INDIA BILL.
The house, the public, the East India Company, and all interested in the great Eastern dependencies included under the general name of India, looked forward with anxiety to the bill which it was necessary to pass in reference to the relations of the country and the East India Company.
On the 3rd of June, Sir Charles Wood, in a speech of five hours’ duration, proposed his plan for the future government of India.*
* See Nolan’s “History of the British Empire in India and the East.”
Mr. Bright, in one of his most elaborate parliamentary efforts, criticised the measure; he eloquently inveighed against the East India Company, but his information upon subjects connected with India did not support the influence his parliamentary powers were so calculated to command. Lord Stanley, during the debates that ensued, distinguished himself for the first time on Indian subjects, over which in a few years he was destined to hold so important an influence. The bill of the government passed the commons, but was subjected to various alterations in the interest of the East India Company in the lords. Thus amended, it was accepted by the commons and became law.
To give even the briefest abstract of this measure would be as unnecessary as it is undesirable, within the limits of our space, for in a few years a great insurrection in India led to the abolition of the act, and the removal of the East India Company from all political power in India, and the vesting in the crown the government of all our eastern possessions.
The main objects of the act of 1858 were to lessen the power of the East India Company still more than it had been fettered by previous acts; to enlarge the scope of the board of control; to increase the direct authority of the president of that board and the governor-general of India; and to simplify the procedure of the home, action, on Indian government.