In 1767, the Crown for the first time put forward claims on the territory and revenues of India; but the Company purchased its relinquishment of them by a subsidy equivalent to ten or twelve millions of francs.
About the year 1773, the East India Company, finding its affairs extremely deranged, made application to Parliament, which took advantage of its embarrassment to secure its dependence. The Company’s possessions were subjected to new political, judicial, and financial regulations, which, however, produced no very satisfactory result. The Indian peninsula was thrown into the utmost disorder; and the establishment of a Supreme Court of Justice, operating as a rival to the Sovereign Council, and appointed for the purpose of introducing English laws in the country, particularly excited the dissatisfaction and alarm of the natives. The fury of parties, and their reciprocal accusations and complaints, have transmitted to us a picture of the odious measures, the boundless rapacity and atrocious tyranny of this stormy period, which is the least honourable in the history of the East India Company.
In 1783, with the view of providing a radical remedy for these evils, Mr. Fox, who was then Prime Minister, brought forward his famous Bill, the failure of which occasioned his resignation. Mr. Pitt, who had been the opponent of this Bill, in the following year introduced another, which laid the foundation of his celebrity, and which still continues to regulate the affairs of the East India Company. Fox’s Bill would, in fact, have been a judicial seizure; it would have placed all the Company’s property in the hands of a managing committee, who were to liquidate its debts, and dispose of all employments. The members of this Committee, appointed by the King or by Parliament, were to be irremoveable, and were to sit until they should have established the affairs of the Company on a better footing. A general outcry was raised against these propositions, which, it was said, would place important interests, vast patronage, and enormous influence, in the hands of a few individuals. It was said that the Bill was calculated to introduce a fourth power in the state, and to set up a rival to the Crown itself. Mr. Fox was even accused of a wish to establish himself permanently in office, by creating a sort of concealed sovereignty, superior to that of the King; for, Fox being at this time Minister, and having Parliament under his control, he would have appointed and ruled the proposed Committee. Through the influence of this Committee, he would have composed and governed Parliament, and with the aid of Parliament, he would have established and perpetuated the Committee; in short, there was no end to the power which he would thus have exercised. A violent clamour arose, and the King made the business a personal matter. He appealed to his own friends, to those individuals in the House of Peers who were sincerely attached to him, and regarded the measures proposed as an attack on his very existence. The Bill failed, and Fox quitted the ministry.
Pitt was more adroit, and assumed the appearance of greater moderation. In his Bill, he merely contented himself with placing the Company under a sort of guardianship; submitting all its operations to a Committee appointed to revise and counter-sign them. He left to the Company the power of nomination to all employments; but reserved to the Crown the appointment of the Governor General, and the veto on all other nominations. This Committee, which was appointed by the King, formed a new branch in the administration. Complaints were now raised against the vast increase of influence which this measure would give to the royal authority, and which, it was affirmed, would infallibly break the constitutional equilibrium. Fox had been reproached with having wished to keep this influence wholly apart from the King; and Pitt was accused of having placed it entirely in his hands. All that the one had desired to do for the people, it was said the other had done for the monarch. Indeed, these two distinct characters, these two opposite evils, constituted the whole difference between the two Bills, which produced a decisive battle between the Whigs and Tories. Mr. Pitt gained the victory, and the Tories triumphed.
The faults of Fox’s Bill still remain hypothetical, since they were never put to the test; but the evils that were predicted from Pitt’s measures have been formally fulfilled. The equilibrium of power has been broken, the true English constitution has ceased to exist, the royal authority, daily augmented, has encroached in every direction, and is now marching, unimpeded, on the high road, to arbitrary and absolute power.
The Ministers command in Parliament a majority, which they have themselves created, which perpetuates their power and legalizes their arbitrary measures. Thus, English liberty is daily more and more fettered by the very forms which were intended for its defence; and the future, instead of affording a prospect of remedy, appears to threaten greater misfortunes! How could Fox’s plan have produced more fatal results? For it may truly be said that all the great encroachments that have been made on the English constitution have been occasioned by the interests of India. Surely the weight which Fox wished to secure to the popular side could not have been more disastrous to the cause of liberty than that with which Pitt surcharged the royal prerogative!
Consequently, it is now often boldly asserted that Fox was in the right, that he was wiser, and could not have been so mischievous as his rival.
The names of Pitt and Fox having been thus introduced, the Emperor dwelt long on the characters, systems, and measures of those two celebrated statesmen; and concluded with the following remarks, which had already fallen from him on several previous occasions: “Pitt,” said he, “was the master of European policy; he held in his hand the moral fate of nations; but he made an ill use of his power. He kindled the fire of discord throughout the universe; and his name, like that of Erostratus, will be inscribed in history, amidst flames, lamentations, and tears!... The first sparks of our Revolution, then the resistance that was opposed to the national will, and, finally, the horrid crimes that ensued, all were his work. Twenty-five years of universal conflagration; the numerous coalitions that added fuel to the flame; the revolution and devastation of Europe; the bloodshed of nations; the frightful debt of England, by which all these horrors were maintained; the pestilential system of loans, by which the people of Europe are oppressed; the general discontent that now prevails;—all must be attributed to Pitt. Posterity will brand him as a scourge; and the man so lauded in his own time will hereafter be regarded as the genius of evil. Not that I consider him to have been really wicked, or doubt his having entertained the conviction that he was acting right. But St. Bartholomew had also its conscientious advocates; the Pope and Cardinals celebrated it by a Te Deum; and we have no reason to doubt their having done so in perfect sincerity. Such is the weakness of human reason and judgment! But that for which posterity will, above all, execrate the memory of Pitt, is the hateful school that he has left behind him, its insolent Machiavelism, its profound immorality, its cold egotism, and its utter disregard of justice and human happiness.
“Whether it be the effect of admiration and gratitude, or the result of mere instinct and sympathy, Pitt is, and will continue to be, the idol of the European aristocracy. There was, indeed, a touch of the Sylla in his character. His system has kept the popular cause in check, and brought about the triumph of the patricians. As to Fox, one must not look for his model among the ancients. He is himself a model, and his principles will sooner or later rule the world.”
The Emperor said a great deal about Fox, and expressed the great attachment he entertained for him. He had had his bust put up at Malmaison, before he knew him personally. He concluded with a remark, which he used often to make, at different times, and in various ways: “Certainly,” said he, “the death of Fox was one of the fatalities of my career. Had his life been prolonged, affairs would have taken a totally different turn; the cause of the people would have triumphed, and we should have established a new order of things in Europe.”