THE QUESTION OF THE REGENCY RESUMED.
On the day that the election of speaker took place, Pitt gave notice that he should, on the morrow, lay before the house the restrictions which he considered necessary to be annexed to the regency. Hitherto Fox had complained of Pitt’s tardiness in proposing a regency, but he now seemed resolved to impede the progress of the minister. He was well aware that Pitt was averse to bring the royal physicians to the bar of the house to give evidence, yet notwithstanding he resolved that they should be again there examined. On the very day that Pitt was to introduce the subject of the restrictions, therefore, urged by Fox, the member for Abingdon, Mr. Loveden, made a motion to that effect. In support of his motion, Mr. Loveden said, that before the house proceeded any further, they ought to know how the case now stood; what was the present state of his majesty’s health, what the degrees of alteration it had undergone since the physicians were last examined, and whether the probability of recovery was increasing or diminishing. This was the more necessary he said, because contradictory reports were in circulation, which were said to be supported by the different royal physicians. The reports unfavourable to the king’s recovery had been put forth by, or at least was imputed to Dr. Warren, whom Pitt, in reply, treated as a violent Whig and party man, whose wishes suggested his predictions. Pitt also plainly intimated that he conceived gentlemen on the opposite side, who were to form the new administration under the regency, wished the doctor’s opinion to be true. This insinuation was repelled by the opposition as unjust and illiberal, but in the same breath they acted as unjustly and illiberally, by falling upon Willis, the Tory doctor, and accusing him with uttering false oracles and predictions of amendment, which were merely meant to serve the purposes of Pitt and his party. But though Pitt at first opposed this measure, he ultimately acquiesced in its course, and a new committee of the house was appointed to re-examine all the physicians. This examination, which ought to have been brief, was prolonged by the frivolous questions of opposition members, and by frequent altercations, so that the report was not brought up before the 13th of January. As the committee had not examined into the grounds of the different opinions held by the physicians, Burke moved that the report should be re-committed; but this was negatived without a division, and it was ordered that it should be printed, and be taken into consideration, in a committee of the whole house, on the 16th of the month. On that day Pitt introduced his plan of a restricted regency. On the 30th of December Pitt had, in a letter, submitted to the Prince of Wales the heads of a plan arranged by the cabinet, and though the prince, acting under the influence of his advisers, had expressed his entire disapprobation of the plan, he nevertheless consented to undertake the regency with the proposed restrictions. What these restrictions were, Pitt now explained to the house. After expressing his great satisfaction at having consented to the re-examination of the physicians, the event of which had justified his sanguine expectations of the king’s recovery, he observed, that under these circumstances, what parliament had to provide for was, a deficiency in the executive government for an interval which he trusted would be brief, and against any embarrassment in the resumption of the royal authority, when his majesty should be able to resume that authority. This was all that was required, he said, for the present; but if contrary to expectations his majesty’s illness should be protracted, then a more permanent plan of government might be arranged. He moved, therefore, that the Prince of Wales should be invested with the whole regal authority, subject to certain necessary limitations. These limitations were, that his authority should not extend to the creation of new peers; that he should not grant any pension or place for life, other than such place as, from its nature, must by law be held for life, or during good behaviour: that he should not have any power over the personal property of the king; and that he should have nothing to do with his majesty’s person or household, which were to be left entirely to the guardianship of the queen. Pitt proposed that the queen should be assisted in the discharge of her duties by a council, which council were to have no power of control, but only that of giving advice, and satisfying themselves daily of the state of the king’s health. Pitt also proposed that they, the said council, or some others, should be appointed to manage the real and personal estate of the king, being bound at the same time not to alienate or dispose or any part of it, except by lease. These propositions were warmly advocated by Pitt and others on the same side of the house, and as warmly opposed by members on the opposite benches. Mr. Powys, after condemning the whole of Pitt’s plan, as tending to mutilate the constitutional authority, and after asserting that the heir-apparent ought to be invested with the full powers and prerogatives of the crown, moved an amendment to the first resolution, by which his royal highness would be appointed regent, “subject to such limitations and exceptions as might be provided.” This motion was seconded by Lord North, who endeavoured to show that the bestowing of the whole power and patronage of the household upon the queen, would be setting up a party at court in opposition to the administration of the regent. Sheridan followed on the same side, and was both witty and severe upon the abstraction of the household patronage from the regency, and endeavoured to show that Pitt wanted it for himself, when he could no longer hold his present high office! Colonel Fullarton also argued against the mutilation of the executive government, and not only attacked Pitt, but the queen herself. Pitt’s resolutions, however, were ably defended by the new speaker, Grenville, and on a division the amendment moved by Powys was lost by a majority of two hundred and twenty-seven against one hundred and fifty-four. All the resolutions were now carried except the last, and this, which referred to the care of the king’s person and household, was debated on the 19th of January, with, if possible, increased animosity. Two amendments were moved—one by Lord North and the other by Mr. Bouverie—but both were negatived by considerable majorities, and on the 22nd the resolutions were taken into consideration by the lords. The contest in the lords was even more obstinate than it had been in the commons, but an amendment, moved by Lord Sandwich, for limiting the time during which the regent should be restrained from creating peers, and another moved by Viscount Stormont, on the restriction placed upon the regent in regard to the granting of places, were negatived, and then all opposition ceased. A protest was signed by fifty-seven peers, among whom the Dukes of York and Cumberland were again numbered. But the storm was not yet over. Both the prince and his friends were irritated in the highest degree by the restrictions which Pitt imposed upon the regency; and though the former had privately expressed his acceptation of, or submission to the limitations, yet the latter were still resolutely bent upon opposing the premier. On the 27th of January, after recapitulating all the steps which had been taken, Pitt suggested that it would be respectful to the Prince of Wales, and expedient in the order of their proceedings, to know parliamentarily, whether he was willing to accept the regency upon the terms imposed by that house. Pitt moved that a committee should be appointed to wait upon his royal highness for that purpose, with the resolutions to which both lords and commons had agreed. On this occasion, the minister was accused by Mr. Gray and Burke, with treating the prince with marked disrespect; and the latter likewise taxed him with the design of converting the monarchy into a republic, with a regent, annually elected, nominally at its head. Against the regency bill he burst into a paroxysm of rage. He exclaimed, “It is a mere mummery, a piece of masquerade buffoonery, formed to burlesque every species of government. A hideous spectre, to which, with Macbeth, we may exclaim,—
‘Avaunt and quit my sight! Let the earth hide thee. Thy bones are marrowless, thy blood is cold: Thou hast no speculation in those eyes That thou dost glare withal.’
“So it is with this ministerial, political spectre. ‘Its bones are marrowless, its blood is cold, and it has no speculation in its eyes.’ I reprobate it as a chimera, a monster summoned up from the depth of hell!” But all the arguments, and accusations, and rage of the opposition proved fruitless: Pitt’s motion was carried without a division, and ordered to be sent up to the lords for their concurrence. Pitt also moved for a similar committee to wait upon the queen, in order to ascertain whether her majesty would undertake the care of his majesty’s person, and the management and control of the household; and this likewise was carried nem. con., and ordered to be carried to the lords. The motion for the concurrence of their lordships to these resolutions was made by Lord Camden; and this being voted, committees were forthwith appointed for the purposes therein specified. One of the joint committees of lords and commons waited upon the Prince of Wales, at Carlton-house, on the 30th of January, the anniversary of the execution of Charles I., a day on which parliament never met for the despatch of business, but which was not considered too sacred for the execution of such an important commission. The reply of the prince was brief, and to the point. He thanked the lords and gentlemen for the communication of the resolutions agreed upon, and requested them to assure their respective houses, that his duty to the king, his father, and his concern for the safety and interests of the people, together with his respect for the united desires of the two houses, outweighed in his mind every other consideration, and determined him upon undertaking the weighty and important trust proposed to him. At the same time, while he accepted this trust, his royal highness took care to record what his opinions were respecting the restrictions imposed upon his regency. He remarked:—“I am sensible of the difficulties that must attend the execution of this trust, in the peculiar circumstances in which it is committed to my charge, of which, as I am acquainted with no former example, my hopes of a successful administration cannot be founded on any past experience. But confiding that the limitations on the exercise of the royal authority, deemed necessary for the present, have been approved by the two houses only as a temporary measure, founded on the loyal hope, in which I ardently anticipate, that his majesty’s disorder may not be of long duration; and trusting, in the meanwhile, that I shall receive a zealous and united support in the two houses and in the nation, proportioned to the difficulty attending the discharge of my trust; in the interval, I will entertain the pleasing hope that my faithful endeavours to preserve the interests of the king, his crown, and people, may be successful.” On the same day, a joint committee of lords and commons waited upon the queen at Kew Palace, and were assured by her majesty, that out of her duty and gratitude to the king, and from a sense of the great obligations she owed to this country, she would accept of the trust proposed to her by parliament, together with the council to aid her in the discharge of an office with which was connected, not only her own happiness, but also the happiness of a great, loyal, and affectionate people. The answers received from the Prince of Wales and the queen were read in the house of lords on the 31st; and after they were ordered to be printed, Lord Camden moved, in a committee of the house on the state of the nation, that letters patent should be issued, under the great seal, empowering certain commissioners to open and hold the king’s parliament at Westminister. Among the commissioners proposed by ministers were the names of the Prince of Wales, his brother, the Duke of York, and his uncles, the Dukes of Cumberland and Gloucester. The duke of York, however, whose views entirely coincided with those of opposition, rose and said, that from want of knowledge, he had been unable to take any steps to prevent his nomination; and that, as he could not sanction such unconstitutional and illegal proceedings with his name, he desired that it might be omitted: he added, “and I am requested to make the same request on the part of my brother, the Prince of Wales.” The Duke of Cumberland, also, on the same grounds, desired that his own name, and the name of his brother, the Duke of Gloucester, should be struck out of the commission. A debate took place on the proper mode of withdrawing the names of these four personages, so as to convey no disrespect either to the house or to their royal highnesses; but it was finally settled that the names should still stand on the transcript, and that when the resolution was reported to the house, an amendment should be moved, to make it appear on the journals, that it was at the express desire of the several princes that their names were omitted. Camden’s motion was now passed without a division; and the resolution being communicated to the commons, at a conference on the 2nd of February, Pitt moved the concurrence of the house therein. Another stormy debate took place, in which Lord North and Burke strongly insisted on the right of the Prince of Wales to the regency, and in which Pitt as strongly denied that right; but no division took place, and the resolution of the lords was therefore carried. The session was now opened on the 3rd of February, and the bill founded on the propositions already agreed upon was brought in, and by the 13th of February passed the house. Every article of it was warmly contested on the same grounds as when the resolutions were discussed, and some amendments and variations were introduced; the peerage clause, in particular, being limited to three years. Thus altered, the bill was sent up to the lords; and on the 17th, their lordships, in committee, made two important additions to it: one placing all the palaces, parks, houses, gardens, &c., under the control and management of the queen; and the other committing to her the care of all the royal offspring under the age of twenty-one.