi; the deliverance of the incomparable defenders and
+preservers of Lucknow; the exploits of Lawrence, and Inglis, and
+Havelock, and Outram, and Peel, and Campbell; and, if we are forced to
+deny ourselves the proud gratification of dwelling on their combined
+heroism and wisdom, we may for the same reason be spared the pain of
+recounting the horrid cruelties wreaked in too many instances not only
+on the officers who fell into the rebels' hands, and on the civil
+magistrates, but on the helpless women and children. In the first
+excitement of fear and horror those cruelties were, no doubt, greatly
+exaggerated, but still enough remains proved to stamp the insurrection
+as one branding with the foulest disgrace the race which perpetrated and
+exulted in them.
+
+It was not till the last week of 1858 that the last sparks of rebellion
+were finally extinguished by the defeat in Oude of the last body of
+rebels who remained in arms, and the flight of the remnant of their
+force across the frontier of Nepaul; but, even before that day came, the
+ministry at home had been led to see the necessity of putting the
+government of the country for the future on a different footing. It
+could hardly be doubted that the prompt suppression of a revolt of so
+unprecedented a magnitude, and the proof given in the course of our
+operations that the British soldier still maintained the same
+superiority over the native trooper as in the days of Clive, had
+heightened our reputation and the belief of our power among the native
+tribes. But, speedily and decisively crushed though it had been, the
+revolt had given too terrible a proof of the inconstancy and treachery
+of the native tribes not to act as a warning to our statesmen; and the
+reflection that was thus forced upon them showed that a company of
+merchants, however distinguished by general courage and sagacity they
+had shown themselves, was no longer qualified to exercise imperial
+dominion over a territory which now extended over more than a million of
+square miles, and more than a hundred and fifty millions of native
+subjects.
+
+Accordingly, in the first week of the session of 1858, Lord Palmerston,
+as Prime-minister, introduced a bill to transfer the government of
+British India from the East India Company to the crown. It was natural
+that the principle of such a measure should be opposed by the Directors
+of the Company, though it was supported by more than one person who had
+held high civil office in India; and equally natural that the
+arrangement of its details should call forth a minute and rigorous
+examination, and on many points a very determined opposition. We need
+not, however, say more about this bill, since circumstances prevented
+its being proceeded with; and the history of those which succeeded it is
+now only worth referring to as showing the extreme difficulty of the
+task of framing a government on new principles for a dependency of such
+vast magnitude and importance.[297]
+
+Lord Palmerston's bill was dropped, in consequence of the fall of his
+ministry, before the time came for its second reading; but the
+discussion on it had to some extent smoothed the way for that of his
+successor, Lord Derby. A great impression on the Parliament, and on the
+country in general, had been made by a very able speech of Sir G.C.
+Lewis, Chancellor of the Exchequer. He traced the whole history of the
+Indian government from the day of Plassy, and substantiated the right of
+the home government and Parliament to remodel it as they might judge
+best, by proving that ever since the passing of Pitt's first bill, in
+1784, the Company had been constantly subject to Parliamentary control.
+He showed, too, most convincingly, that a petition which the Company had
+presented to the House of Commons, deprecating any change in the
+existing system which should tend to diminish the authority of the
+Directors, was based on one great fallacy--speaking, as it did, of the
+Company as one and indivisible, and unchanged in character, functions,
+and influence, down to the date of the last renewal of its charter, only
+five years previously; whereas the truth was, that in the one hundred
+years since Plassy the system had undergone as many changes as the
+English constitution between the Heptarchy and the reign of Queen
+Victoria.
+
+He had thus removed some of the obstacles out of the way of the measure
+of the new government, though Lord Derby would have preferred postponing
+it till tranquillity should have been restored to the country by the
+complete suppression of the revolt, had not the large majority[298]
+which had sanctioned the introduction of Lord Palmerston's bill, in his
+opinion, "placed the Company in such a situation that they could no
+longer command the same amount of public confidence and public support
+as they were entitled to receive previously to that vote of the House of
+Commons." It may be added that the first bill on the subject which was
+introduced by his government bore evident marks of the difficulties
+under which it was framed--difficulties existing from the unexpected
+suddenness of his accession to office; so that, after a not very short
+discussion, it was eventually withdrawn, and it was not till the end of
+June that the measure which was finally adopted was introduced.
+
+The leading enactments of the measure[299] provided that for the future
+the government of India, described as having been hitherto vested in, or
+exercised by, the Company in trust for her Majesty, should be vested in
+her Majesty, and exercised in her name; that one of her Majesty's
+principal Secretaries of State should have and perform all such powers
+and duties relating to the government or revenues of India as had
+formerly belonged to the Court of Directors, as the Court of Proprietors
+of the Company; that a Council of the Governor-general should be
+established, consisting of fifteen members, seven of whom should be
+appointed by the Court of Directors, being persons who were, or had
+formerly been, Directors of the Company, and eight should be nominated
+by the crown. And as to both classes, it was provided that the majority
+should consist of persons who had served or resided in India for ten
+years at the least, and should not have left India more than ten years
+when appointed. They were to hold their offices during good behavior, to
+receive salaries, and to be entitled to retiring pensions, but to be
+incapable of sitting in Parliament. The appointment of Governor-general
+and Governor of each Presidency was to belong to the crown. The
+expenditure of the revenues of India, both in India and elsewhere, was
+to be subject to the control of the Secretary of State in Council; other
+clauses provided for the dividends of the Company, for the admission of
+persons into the civil service; and, with reference to existing
+establishments, one clause provided that "the Indian military and naval
+forces should remain under existing conditions of service."
+
+This last clause was strongly objected to by the Queen,[300] as
+"inconsistent with her constitutional position as head of the army,
+which required that the Commander-in-chief should be put in
+communication with the new Secretary of State for India, in the same
+manner in which he is placed with regard to the troops at home or in the
+colonies toward the Secretary of State for War.... With regard to the
+whole army, whether English or Indian, there could, with due regard to
+the public interest, be only one head and one general command." She
+yielded her opinion, however, to the resolute objections of the
+Prime-minister, with whom on this point his predecessor,[301] Lord
+Palmerston, agreed; but the result proved the superior soundness of her
+Majesty's view. It was not only a most anomalous arrangement, since the
+supreme control of all the warlike forces was one of the most
+inalienable prerogatives of the crown, but it had the strange fault of
+preserving the double government in the case in which, above all others,
+unity of system and unity of command were most indispensable. And, what
+weighed more than either consideration with the generally practical
+views of English statesmen, it was from the beginning found to work
+badly, creating, as it did, great and mischievous jealousies between the
+two divisions, the Royal and the Indian army. It was found that all the
+generals then in the highest commands in India--Lord Clyde (Sir Colin
+Campbell having been ennobled by that title), Sir Hugh Rose, and Sir
+William Mansfield--strongly disapproved of it, and recommended a change;
+and consequently, in the summer of 1860, Lord Palmerston, who in the
+mean while had returned to the Treasury, came round to the Queen's view
+of the subject, and a new act was passed which amalgamated the two
+armies into one Imperial army, taking its turn of duty throughout all
+parts of the British empire.[302]
+
+A letter addressed by Lord Palmerston to the Queen in the autumn of
+1857, which appears to have been his first statement to her Majesty of
+the opinion which he had formed of the necessity of abolishing the
+governing authority of the Company, states the principal arguments in
+favor of such a measure with great clearness, as arising from "the
+inconvenience and difficulty of administering the government of a vast
+country on the other side of the globe by means of two cabinets, the one
+responsible to the crown and Parliament, the other only responsible to
+the holders of Indian stock, meeting for a few hours three or four times
+a year, which had been shown by the events of the year to be no longer
+tolerable." His disapproval of parts of Lord Ellenborough's policy
+probably prevented him from alluding to his recall from India by the
+Directors, in direct defiance of the opinion of the government,[303]
+though that strange step can hardly have been absent from his mind. But,
+in fact, the case for taking the whole rule of so vast a dominion wholly
+into the hands of the Queen's government at home was so irresistible,
+that it did not require to be strengthened by reference to any
+individual instances of inconvenience. When the double government was
+originally established, the English in India were still but a small
+mercantile community, with very little territory beyond that in the
+immediate neighborhood of its three chief cities. Of the conduct of the
+affairs of such a body, still almost confined to commerce, the chief
+share might not unreasonably be left to the merchants themselves,
+subject to such supervision on the part of the government at home as was
+implied in the very name of the department invested with that
+supervision, the Board of Control, which, as Pitt explained the name,
+was meant to show that it was not to be, like the measure proposed by
+the Coalition Ministry, a board of political influence.[304] But the
+case was wholly altered when British India reached from Point de Galle
+to the Himalayas, and spread beyond the Ganges on the east, to beyond
+the Indus on the west; when the policy adopted in India often influenced
+our dealings with European states, and when the force required for the
+protection of those vast interests exceeded the numbers of the royal
+army. India, too, is a country the climate of which prevents our
+countrymen from emigrating to it as settlers, as they do to Canada or
+Australia, and where, consequently, the English residents are, and
+always must be, a mere handful in comparison with the millions of
+natives. In such a case their government must at all times rest mainly
+on opinion, on the belief in the pre-eminent power of the ruler; and it
+was obvious that that belief would be greatly fortified by the sovereign
+of Britain becoming that ruler.[305] The great rajahs cordially
+recognized the value of the transfer of power considered in this light,
+and felt their own dignity enhanced by becoming the vassals of the
+sovereign herself.
+
+Turning to French affairs, a brilliant French writer has remarked, that
+his countrymen are, of all peoples, the least suited to be conspirators,
+since none of them can ever keep a secret. But it was the ill-fortune of
+Louis Napoleon that he had provoked enmities, not only among his own
+countrymen, but among the republican fanatics of other nations also, who
+saw in his zeal for absolute authority the greatest obstacle to their
+designs, which aimed at the overthrow of every established government on
+the Continent, and shrunk from no crimes which they conceived to be
+calculated to promote their object. To free themselves from such an
+antagonist, the most wholesale murders seemed by no means too large a
+price. And in the middle of January, as the Emperor and Empress were
+going to the Opera, a prodigious explosion took place almost beneath the
+wheels of their carriage, from the effect of which they themselves had a
+most narrow escape, both being struck in the face by splinters, the
+aide-de-camp in their carriage also being severely wounded on the head;
+while their escort and attendants were struck down on all sides, ten
+being killed and above one hundred and fifty wounded.[306] It was soon
+found out that the authors of this atrocious crime were four Italians,
+of whom a man named Orsini was the chief, and that he, who had but
+recently escaped from a prison in Mantua, had fled from that town to
+England, and had there concocted all the details of his plot, and had
+procured the shells which had been his instruments.
+
+It was not unnatural that so atrocious a crime, causing such wide-spread
+destruction, should awaken great excitement in France, and in many
+quarters violent reclamations against England and her laws, which
+enabled foreign plotters to make her a starting-place for their
+nefarious schemes. Even in the French Chambers very bitter language was
+used on the subject by some of the most influential Deputies, for which
+our ministers were disposed to make allowance, Lord Clarendon, the
+Foreign Secretary, writing to the Prince Consort that "it was not to be
+expected that foreigners, who see that assassins go and come here as
+they please, and that conspiracies may be hatched in England with
+impunity, should think our laws and policy friendly to other countries,
+or appreciate the extreme difficulty of making any change in our
+system."[307]
+
+But a different feeling was roused by a despatch of the French Secretary
+of State to the ambassador here, which seemed to impute to this country
+that it deliberately sheltered and countenanced men by whose writings
+"assassination was elevated into a doctrine openly preached, and carried
+into practice by reiterated attacks" upon the person of the French
+sovereign, and asked, in language which had rather an imperious tone,
+"Ought the English Legislature to contribute to the designs of men who
+were not mere fugitives, but assassins, and continue to shelter persons
+who place themselves beyond the pale of common right, and under the ban
+of humanity? Her Britannic Majesty's Government can assist us in
+averting a repetition of such guilty enterprises, by affording us a
+guarantee of security which no state can refuse to a neighboring state,
+and which we are justified in expecting from an ally. Fully relying,
+moreover, on the profound sagacity of the English Cabinet, we refrain
+from indicating in any way the measures which it may seem fit to take in
+order to comply with this wish. We confidently leave it to decide on the
+course which it shall deem best fitted to the end in view." Still,
+though the charge that our Legislature contributed to the designs of
+assassins was some departure from the measured language more usual in
+diplomatic communications between friendly powers, under the
+circumstances this remonstrance might have been borne with. Unluckily,
+it was not all, nor the worst, that we were called upon to bear. A few
+days afterward some addresses to the Emperor from different military
+corps were published in the _Moniteur_, which not only poured forth
+bitter reproaches against the whole English nation, but demanded to be
+led to an invasion of the country, "as an infamous haunt for the
+carrying out of infernal machinations." Political addresses seem to our
+ideas inconsistent with military discipline; but the army had been
+permitted, and even encouraged, to make them ever since the days of the
+Consulate, though such addresses never received the recognition of a
+publication in the official journal till they had been subjected to
+careful revision, and, if necessary, expurgation. On this occasion,
+however, that supervision had been carelessly performed, and the
+offensive passages were left standing, though, when the Emperor learned
+the indignation which they had excited even among his well-wishers in
+England, he instructed his ambassador to apologize for their retention
+and publication, as an act of inadvertence on the part of the officials
+whose duty it had been to revise such documents. So far all was well.
+And had the English ministers replied to the despatch of M. de Persigny
+in firm and temperate language, they would have escaped the difficulties
+which eventually overthrew them. There was no doubt that, according to
+diplomatic usage, a written despatch formally communicated to the
+Secretary of State required a written reply.
+
+Unfortunately, a written reply was not given. Lord Clarendon was too
+apprehensive of the mischief which might possibly arise from a
+protracted discussion, leading, perhaps, to an angry controversy; and
+under the influence of this feeling contented himself, when the despatch
+was presented, with giving the ambassador a verbal answer, that "no
+consideration on earth would induce Parliament to pass a measure for the
+extradition of foreign political refugees; that our asylum could not be
+infringed, and that we adhered to certain principles on that subject
+which were so old and so sacred that they could not be touched;"[308]
+adding, however, at the same time an assurance that the Attorney-general
+was already, at his request, examining our law of conspiracy, to see
+whether it was sufficiently comprehensive or stringent. The purport of
+this answer was all that could have been desired; but there was a very
+general impression that the omission to reply by a written despatch was
+a sacrifice of the national dignity, if not an unworthy submission to
+scarcely disguised menace; though at the same time there was also a
+feeling among both parties in Parliament that our laws with respect to
+the conduct of foreigners residing among us were, perhaps, susceptible
+of improvement. On the very first night of the session, in allusion to
+the attack on the French Emperor, Lord Derby had said that "he could
+wish to hear the opinion of the ministers whether the existing laws of
+this country were adequate to afford security for the lives of foreign
+princes against plots contrived in this country; and, if they were not,
+whether they might not be amended, so as to meet the case of such crimes
+as had recently been perpetrated, which were so heinous and revolting to
+every feeling of humanity." And even before that speech the ministers
+had applied themselves to frame a measure to amend the law, which in the
+second week of February the Prime-minister himself introduced to the
+House of Commons.
+
+It was read a first time, though not without some opposition; but before
+it arrived at the second reading, though only a week afterward, the
+feeling of the country, reflected in this instance by the House, had
+become so inflamed, that the measure was not discussed on its own
+merits, but on the point whether, since no other answer had been given
+to the French despatch, this must not be regarded as the ministerial
+answer, and therefore whether it were such an answer as it befitted
+England to send. Had it been examined on its own merits solely, it could
+hardly have provoked much adverse criticism. It was entitled, "A bill to
+amend the law with relation to the crime of conspiracy to commit
+murder," and it merely proposed to establish in England a law which had
+long existed in Ireland. Hitherto, as Lord Palmerston explained the
+matter, England had treated conspiracy to murder as a misdemeanor,
+punishable with fine and imprisonment. In Ireland it had long been a
+capital crime; and, though he did not propose to assimilate the English
+to the Irish statute in all its severity, he proposed to enact that
+conspiracy to murder should be a felony, punishable with penal
+servitude, by whomsoever the conspiracy might be concocted, or wherever
+the crime might be designed to be committed.
+
+The principle of such a law, supported as it was by the precedent of
+Ireland, could hardly be resisted. And Mr. Walpole, who had been
+Home-secretary in Lord Derby's ministry, avowed his determination to
+support the bill, "as being right in principle." But even he limited his
+promise of support by a condition "that the honor of England should be
+previously vindicated;" arguing that the French despatch bore the
+character of a demand, based upon allegations which were contrary to
+truth, and which, therefore, the ministers were bound to repudiate; and
+that to pass such a bill without putting on record a formal denial of
+those allegations would, in the general view of Europe, imply a
+confession that to them we had no answer to give. And it was this
+consideration which eventually determined the decision of the House, Mr.
+Disraeli, who closed the debate on his side, condemning the conduct of
+the ministers as "perplexed, timid, confused, wanting in dignity and
+self-respect. In not replying to the despatch, they had lost a great
+opportunity of asserting the principles of public law." The House,
+taking his view of their conduct, threw out the bill by a majority of
+nineteen;[309] and the ministry resigned, and was succeeded by one under
+the presidency of Lord Derby.
+
+Many of those who on this occasion combined to form the majority had
+denounced the bill, as an infringement of the principles of our
+constitution. It is, however, evident that, had it passed, it would not
+have deserved such a description. It would in no degree whatever have
+deprived a foreign resident of safety and the protection of English law,
+so long as he should obey that law; and that is all the indulgence that
+the constitution ever gave or ought to give. Foreigners had always been
+amenable to our courts of justice for any violation of the law. And Lord
+Palmerston's bill not only went no farther than removing a certain class
+of offences from the category of misdemeanors to that of felonies, but
+it also imposed no liability in that respect on foreigners which it did
+not at the same time impose on all the Queen's subjects. Indeed, the
+bill was so moderate, and the improvement it proposed so desirable,
+that, in a subsequent discussion in the House of Lords, Lord Campbell,
+the Chief-justice, expressed a hope that Lord Derby's government would
+take it up; though Lord Derby, in view of the existing feeling of the
+country on the subject, prudently forbore to act on that suggestion.
+But, as one of Orsini's most guilty accomplices, a man named Bernard,
+was still in London, he caused him to be indicted for murder, as having
+incurred that guilt as accessary to the death of some whom the explosion
+had killed. The excitement on the question had, however, not died away
+when the trial came on; and, though it will, probably, be generally
+admitted that the evidence was sufficiently clear, Bernard was
+acquitted.
+
+Lord Derby, however, did not long retain his office. Indeed, the Earl
+was so conscious that, on questions of general policy, the House of
+Commons was inclined to views differing from his own, that he would have
+preferred declining the task of forming a ministry, had he not conceived
+that, in the difficulty in which the Queen was placed by recent
+circumstances, he was bound by his duty to make the attempt, even if the
+result of it were merely to obtain a kind of respite for his sovereign
+and the country, which might give time for the present excitement of
+feeling to calm down. He was not deceived in his forebodings of his
+inability to maintain his position. In the course of the next spring he
+was twice defeated in the House of Commons--once by the House which he
+found in existence, and a second time in one which was the fruit of a
+general election. And in the summer of 1859 Lord Palmerston returned to
+office, with power increased by the junction of many of those who had
+helped to overthrow him in 1858, but who now combined with him to strike
+a similar blow at his Conservative successor.
+
+Yet, brief as was Lord Derby's tenure of power, it was made memorable by
+the commencement of a movement which cannot be regarded as devoid of
+constitutional importance, since, though originally it was only designed
+to supply a temporary re-enforcement to our ancient constitutional
+forces, the regular army and the militia, it has eventually created a
+force which, to the great honor of those who constitute it, has become a
+permanent addition to them. In the great war against Revolutionary
+France, when it was generally believed that those who held rule in Paris
+were contemplating an invasion of these islands, Pitt, as we have seen,
+had encouraged the formation of corps of volunteers, which continued to
+be of great use till the very end of the war, by performing, in
+conjunction with the militia, a great portion of the home duties which
+must otherwise have fallen on the line regiments, and thus disengaging
+the regular army for service on the Continent. There was now no such
+formidable enemy to be dreaded as the first Napoleon, but in every part
+of Europe affairs were in a state so unquiet that every kingdom seemed
+at times on the very brink of war; and since, if it should once break
+out, no one could feel confident that we should not be involved in it,
+or, if we should be, who would be our allies or our enemies, measures of
+precaution and self-defence seemed as needful now as they had been sixty
+years before. Our boldest statesmen were disquieted and anxious; and the
+nation at large, sharing their uneasiness, kindled with the feeling that
+it was a time to show that the present generation inherited the
+self-denying patriotism of their fathers. Leaders were not wanting again
+to prompt the formation of a volunteer force. The government at once saw
+the value of the scheme. Fortunately, the Secretary for War, Colonel
+Peel, happened to be an old soldier, a veteran who had learned the art
+of war under Wellington himself; and he, having great talents for
+organization, placed the force from its infancy on a sound footing. How
+thoroughly the movement harmonized with the martial spirit of the
+nation--to which, indeed, it owed its birth--is shown by the history of
+the force, which now, above twenty years after its original formation,
+maintains its full numbers and yearly improves its efficiency. Though
+there has not for many years been any apprehension of war, above one
+hundred and twenty thousand men still annually devote no small portion
+of their time to the acquisition of military discipline and science, and
+that so successfully, that, by the testimony of the most experienced
+judges, they have attained a degree of efficiency which, if the
+necessity for their services should ever arise, would render them
+valuable and worthy comrades to the more regularly trained army. Lord
+Derby retired from office while the force was still in its infancy; but
+Lord Palmerston was equally sensible of its value, and gave a farther
+proof of his appreciation of the vast importance of measures of national
+defence by the vigor with which he carried out the recommendations of a
+royal commission which had been appointed by the preceding ministry to
+investigate the condition of our national defences. Its report had
+pointed out the absolute necessity of an improved system of protection
+for our great dockyards and arsenals, which, from their position on the
+coast, were more liable to attack than inland fortresses would have
+been, had we had such. And, in accordance with that warning, in the
+summer of 1860, Lord Palmerston proposed the grant of a large sum of
+money for the fortification of our chief dockyards. It was opposed on a
+strange variety of grounds; some arguing that the proposed
+fortifications were superfluous, because our navy was the defence to
+which the nation was wont deservedly to trust; some that they were
+needless, because no other nation was in a condition to attack us;
+others that they were disgraceful, because it was un-English and mean to
+skulk behind stone walls, and because Lycurgus had refused to trust to
+stone walls for the safety of Sparta; and one member, the chief
+spokesman of a new and small party, commonly known as the
+"peace-at-any-price party," boldly denounced the members of the
+commission as a set of "lunatics" for framing such a report, and the
+ministers as guilty of "contemptible cowardice" for suggesting to the
+nation that there was any danger in being undefended. But the ministry
+prevailed by a large majority;[310] the money was voted, and the nation
+in general warmly approved of the measure. As Lord Palmerston
+subsequently expressed it, "the government, the Parliament, and the
+nation acted in harmonious concert"[311] on the subject.
+
+One of the arguments against it which the objectors had brought forward
+was, that the ministry was not unanimous in the conviction of the
+necessity; and we learn from the "Life of the Prince Consort"[312] that
+Mr. Gladstone, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, was vehement in his
+resistance to it, threatening even to carry his opposition so far as to
+resign his office, if it were persevered in. And, as has been intimated
+on a previous page, this was not the only question on which in the
+course of this year the Prime-minister did in his heart differ from his
+Chancellor of the Exchequer, though he did not think it expedient to
+refuse his sanction to his proposals on a matter belonging to his own
+department, the Exchequer. The subject on which he secretly doubted his
+colleague's judgment was one of the proposals made in the Budget of the
+year. As has already been mentioned, the transaction throws a rather
+curious light on the occasional working of our ministerial system; and
+the fate of the measure in the two Houses of Parliament is also
+deserving of remark and recollection, as re-opening the question, which
+had not been agitated for nearly a century, as to the extent of the
+power of the House of Lords with respect to votes of money. In a former
+chapter[313] we have had occasion to mention the angry feeling on the
+part of the House of Commons which, in the year 1772, had been evoked by
+the act of the House of Lords, in making some amendments on a bill
+relating to the exportation of corn which had come up to them from the
+Commons. A somewhat similar act had, as we have also seen, revived the
+discussion a few years later, when the minister of the day had shown a
+more temperate feeling on the subject. On neither occasion, however, had
+the question of the privileges of the Lords been definitively settled;
+and no occasion had since arisen for any consideration of the subject.
+But the Budget of 1860 contained a clause which, in spite of the
+deserved reputation of the Chancellor of the Exchequer as a skilful
+financier, was not regarded with general favor. There was a large
+deficiency in the revenue for the year; but while, among his expedients
+for meeting it, Mr. Gladstone proposed an augmentation of the
+income-tax, he proposed also to repeal the excise duty on paper, which
+produced about a million and a quarter. It is now known that the
+Prime-minister himself highly disapproved of the sacrifice at such a
+time of so productive a tax.[314] And, if that had been suspected at the
+time, the House of Commons would certainly not have consented to it;
+even when the ministry was supposed to be unanimous in its approval of
+it, it was only carried by a majority of nine; and, when the bill
+embodying it came before the House of Lords, a Whig peer, who had
+himself been formerly Chancellor of the Exchequer in Lord Melbourne's
+administration, moved its rejection, and it was rejected by a majority
+of eighty-nine.
+
+The rejection of a measure relating to taxation caused great excitement
+among a large party in the House of Commons--so violent, indeed, that
+the only expedient that presented itself to the Prime-minister, if he
+would prevent the proposal of some step of an extreme and mischievous
+character, was to take the matter into his own hands. Had he been able
+to act entirely on his own judgment, it may, perhaps, be thought that,
+with his sentiments on the inexpediency of the measure which had been
+rejected, he would have preferred a silent acquiescence in the vote of
+the Lords; but he would have been quite unable to induce the majority of
+his own supporters, and even some of his own colleagues, to adopt so
+moderate a course; and accordingly he moved the appointment of a
+committee to examine and report on the practice of Parliament in regard
+to bills for imposing or repealing taxes. And when it had made its
+report, which was purely of an historical character, setting forth the
+precedents bearing on the subject, he proposed three resolutions,
+asserting "that the right of granting aids and supplies to the crown is
+in the Commons alone, as an essential part of their constitution, etc.;
+that, although the Lords had exercised the power of rejecting bills of
+several descriptions relating to taxation by negativing the whole, yet
+the exercise of that power by them had not been frequent, and was justly
+regarded by the Commons with peculiar jealousy, as affecting their
+rights, etc.; and that, to guard for the future against an undue
+exercise of that power by the Lords, and to secure to the Commons their
+rightful control over taxation and supply, the Commons had it in their
+power so to impose and remit taxes, and to frame bills of supply, that
+their right, etc., might be maintained inviolate."
+
+In the debate which ensued his chief opponents came from his own party,
+and even his own colleague, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, displayed a
+fundamental difference of feeling from his on the subject, a difference
+which was expressed by one of the most eloquent supporters of the
+resolutions, Mr. Horsman, M.P. for Stroud, saying that "Lord Palmerston
+wished to make the independence of the House of Lords a reality, while
+Mr. Gladstone seemed to desire that it should be a fiction." Lord
+Palmerston, indeed, showed the feeling thus attributed to him in a
+statesman-like declaration that, if "this nation had enjoyed a greater
+amount of civil, political, social, and religious liberty than, as he
+believed, any other people in the world, that result had been
+accomplished, not by vesting in either of the three estates, the Crown,
+the Lords, or the Commons, exclusive or overruling power over the
+others, but by maintaining for each its own separate and independent
+authority, and also by the three powers combining together to bear and
+forbear, endeavoring by harmonious concert with each other to avoid
+those conflicts and clashings which must have arisen if independent
+authority and independent action had been exerted by each or by all." He
+entered into the history of the question, explaining that, though "each
+branch of the Legislature retained its respective power of rejecting any
+measure, the Commons had claimed from time immemorial particular
+privileges in regard to particular measures, and especially the
+exclusive right of determining matters connected with the taxation of
+the people. They claimed for themselves, and denied to the Lords, the
+right of originating, altering, or amending such measures; but, as long
+ago as 1671, the Attorney-general, in a memorable conference between the
+two Houses, had admitted that the Lords, though they could not originate
+or amend, had, nevertheless, power to reject money-bills;" and this
+admission he regarded as consistent with common-sense, for "it was well
+known that, though the Commons contended for the right of originating
+measures for the grant of supply, and of framing bills with that object,
+according to their belief of what was best for the public interest, yet
+such bills could not pass into law without the assent of the Lords; and
+it was clear that an authority whose assent was necessary to give a
+proposal the force of law, must, by the very nature of things, be at
+liberty to dissent and refuse its sanction."
+
+The committee had enumerated a large number of precedents (above thirty)
+in which, since that conference, the Lords had rejected such bills; but
+the cases were not in general exactly similar to that now under
+consideration, since the bills which they had rejected had commonly, if
+not in every case, been for the imposition and not for the repeal of a
+tax; and in most cases some question of national policy had been
+involved which had influenced their vote. But the view which Lord
+Palmerston pressed on the House was that the present was "a case in
+which party feelings ought to be cast aside. It was one in which higher
+and larger interests than those of party were concerned, and in which
+the course that the House now took would be a precedent to guide future
+Parliaments." He pointed out, moreover, that the smallness of the
+majority in the House of Commons had been to the Lords "some
+encouragement to take this particular step," and that "he was himself
+led to think that they had taken it, not from any intention to step out
+of their province, and to depart from the line of constitutional right
+which the history of the country has assigned them, but from motives of
+policy dependent on the circumstances of the moment; and therefore he
+thought it would be wise if the Commons forbore to enter into a conflict
+with the Lords on a ground which might really not exist, but satisfied
+themselves with a declaration of what were their own constitutional
+powers and privileges. It was of the utmost importance in a constitution
+like ours, where there are different branches, independent of each
+other, each with powers of its own, and where cordial and harmonious
+action is necessary, that care should be taken to avoid the commencement
+of an unnecessary quarrel, and the party that acted otherwise would
+incur a grave responsibility."
+
+Mr. Gladstone, however, though he ended by expressing his concurrence in
+the resolution proposed by his chief, used very different language
+respecting the vote of the House of Lords, characterizing it as "a
+gigantic innovation, the most gigantic and the most dangerous that had
+been attempted in our time," since "the origination of a bill for the
+imposition of a tax, or the amendment of a money-bill, was a slight
+thing compared with the claim to prevent the repeal of a tax;" and,
+dealing with assertions which he had heard, that in this instance "the
+House of Commons had been very foolish and the House of Lords very
+wise," he asked whether that really described the constitution under
+which we live. The House of Commons could not be infallible in matters
+of finance more than in other matters. It might make errors, but he
+demanded to know whether those errors in finance were or were not liable
+to correction by the House of Lords. If they were, "what became of the
+privileges of the Commons?" On the other hand, Mr. Disraeli, as leader
+of the Opposition or Conservative party, supported the resolutions, and
+applauded the speech of the Prime-minister, as "a wise, calm, and ample
+declaration of a cabinet that had carefully and deliberately considered
+this important subject. It had acknowledged that the conduct of the
+Lords was justified by law and precedent, and sanctioned by policy," and
+he maintained that it showed that "the charge made by the Chancellor of
+the Exchequer was utterly untenable, and had no foundation." And Mr.
+Horsman, taking a large general view of the legitimate working of the
+parliamentary constitution, argued that, while it was an undoubted rule
+that "all taxes should originate with the Commons, as that elective and
+more immediately responsible assembly that is constantly referred back
+to the constituencies, the reviewing power of a permanent and
+independent chamber was no less essential;" and that, considering that
+"the Reform Bill of 1832 had given a preponderance of powers to the
+Commons, and that the tendency of any farther Reform Act must be in the
+same direction, so far from narrowing the field of action for the peers,
+the wiser alternative might be to adopt a generous construction of their
+powers, with a view to preserving the equilibrium that is held to be
+essential to the safety and well-working of the constitution. The House
+of Commons," he concluded, "is perpetually assuming fresh powers and
+establishing new precedents. Virtually all bills now originate with the
+Commons; but this is not the consequence of any aggressive spirit in
+them, but is the necessary and inevitable result of the historic working
+of the constitution; and so this act of the Lords was but the natural
+working of the constitution to meet a definite emergency." The
+resolutions were passed, the first and third without a division; the
+second, to which an amendment had been proposed, designed to limit the
+force of the precedents alleged as justifying the act of the Lords, by a
+majority of nearly four hundred.[315] In their form and language the
+resolutions cannot be said to have greatly affected the power claimed by
+the Lords, and exercised by them in this instance. The first two were
+simply declaratory of acknowledged principles or facts, and the third
+intimated no desire to guard against anything but an undue exertion by
+the Lords of the right which they were admitted to possess. But it can
+hardly be doubted that the intention even of Lord Palmerston, dictated
+by the strong feeling which he perceived to prevail in the House of
+Commons on the subject, was to deter the Lords from any future exercise
+of their powers of review and rejection of measures relating to
+taxation, when, perhaps, the Commons might be under less prudent
+guidance; nor that the effect of the resolutions will correspond with
+the design rather than with the language of the mover, and will prevent
+the Lords, unless under the pressure of some overpowering necessity,
+from again interfering to control the Commons in such matters. At the
+same time it seems superfluous to point out that one claim advanced by
+the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who was apparently carried beyond his
+usual discretion by his parental fondness for the rejected bill, is
+utterly unreconcileable with the maintenance of any constitution at all
+that can deserve the name. When there are three bodies so concerned in
+the legislation that the united consent of all is indispensable to give
+validity to any act, to claim for any one of them so paramount an
+authority that, even if it should adopt a manifestly mischievous course,
+neither of the others should have the right to control or check or
+correct the error, would be to make that body the irresponsible master
+of the whole government and nation; to invest it with that "overruling
+power" which Lord Palmerston with such force of reasoning had
+deprecated; and to substitute for that harmonious concert of all to
+which, in his view, the perfection of our liberties was owing, a
+submission to one, and that the one most liable to be acted upon by the
+violence or caprice of the populace. He was a wise man who said that he
+looked on the tyranny of one man as an evil, but on the tyranny of a
+thousand as a thousand times worse. And for this reason also the
+resolutions which were now adopted seem to have been conceived in a
+spirit of judicious moderation, since, while rendering it highly
+improbable that the Lords would again reject a measure relating to
+taxation, it avoided absolutely to extinguish their power to do so. Lord
+Palmerston, it may be thought, foresaw the possibility of an occasion
+arising when the notoriety that such a power still existed might serve
+as a check to prevent its exercise from being required. In the very case
+which had given rise to this discussion he regarded it as certain that
+the feeling of the majority of the nation approved of the action of the
+peers; and, as what had occurred once might occur again, it was
+certainly within the region of possibility that another such emergency
+might arise, when the Lords might interfere with salutary effect to save
+the country from the evil result of ill-considered legislation; finance
+being, above all others, the subject on which a rash or unscrupulous
+minister may find the greatest facility for exciting the people by
+plausible delusions. There is, moreover, another reason why it would not
+only be impolitic, but absolutely unfair, to deprive the Lords
+altogether of their power of rejection even in cases of taxation;
+namely, that the Commons, when imposing taxes, are taxing the Lords
+themselves, as well as the other classes of the community; while the
+Lords alone of the whole nation are absolutely unrepresented in the
+House of Commons. There is a frequent cry for a graduated income-tax;
+and surely if an unscrupulous demagogue in office were to contrive such
+a graduation as would subject a peer to three times the income-tax borne
+by a commoner, it would be a monstrous iniquity if the peers were to
+have no power of protecting themselves in their own House.
+
+In the last sentence of his speech the Chancellor of the Exchequer had
+"respectfully reserved to himself the freedom of acting in such a way as
+should appear to offer any hope of success in giving effect by a
+practical measure to the principle contained in the first resolution."
+And it was, probably, an exemplification of the power of which he thus
+bespoke the use that he the next year struck out a scheme for insuring
+the repeal of the paper-duties, including it in one bill with all his
+other financial propositions, instead of dividing them in the ordinary
+way in several distinct bills. It was a manoeuvre which too much
+resembled the system of "tacking," which had been so justly denounced as
+one of the most unseemly manoeuvres of faction in the previous
+century.[316] But, as some of the principal reasons which in the
+preceding year had led the Lords to condemn the repeal had ceased to
+exist, and the deficiency of the revenue had been converted into a
+surplus, they thought it wiser to prove their superiority of wisdom to
+the House of Commons by showing a more conciliatory spirit, and passed
+the bill; though the course adopted, which had the effect of depriving
+the Lords of that power of examination of the details of the financial
+scheme of the government which they had hitherto enjoyed without any
+question or dispute, was strongly protested against in both Houses, and
+by some members who were not generally unfriendly to the administration.
+
+A hundred years had now elapsed since George III. ascended the throne.
+It had been a period full of transactions of great importance,
+developing the constitution in such a manner and to such an extent as to
+make a change in its character but little inferior to those which had
+been produced by the contests of the preceding century. One principal
+result of the Revolution of 1688 has been described as having been the
+placing of the political power of the state chiefly in the hands of the
+aristocracy. The Reform Bill of 1832, which has been sometimes called a
+"second Revolution," transferred that power to the middle classes.[317]
+And what may be called the logical sequence of the later measures is the
+contrary of that which was designed to flow from the earlier ones. The
+changes which were effected in 1688 were intended to promote, and were
+believed to have insured, stability; to have established institutions of
+a permanent character, as far as human affairs can be invested with
+permanency. And down to the death of George II. the policy of succeeding
+ministers, of whom Walpole may be taken as the type, as he was
+unquestionably the most able, aimed chiefly at keeping things as they
+were. _Quieta non movere_. The Peerage Bill, proposed by a
+Prime-minister thirty years after the Revolution, was but an exaggerated
+instance of the perseverance with which that object was kept in view.
+But the Reform Bill of 1832, like the Emancipation Act which preceded
+it, on the contrary, contained in itself, in its very principle, the
+seeds and elements of farther change.
+
+The Emancipation Act, following and combined with the repeal of the Test
+Act, rendered it almost inevitable that religious toleration would in
+time be extended to all persuasions, even to those adverse to
+Christianity. And the Reform Bill, as has been already pointed out, by
+the principles on which it based its limitations of the franchise, laid
+the foundation for farther and repeated revision and modification.[318]
+The consequence is, that the aim of statesmen of the present day differs
+from that which was pursued by their predecessors. The statesman of the
+present day can no longer hope to avoid farther changes, and must,
+therefore, be content to direct his energies to the more difficult task
+of making them moderate and safe, consistent with the preservation of
+that balance of powers to which the country owes the liberty and
+happiness which it has hitherto enjoyed.
+
+It is in this point of view that the diffusion of education, beyond the
+blessing which it confers on the individual, is of especial importance
+to the state. Political theorists affirm that all men have an equal
+right to political power--to that amount, at least, of political power
+which is conferred by a vote at elections. Men of practical common-sense
+affirm that no one has a right to power of any kind, unless he can be
+trusted to forbear employing it to the injury of his fellow-creatures or
+of himself. And the only safeguard and security for the proper exercise
+of political power is sound and enlightened education. It is unnecessary
+to dwell on this point, because our statesmen of both parties (to their
+honor) give constant proof of their deep conviction of its importance.
+
+But, in closing our remarks, it may be allowable to point out the
+political lesson which, above all others, the teachers of the masses
+should seek to inculcate on their pupils. The art of government, and
+each measure of government, is, above all other things, the two-sided
+shield. There are so many plausible arguments which may be advanced on
+each side of almost every question of policy, that no candid man will
+severely condemn him who in such disputable matters forms an opinion
+different from his own. Age and experience are worse than valueless if
+they do not teach a man to think better of his kind; and the history of
+the period which we have been considering teaches no lesson more
+forcibly than this, that the great majority of educated men, and
+especially of our leading statesmen, are actuated by honest and
+patriotic motives. And we would presume to urge that more important than
+a correct estimate of any one transaction of the past, or even of any
+one measure to influence the future, is the habit of putting a candid,
+and therefore a favorable, construction on the characters and intentions
+of those to whom from time to time the conduct of the affairs of the
+nation is intrusted.
+
+Notes:
+
+[Footnote 276: "Life of Palmerston," vol. i., c. vii.]
+
+[Footnote 277: "Life of the Prince Consort," ii, 303.]
+
+[Footnote 278: _Ibid_., p. 412.]
+
+[Footnote 279: Amos, "Fifty Years of the English Constitution," p. 289.]
+
+[Footnote 280: "Past Gleanings," i., 242.]
+
+[Footnote 281: "Life of the Prince Consort," iv., 458.]
+
+[Footnote 282: 219 to 210.]
+
+[Footnote 283: "Life of the Prince Consort," v., 100.]
+
+[Footnote 284: _Ibid_., p. 148.]
+
+[Footnote 285: "Life of Pitt," by Earl Stanhope, iii., 210.]
+
+[Footnote 286: "Life of the Prince Consort," iv., 329.]
+
+[Footnote 287: _Ibid._, p. 366.]
+
+[Footnote 288: "Constitutional History," iii., 319, 3d edition.]
+
+[Footnote 289: It should be added that, on a subsequent occasion, Mr.
+Roundell Palmer, member for Plymouth (now Lord Chancellor Selborne, and
+even then in the enjoyment of the highest professional reputation),
+declared his opinion to be in favor of the legality and constitutional
+propriety of the proceeding.]
+
+[Footnote 290: To illustrate this position, Lord Lyndhurst said: "The
+sovereign may by his prerogative, if he thinks proper, create a hundred
+peers with descendible qualities in the course of a day. That would be
+consistent with the prerogative, and would be perfectly legal; but
+everybody must feel, and everybody must know, that such an exercise of
+the undoubted prerogative of the crown would be a flagrant violation of
+the principles of the constitution. In the same manner the sovereign
+might place the Great Seal in the hands of a layman wholly unacquainted
+with the laws of the country. That also would be a flagrant violation of
+the constitution of this country."--Hansard's _Parliamentary Debates_,
+cxl., February 7, 1856. In the same debate Lord Derby defined
+"prerogative" as "the power of doing that which is beside the law."
+Hallam, in discussing the prosecution of Sir Edward Hales, fully
+recognizes the principle contended for by Lord Lyndhurst, saying that
+"it is by no means evident that the decision of the judges" in that case
+"was against law," but proceeding to show that "the unadvised assertion
+in a court of law" of such an exercise of the prerogative "may be said
+to have sealed the condemnation of the house of Stuart."--
+_Constitutional History_, vol. iii., c. xiv., p. 86.]
+
+[Footnote 291: In the reign of Richard II. the Earl of Oxford had been
+made Marquis of Dublin for life, but he already had a seat in the House
+as Earl. Henry V. had originally made the peerages of his brothers, the
+Dukes of Bedford and Gloucester, life peerages; but these were afterward
+surrendered and regranted "in the usual descendible form," so that they
+rather made against the present case than for it. Henry VIII. had
+created the Prince of Thomond Earl of Thomond for his life, but he had
+at the same time granted him the barony of Inchiquin "for himself and
+his heirs forever." It was also alleged that these life peerages had not
+been conferred by the King alone, but by the King with the authority and
+consent of Parliament, "these significant words being found in the
+patents."]
+
+[Footnote 292: The division was 153 to 133. Some years afterward,
+however, a clause in the act, which created a new appellate
+jurisdiction, empowered the sovereign to create peerages of this limited
+character, one of the clauses providing that "every Lord of Appeal in
+Ordinary should be entitled during his life to rank as a Baron by such
+style as her Majesty may be pleased to appoint, and shall during the
+time that he continues in office as a Lord of Appeal in Ordinary, and no
+longer be entitled to a writ of summons to attend, sit, and vote in the
+House of Lords. His dignity as a Lord of Parliament shall not descend to
+his heirs." As this act was passed long after the period at which the
+present volume closes, it does not belong to the writer to examine how
+far this act, in providing that every Lord of Appeal shall for the time
+rank as a Baron (the Lords of Appeal being, of course, appointed by the
+crown), is entitled to be spoken of as introducing a great
+constitutional innovation, big with future consequences, as it has been
+described by some writers.]
+
+[Footnote 293: In one notorious instance, that of the Earl of Bristol
+(_confer_ Hallam, i., 518), in the time of Charles I., the House of
+Lords had interfered and compelled the issue of the writ; their action
+forming a precedent for their right of interference in such matters,
+which in the present case the Lord Chancellor denied.]
+
+[Footnote 294: The grant of a pension of L1000 a year, with a baronetcy,
+to General Havelock, and more recently to Sir F. Roberts, are, it is
+believed, the only exceptions to this rule.]
+
+[Footnote 295: Bishop Lonsdale, of Lichfield, in reference to Simon
+Magus, from whose offer of money to the Apostles the offence derives its
+name, denying that there was any similarity between his sin and the act
+of purchasing an advowson or presentation, remarked that it might just
+as fitly be called magic as simony.]
+
+[Footnote 296: It has been, and will probably continue to be, a matter
+of dispute whether the first conception and plan of the insurrection
+originated with the restless boldness of the Mohammedans or the deeper
+fanaticism of the Hindoos. It is notorious that the prophecy that a
+century had been assigned by the Almighty as the allotted period of our
+supremacy in India had for many years been circulated among both; and,
+though the conspiracy was at first generally attributed to the
+Mohammedans, the argument that the period from the battle of Plassy, in
+1757, to the outbreak in 1857, though an exact century according to the
+Hindoo calendar, is three years longer according to the Mohammedan
+computation, seems an almost irresistible proof that the Brahmins were
+its original authors. Sir John Kaye, in his "History of the Sepoy War,"
+at the end of book iii., c. iii., prints the following note, as
+furnished to him by Mr. E.A. Reade, a gentleman of long experience in
+India: "I do not think I ever met one man in a hundred that did not give
+the Mohammedans credit for this prediction. I fully believe that the
+notion of change after a century of tenure was general, and I can
+testify, with others, to have heard of the prediction at least a quarter
+of a century previously. But, call it a prediction or a superstition,
+the credit of it must, I think, be given to the Hindoos. If we take the
+Hejira calendar, 1757 A.D. corresponds with 1171 Hejira; 1857 A.D. with
+1274 Hejira; whereas, by the lunisolar year of the Sumbut, 1757 is 1814
+Sumhut, and 1857 is 1914 Sumbut."]
+
+[Footnote 297: It is worthy of remark that, as early as 1829, the Earl
+of Ellenborough, then President of the Board of Control, had come to the
+conclusion that the Company was no longer competent to govern so vast a
+dominion as that of British India had gradually become. In his Diary,
+recently published (ii., 131), he expresses his firm conviction that,
+"in substituting the King's government for that of the Company, we shall
+be conferring a great benefit on India, and effecting the measure which
+is most likely to retain for England the possession of India;" and from
+the same work (ii., 61) we learn that Mr. Mountstuart Elphinstone, one
+of the ablest servants of whom the Company could boast, and who had
+recently been Governor of Bombay, even while confessing himself
+prejudiced in favor "of the existing system, under which he had been
+educated and lived," admitted that "the administration of the government
+in the King's name would be agreeable to the civil and military
+services, and to people in England. He doubted whether, as regarded the
+princes of India, it would signify much, as they now pretty well
+understood us." See also _ibid_., p. 414.]
+
+[Footnote 298: 318 to 173.]
+
+[Footnote 299: The whole bill is given in the "Annual Register" for the
+year 1858, p. 226.]
+
+[Footnote 300: See her letter to Lord Derby on the subject, given in the
+"Life of the Prince Consort," iv., 308; _confer_ also a memorandum of
+the Prince Consort, _ibid._, p. 310.]
+
+[Footnote 301: _Ibid._, p. 106.]
+
+[Footnote 302: It should be remarked that the arrangement originally
+carried out awoke among the European troops of the Company so deep and
+general a spirit of discontent as at one time threatened to break out in
+open mutiny; the ground of their dissatisfaction being "the transfer of
+their services in virtue of an act of Parliament, but without their
+consent." Accordingly, "on the announcement of the proclamation
+transferring the possessions of the East India Company to the crown,
+some of the soldiers of the Company's European force set up a claim for
+a free discharge or a bounty on re-enlistment." Lord Clyde's
+recommendation "that a concession should be made" was overruled by the
+government of India, and "pronounced inadmissible by the law-officers of
+the crown" in England. The dissatisfaction was allayed for the time by
+the judicious measures, equally conciliatory and firm, adopted by Lord
+Clyde, in whom all ranks of both armies felt equal confidence; but
+eventually the government became convinced of the necessity of granting
+discharges to every man who wished for one, provided he had not
+misconducted himself.--Shadwell's _Life of Lord Clyde_, ii., 407-416.]
+
+[Footnote 303: See _ante_, p. 385.]
+
+[Footnote 304: Stanhope's "Life of Pitt," i., 173.]
+
+[Footnote 305: Sir Theodore Martin quotes a passage from a letter of the
+_Times_ correspondent, giving a report of the effect of the proclamation
+on the natives: "Genuineness of Asiatic feeling is always a problem, but
+I have little doubt it is in this instance literally sincere. The people
+understand an Empress, and did not understand the Company. Moreover,
+they (I am speaking of the masses) have a very decided notion that the
+Queen has hanged the Company for offences 'which must have been very
+great,' and that fact gives hope of future justice."--_Life of the
+Prince Consort_, iv., 337.]
+
+[Footnote 306: The "Annual Register" says that "neither the Emperor nor
+the Empress was touched;" but Sir Theodore Martin ("Life of the Prince
+Consort," iv., 155) says that "the Emperor's nose was grazed, and that
+the Empress received a blow on the left eye which affected it for some
+time."]
+
+[Footnote 307: "Life of the Prince Consort," iv., 156.]
+
+[Footnote 308: Speech of Lord Palmerston, February 19.]
+
+[Footnote 309: It is remarkable that it was not a very full House, the
+numbers of the division being only 234 to 215. Many members absented
+themselves, being equally unwilling to condemn the bill or to approve
+the silence of the ministry.]
+
+[Footnote 310: 268 to 39.]
+
+[Footnote 311: "Life of the Prince Consort," v., 131.]
+
+[Footnote 312: "Life of the Prince Consort," i., 99.]
+
+[Footnote 313: Chapter II., p. 54.]
+
+[Footnote 314: It is known, from two letters from Lord Palmerston to the
+Queen, published in the "Life of the Prince Consort," v., 100--in one,
+written before the debate in the House of Lords, he expresses a hope
+that the smallness of the majority in the House of Commons will
+encourage the Lords to throw it out, and he "is bound in duty to say
+that, if they do so, they will perform a good public service;" and in
+another, the day after the division in the Lords, he writes again "that
+they have done a right and useful thing," adding that the feeling of the
+public was so strong against the measure, that those in the gallery of
+the House are said to have joined in the cheers which broke out when the
+numbers were announced.]
+
+[Footnote 315: 433 to 36.]
+
+[Footnote 316: See the proceedings of 1700 (Macaulay, "History of
+England," v., 278; and of 1704, Lord Stanhope's "Reign of Queen Anne,"
+p. 168). The Whig and the Tory writer equally condemn the "Tackers."]
+
+[Footnote 317: In the debate on life peerages ("Parliamentary History,"
+cxl., 356), Lord Grey spoke of "that great transfer of political power
+from one class to another which was accomplished by the Reform Bill" And
+Lord Campbell, speaking of Lord Grey himself in connection with that
+measure, says: "His Reform Bill ought to place him in a temple of
+British worthies by the side of Lord Somers, for it wisely remodelled
+the constitution, and it is hardly less important than the Bill of
+Rights."--_Life of Lord Campbell_, ii., 201.]
+
+[Footnote 318: A recent writer, professedly belonging to the Radical
+party, claims for it the credit of "being the legitimate issue of the
+Reform Bill of 1832." ("The State of Parties," by J.E. Kebbel,
+_Nineteenth Century_, March, 1881, p. 497.)]
+
+
+
+
+INDEX.
+
+
+ABBOTT, Mr., proposes a census.
+Addington, Mr., becomes Prime-minister,  See Sidmouth.
+Additional Force Bill.
+Albert, Prince, marries Queen Victoria.
+Alien' Act, the.
+Althorp, Lord, introduces a bill for the reform of the Poor-laws;
+  his speech on the condition of Ireland;
+  invites the House of Commons to rescind a vote.
+Amelia, Princess, death of.
+Archdall, Mr., on Catholic Emancipation, note.
+Association, Catholic, suppression of.
+
+BAKER, Mr., moves a resolution on the dismissal of the Coalition
+  Ministry.
+Barrington, Lord, moves the expulsion of Wilkes.
+Battle, wager of, abolished.
+Bernard, trial of, as accomplice of Orsini.
+Bishoprics, provision for the increase of;
+  exclusion of the occupants of the junior bishoprics from the House of
+  Peers;
+  resignation of, by aged bishops.
+Blucher, Field-marshal, proposes to put Napoleon to death.
+Boston, United States, tea ships at, boarded by rioters, and the cargo
+  thrown into the sea.
+Bristol, Lord, denounces the appointment of the Chief-justice to a seat
+  in the cabinet.
+Brougham, Mr., afterward Lord Chancellor, the chief adviser of the
+  Queen;
+  defends the ministry for stopping Lord Powis's bill.
+Brownlow, Mr., opposes Pitt's commercial reforms.
+Buonaparte, Napoleon, detention of.
+Burdett, Sir F., carries a motion for repeal of Roman Catholic
+  disabilities.
+Burke, Mr. B., opposes the expulsion of Wilkes;
+  supports Mr. Grenville's act;
+  complains of the insolence of the House of Peers;
+  supports the repeal of the bill for taxing the American Colonies;
+  on annual Parliaments;
+  brings in a bill for economical reform;
+  his "short account of a late administration";
+  asserts the right of the House of Peers to examine the public
+  accounts;
+  his violent language on the Regency Bill;
+  member of Lord Rockingham's second ministry;
+  his view of the attachment of the Colonies to England.
+Bute, Earl of, Prime-minister in 1762;
+  resigns office.
+
+CABINET, character of.
+Camden, Earl of, approves the resolution of the House of Commons;
+  opposes the Royal Marriage Act;
+  supports Lord Chatham's views on the American question;
+  moves the Regency bill of 1788.
+Campbell, Lord, his "Lives of the Chancellors" referred to;
+  his denunciation of the Declaratory Act;
+  and of the Regency bill;
+  on the Chief-justice in the cabinet.
+Canada, disquietude in;
+  union of the two provinces.
+Canning, Lord, grants the right of adoption to the Hindoo feudatories.
+Canning, Mr. G., attacks the appointment of the Chief-justice to a seat
+  in the cabinet; becomes Prime-minister;
+  dies;
+  his opinion on the question in which House of Parliament the
+  Prime-minister should be.
+Caroline, Princess of Brunswick, marries the Prince of Wales;
+  investigations into her conduct;
+  she dies.
+Cave, Mr., punished for publishing reports of debates.
+Census established.
+Charlotte, Princess, birth of.
+Chartists, rise of;
+  outrages of, at Birmingham and Newport.
+Chatham, Earl of, Secretary of State in 1760;
+  Lord Privy Seal in 1767; supports Lord Rockingham's resolution on the
+  expulsion of Wilkes;
+  denies the power of the Parliament to tax America.
+Church reform, sketched out by Sir Robert Peel;
+  earned by Lord Melbourne's ministry.
+Clarence, Duke of, opposes the abolition of the slave trade;
+  his leaning toward the Whigs.
+Clarendon, Earl of, omits to reply to the despatch of the French
+  minister.
+Clergy, Roman Catholic, question of endowing the.
+Colborne, Sir John crushes the insurrection in Canada.
+Colonies, general grant of constitutions to, in New Zealand, the Cape,
+  and Australia.
+Commons, House of privileges of, with respect to money bills.
+Conventicle Act, repeal of.
+Conway, General, Secretary of State, introduces a bill of indemnity.
+Cornwallis, Lord, surrenders in America.
+Corporations, reform of.
+Crosby, Brass, Mr, Lord Mayor, commits a messenger of the House of
+  Commons, and is himself committed to the Tower.
+Cumberland, Duke of, marries Mrs Horton.
+Cust, Sir J, Speaker of the House of Commons.
+
+DASHWOOD, Sir F.,  his revels at Medmenham Abbey.
+Declaratory Act.
+De Grey, Mr, Attorney-general, supports the resolutions against Wilkes.
+Denbigh, Lord, defends the employment of Hanoverian troops at Gibraltar.
+Denman, Lord Chief justice, his charge to the jury in the case of
+  Stockdale v. Hansard.
+Disraeli, Mr B, his act for the trial of election petitions;
+  he denounces Sir Robert Peel for not resigning when defeated on the
+  sugar-duties;
+  condemns Lord Clarendon's omission to reply to the French despatch;
+  supports the House of Lords on the paper duties.
+Dowdeswell, Mr, opposes the Royal Marriage Act.
+Dundas, Mr, moves an amendment to Mr Dunning's resolution.
+Dunning, Mr, afterward Lord Ashburton, supports Mr Glenvilles act;
+  criticizes a resolution on the influence of the crown.
+Dunham, Lord, Governor of Canada.
+
+EDUCATION, influence of the penal laws on in Ireland.
+Eldon, Lord, on the coronation oath in connection with the Catholic
+  question;
+  on the detention of Napoleon;
+  on life peerages.
+Elgin, Lord, Governor general of Canada.
+Ellenborough, Lord, supports the Additional Force Bill;
+  becomes a member of the Cabinet;
+  is recalled from the government of India by the Company.
+Emancipation of Roman Catholics designed by Pitt;
+  concurred by the Duke of Wellington.
+Erskine, Lord, as Chancellor, presides over the impeachment of Lord
+  Melville;
+  resists Lord Sidmouth's Six Acts.
+
+FITZGERALD, LORD E., opposes the English government.
+Fitzgerald, Mr Vesey, is defeated in Clare.
+Fitzgibbon, Mr (afterward Lord Clare), opposes the convention of
+  delegates in Dublin;
+  Attorney-general in Ireland, prosecutes the sheriff of Dublin;
+  supports the Regency bill.
+Fitzwilliam, Earl, is dismissed from the Lord-lieutenancy of Yorkshire.
+Five Mile Act repealed.
+Fox, Mr C., opposes Mr Grenville's act;
+  on the privileges claimed by the House of Commons respecting
+  money-bills;
+  _note_, on Parliamentary reform and annual Parliaments;
+  urges the appointment as Prime-Minister of the Duke of Portland;
+  resigns office;
+  becomes Secretary of State;
+  his India Bill;
+  violence of his attacks on Pitt at the beginning of his ministry;
+  his opinions on Colonial policy;
+  denies the Prince's marriage;
+  opposes the Regency bill;
+  opposes the Alien Act and other bills;
+  opposes Pitt's commercial reforms;
+  becomes Secretary of State;
+  supports the abolition of the slave trade;
+  dies.
+France, new revolution in 1848.
+Franklin, Dr, is examined by the House of Commons on Mr Glenville's
+  measures of taxation.
+
+GEORGE III., state of affairs at the accession of;
+  illness of in 1764;
+  firmness in the Gordon riots;
+  becomes deranged;
+  is attacked on the street;
+  resists the relaxation of Catholic restrictions;
+  becomes permanently deranged;
+  dies;
+  character of his reign.
+George IV. succeeds to the throne.
+Gladstone, Mr W.E., opposes the fortification of the dockyards;
+  proposes to repeal the paper-duties;
+  carries the repeal of the paper-duties;
+  desires to weaken the power of the House of Lords.
+Gloucester, Duke of, marries Lady Waldegrave.
+Gordon, Lord George, the Gordon riots.
+Goulburn, Mr. H, is Chancellor of the Exchequer.
+Grafton, Duke of, Prime-minister in 1767;
+  disapproves of American taxation.
+Graham, Sir J., as Home-secretary, orders the opening of letters.
+Grampound disfranchised.
+Granville, Earl, defends life peerages.
+Grattan, Mr. H., moves the repeal of Poynings' Act;
+  opposes Pitt's commercial reforms;
+  opposes Pitt's Regency bill.
+Grenville, Mr. G., becomes Prime minister;
+  opposes the expulsion of Wilkes;
+  brings in a bill for the investigation of election petitions;
+  imposes taxes on the North American Colonies.
+Grenville, Lord, introduces the Alien Bill;
+  opposes the Additional Force Bill;
+  brings in a bill for the abolition of the slave trade;
+  refuses a seat in the cabinet in 1812.
+Grey, Mr. (afterward Earl), opposes the Regency bill;
+  opposes the Alien Act;
+  opposes the union with Ireland;
+  proposes to diminish the number of members of the House of Commons;
+  opposes the abolition of slavery;
+  refuses a seat in the cabinet in 1812;
+  becomes Prime minister;
+  his ministry brings in Reform Bill;
+  defends a proposed creation of peers;
+  mentions the sovereign's opinion unconstitutionally;
+  letters from office.
+Grey, Earl (son of the preceding), his doctrine on the true principles
+  of colonial government;
+  on life peerages.
+Gower, Lord F.L., carries a resolution for the endowment of the Roman
+  Catholic clergy.
+Girizot, M., Foreign Secretary in France.
+
+HALIFAX, Earl of, issues a general warrant against the publishers, etc.,
+  of _The North Briton_.
+Hanoverian troops, employment of, at Gibraltar.
+Hansard, Mr., publishes the Parliamentary debates.
+Hardy, General, taken prisoner by Sir J. Warren.
+Hill, Mr. Roland, proposes a reform of the Post-office.
+Hillsborough, Lord, writes a circular letter to the North American
+  Colonies.
+Hoche, General, sails for Ireland.
+Holdernesse, Earl of, Secretary of State in 1760.
+Holland, Lord, opposes the Regency Bill.
+Holt, Chief justice, his decision on the question of slavery.
+Holsmann, Mr., supports the House of Lords on the paper duties.
+Humbert, General, taken prisoner in Mayo.
+
+INDIA, Fox's India Bill;
+  Pitt's India Bill;
+  Mutiny in;
+  transfer of the authority of the Company to the crown;
+  establishment of the Order of the Star of India;
+  is visited by the Prince of Wales.
+Ireland, affairs of;
+  connection with France;
+  rebellion in.
+
+JAMAICA, planters in, compensated for the diminution of the value
+  of their property by the abolition of slavery;
+  disturbances in;
+  its constitution is suspended.
+Judges, new tenure of their office.
+
+KING, the, cannot be a witness in any legal proceeding.
+
+LABOUCHERE, Mr. H., reproaches Sir Robert Peel for not resigning.
+Leopold, King of Belgium, points of the insufficiency of the description
+  of Prince Albert.
+Lewis, Sir. G.C., speech on the history and power of the East India
+  Company.
+Liverpool, Lord, earnest for the universal abolition of the slave trade;
+  becomes Prime minister;
+  makes the Catholic question an open question in the cabinet;
+  brings in, and subsequently withdraws, a "Bill of Pains and
+  Penalties";
+  against the Queen;
+  attacked by apoplexy and dies;
+  contemplates an increased grant to Maynooth.
+Lopes, Sir M., procures the return of Mr. Pool for Westbury.
+Louise, Princess, marriage of.
+Lowther, Sir John, obtains a grant of Inglewood Forest.
+Luttrell, Mr., is declared elected for Middlesex.
+Lyndhurst, Lord, carries an amendment on the Reform Bill;
+  introduces a Regency bill.
+
+MACINTOSH, Sir J., applies himself to mitigate the severity of the law.
+Mahon, Lord, brings in a bill to diminish the expenses of elections.
+Mansfield, Lord, condemns general warrants;
+  insists on the necessity of a bill of indemnity;
+  vindicates the supremacy of Parliament;
+  his house is burnt by the rioters in 1780.
+Martin, Mr., wounds Wilkes in a duel.
+Massachusetts, riots in.
+Maynooth, foundation of a college at;
+  is enlarged and more fully endowed.
+Melbourne, Lord, becomes Prime-minister;
+  resigns;
+  resumes office;
+  mismanages the arrangements for Prince Albert.
+Melville, Lord, is impeached.
+Metternich, Prince, is driven from Vienna.
+Miles, Mr., defeats the government on the sugar-duties.
+Moira, Lord, employed by the Regent to negotiate with the Whig leaders
+  in 1812.
+Money-bills, power of the House of Lords as to.
+Montesquieu, M. de, his opinion of the English constitution.
+Montmorin, M., Wilberforce writes to him on the subject of the
+  slave-trade.
+
+NAPOLEON, Louis, is elected President of the French Republic;
+  his _coup d'etat_;
+  conspiracy against.
+Navigation laws, the, repeal of.
+Nelson, Lord, his victory at Copenhagen.
+Newcastle, Duke of, Prime minister in 1760.
+New Shoreham, disfranchisement of for bribery.
+Newspapers, tax on, reduced and afterward abolished.
+Nicholas, Emperor of Russia, writes to the Queen.
+Normanby, Lord, ambassador in Paris, complains of Lord Palmerston.
+North, Lord, supports the decision in favor of Mr. Luttrell;
+  opposes Mr. Grenville's act;
+  opposes Mr. Seymour's bill to limit the _Nullum Tempus_ Act;
+  opposes reform of Parliament;
+  rejects the demands of Ireland.
+Northington, Lord C., defends the embargo on corn;
+  indicates the supremacy of Parliament.
+_Nullum Tempus_ Act, the, extended.
+
+O'CONNELL, Mr. D., is returned for Clare;
+  is chief of the Catholic Association.
+Octennial act for Ireland.
+"Olive Branch, the,"
+Onslow, Colonel, complains of the publication of the debates.
+Orsini, conspiracy of.
+
+PALMERSTON, Lord, is dismissed from the Foreign-office;
+  introduces the bill for the transfer of the government of India to
+  the crown;
+  writes to the Queen on the abolition of the authority of the East
+  India Company;
+  is defeated on the Conspiracy Bill and resigns;
+  returns to office;
+  disapproves of the reduction of the paper-duty;
+  desires to uphold the House of Lords.
+Papineau. M., organizes an insurrection in Canada.
+Parke, Sir J., is created a peer for life.
+Parliament, first meeting of the United.
+Peel, Sir Robert, responsible for the change of ministry in 1834;
+  becomes Home-secretary;
+  resigns his seat for Oxford and fails to be re-elected;
+  impropriety of his resignation;
+  speech on introducing the bill for Catholic Emancipation;
+  becomes Prime-minister;
+  declines to form an administration in 1839;
+  supports Lord J. Russell's resolutions in the case of Stockdale _v._
+  Hansard;
+  his opinion on the question in which House the Prime-minister should
+  be;
+  becomes Prime-minister in 1841;
+  revises the commercial tariff;
+  suspends the Corn-law;
+  causes its abolition.
+Peel, Colonel, organizes the Volunteers.
+Peerages, life, legality of.
+Peers, the House of, strikes out of a corn bill some clauses giving
+  bounties;
+  their right to inquire into the public expenditure asserted by Lord
+  Camden and others;
+  their privileges as to money-bills;
+  provisions as to Irish peers in the Act of Union;
+  proposed creation of peers to carry the Reform Bill considered;
+  the House of Peers rejects the abolition of the paper-duty.
+Penal laws, in Ireland;
+  repeal of;
+  in the United Kingdom.
+Penu, Mr., sent from America to England with "the Olive Branch."
+Perceval, Mr., becomes Prime-minister;
+  proposes a Regency bill;
+  is murdered.
+Percy, Lord, proposes the entire abolition of slavery.
+Persigny, M. de, French Secretary of State, his despatch on Orsini's
+  conspiracy.
+Pigott, Sir A., brings in a bill on the slave-trade.
+Pitt, see Earl of Chatham.
+Pitt, Mr. T., denounces the influence of the crown.
+Pitt, Mr. W., on the privileges of House of Commons respecting
+  money-bills;
+  _note_;
+  becomes Prime-minister;
+  his long struggle against, and eventual defeat of the Opposition;
+  comparisons between his father and him;
+  his India bill;
+  his Quebec bill;
+  his Regency bill;
+  founds Maynouth;
+  carries the Irish Union;
+  resigns on the Catholic question.
+Plunkett, Mr., opposes the Irish Union.
+Ponsonby, Mr. G., condemns the policy of open questions.
+Poor-law, the, reform of.
+Portland, Duke of, becomes Prime-minister;
+  again.
+Post-office, reform of;
+  letters opened by the order of the Secretary of State.
+Powis, Earl, brings in a bill to preserve the Welsh sees.
+Pownall, Governor, introduces a corn bill.
+Poynings' Act;
+  repeal of.
+
+RADETSKY, MARSHAL, his campaign in North Italy.
+Reform of Parliament, Alderman Sawbridge proposes a measure of;
+  Mr. Pitt brings in a bill for;
+  agitation for, in 1818;
+  introduced and carried by Lord Grey's administration;
+  the people indifferent to farther reform.
+Regency bill of 1764;
+  of 1840;
+  former Regency bills had been passed in the reigns of Edward III.,
+  Richard II., Henry VI., and George II.;
+  in Ireland;
+  bill of 1810.
+Registration, extension of, 342.
+Rice, Mr. Spring, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, introduces
+  Post-office reform;
+  as Lord Monteagle proposes the rejection of the paper-duty bill.
+Roberts, Mr., returning officer for New Shoreham.
+Rochfort, Lord, introduces the Royal Marriage Act.
+Rockingham, Marquis of, Prime-minister in 1768;
+  moves a resolution condemning the proceedings against Wilkes;
+  Prime-minister a second time;
+  repeals the American taxes;
+  disapproves of the employment of Hanoverian troops at Gibraltar;
+  wisdom of his policy toward America;
+  his speech on the influence of the crown;
+  becomes Prime-minister a second time.
+Rolle, Mr., moots the question of the Prince's marriage.
+Romilly, Sir S., opposes the Regency bill;
+  applies himself to reforms of the law.
+Rose, Mr., opposes Sir A. Pigott's bill on the slave-trade.
+Russell, Lord J., his opinion on Fox's conduct in Opposition;
+  on the Regency bill;
+  carries the repeal of the Test Act;
+  introduces the Reform Bill;
+  introduces a bill for municipal reform;
+  his resolutions in the case of Stockdale v. Hansard;
+  becomes Prime--minister.
+Russia, war with.
+
+SANDWICH, EARL OF, denounces Wilkes's "Essay on Woman."
+Sarsfield, General, takes refuge in France.
+Savile, Sir G., his bill for the limitation of the _Nullum Tempus_ Act.
+Seaforth, Lord, reports of the treatment of slaves in Barbadoes.
+Seditious Meetings Act.
+Shelburne, Lord, denounces the employment of Hanoverian troops at
+  Gibraltar;
+  becomes Prime-minister.
+Sheridan, Mr. R., his language on the Prince's marriage;
+  opposes the Alien Act;
+  conceals Lord Yarmouth's intention to resign.
+Sidmouth, Lord, as Home-secretary, introduces six bills for the
+  suppression of sedition;
+  resigns office.
+Slavery, abolition of.
+Slave-trade, abolition of.
+Smith, Mr. W., M.P. for Norwich, on repeal of the Five Mile Act.
+Somersett, is released by Lord Mansfield.
+Stamp Act, imposed on the American Colonies by Mr. Grenville;
+  repealed by Lord Rockingham.
+Stanley, Mr., afterward Lord, and afterward Lord Derby, denounces the
+  Catholic Association;
+  brings in a bill for the abolition of slavery;
+  fails in the attempt to form a ministry in 1845;
+  becomes Prime-minister in 1852;
+  proposes a committee on life peerages;
+  becomes Prime-minister;
+  resigns.
+St. Vincent, Lord, opposes the abolition of the slave-trade.
+Stockdale, Mr., brings an action against Messrs. Hansard.
+Sugar-duties, Sir Robert Peel's ministry is defeated on a reduction of.
+Sussex, Duke of, protests against some clauses of the Regency Act.
+Sydenham, Lord, Governor-general of Canada.
+
+TANDY, NAPPER, proposes a congress.
+Temple, Earl, his interview with George III.
+Test and Corporation Acts are repealed.
+Thurlow, Mr., afterward Lord Chancellor, on the case of Wilkes;
+  defends the employment of Hanoverian troops at Gibraltar;
+  denounces Fox's India Bill;
+  approves of the King's employment of Lord Temple.
+Tone, Wolfe, commits suicide.
+Townsend, Lord, Lord-lieutenant of Ireland.
+Townsend, Mr. C., re-imposes taxes on North America.
+Traitorous Correspondence Bill.
+Troy, Dr., petitions for a Roman Catholic college in Ireland.
+
+UNION, the Irish.
+Union with Scotland, obstacles to, and advantages resulting from.
+
+VICTORIA, Queen, succeeds to the throne;
+  marries;
+  her careful exercise of her duties;
+  draws up a memorandum for the guidance of the ministers;
+  writes to foreign sovereigns.
+Victoria, the province of, grant of a constitution to.
+Villiers, Mr. C., advocates the repeal of the Corn-laws.
+Volunteers, rise of the Irish, 158; rise of the English.
+
+WALES, Prince or, son of George III., his conduct and establishment;
+  marries Mrs. Fitzherbert;
+  is attacked in the streets;
+  See George IV.
+Wales, Prince of, son of the Queen, visits India.
+Walpole, Sir R., the case of;
+  on election petitions;
+  refuses to repeal the Test Act;
+  his general policy.
+Walpole, Mr. Spencer, supports the Conspiracy Bill.
+Warburton, Bishop of Gloucester, denounces Wilkes.
+Ward, Mr., his motion on the appropriation of Church funds.
+Wedderburn, Mr., on the case of Wilkes;
+  supports Mr. Grenville's act;
+  his opinion on the Riot Act;
+  the chief legal adviser of the Prince of Wales;
+  suggests the Traitorous Correspondence Bill;
+  excites the King to resist the removal of Catholic disabilities.
+Wellesley, Marquis, proposed to be appointed Prime-minister.
+Wellington, Lord, afterward Duke of, his victories in the Peninsula and
+  in France;
+  becomes Commander-in-chief;
+  advises the King to decline dining with the Lord Mayor;
+  fails in the endeavor to form an administration;
+  becomes temporary Prime-minister, holding several offices;
+  condemns the recall of Lord Ellenborough.
+Westmoreland, Lord, opposes the abolition of the slave-trade.
+Wetherall, Sir Charles, is attacked at Bristol.
+Weymouth, Lord, Secretary of State, writes a letter to the Surrey
+  magistrates.
+Whately, Archbishop, his opinion on the Lord-lieutenancy of Ireland;
+  _note_.
+Whitbread, Mr., promotes the impeachment of Lord Melville.
+Wilberforce, Mr. W., proposes the admission of Roman Catholics to the
+  militia;
+  devotes himself to the abolition of the slave-trade.
+Wilkes, Mr., sets up _The North Briton_;
+  criticises the King's speech;
+  is apprehended;
+  is expelled the House of Commons for printing the "Essay on Woman;"
+  is elected for Middlesex, expelled, and re-elected;
+  as Lord Mayor behaves with spirit during the Gordon riots;
+  procures the expunction of the resolutions against him.
+William IV., his conduct on the Reform Bill;
+  dies.
+Windham, Mr., brings in a bill for reenforcing the army.
+Wolseley, Sir C., is elected M.P. by a Birmingham convention.
+
+YARMOUTH, Earl of, Lord Chamberlain.
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Constitutional History of England
+From 1760 to 1860, by Charles Duke Yonge
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+    (Or /etext 05, 04, 03, 02, 01, 00, 99,
+     98, 97, 96, 95, 94, 93, 92, 92, 91 or 90)
+
+EBooks posted since November 2003, with etext numbers OVER #10000, are
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+example an eBook of filename 10234 would be found at:
+
+     https://www.gutenberg.org/1/0/2/3/10234
+
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+     https://www.gutenberg.org/2/4/6/8/24689
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+
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