Still undismayed, Fox, on the 15th of December—which was a Saturday—a day when parliament did not usually meet—moved, “that a minister be sent to Paris, to treat with those persons who exercise provisionally the executive government of France.” Fox contended that this measure would neither imply approbation nor disapprobation of the conduct of the existing government; and that it was the policy and practice of every nation to treat with the existing government of every other nation with which it had relative interests, without inquiring how that government was constituted, or by what means it acquired possession of power. He illustrated his argument by asserting that we had more then once sent embassies to the government of Morocco, when men sat upon that throne who had waded to it through blood. We had, likewise, he said, ministers at the German courts at the time of the infamous partition of Poland; and we had a minister at Versailles when Corsica was bought and enslaved. Yet, he argued, in none of these instances was any sanction given, directly or indirectly, by Great Britain to these nefarious transactions. But this line of argument was more specious than sound; for, although there was nominally a government in France, it was self-constituted, and founded in anarchy. This motion was seconded by Mr. Grey, who declared that an immediate embassy to Paris was the only means of averting war; a war which he deemed the most dangerous that had overtaken this country. Lord Sheffield, who had been an ardent admirer of Fox, reprobated the object of this motion, and, with many others, censured him for his conduct during the last three days. Fox, however, was resolute, and the debate continued. In combating his arguments, Mr. Jenkinson asked, what government we could acknowledge where there was virtually no government? and how England could recognize a constitution which the French themselves were every day violating? and how we could negociate with men who had declared a universal war against all governments? He added,—“On this very day, while we are here debating about sending an ambassador to the French republic; on this very day is the king to receive sentence, and, in all probability, it is the day of his murder. What is it, then, that gentlemen would propose to their sovereign? To bow his neck to a band of sanguinary ruffians, and address an ambassador to a set of regicides, whose hands are still reeking with the blood of a slaughtered monarch? No, sir, the British character is too noble to run a race of infamy; nor shall we be the first to compliment a set of monsters who, while we are agitating the subject, are probably bearing through the streets of Paris—horrid spectacle—the bloody victim of their fury.” The master of the rolls, Sheridan, Windham, Burke, Sir William Young, and others took part in this debate; but the motion was negatived without a division.
In the meantime the address had been carried in the lords almost unanimously; the Duke of Norfolk, and lords Lansdowne, Hawdon, and Stanhope only speaking against it. In both houses the opposition had, at this time, suffered a severe defection. At the head of the seceders in the lords were the Prince of Wales, the Duke of Portland, Lords Fitzwilliam, Spencer, Mansfield, and Loughborough, the last of whom, on the resignation of Lord Thurlow, had been created chancellor; the chief seceders in the commons, besides Burke, were Mr. Windham, Sir Gilbert Elliot, Mr. Anstruther, Lord Sheffield, &c., who by their secession acquired the appellation of alarmists.
Yet, though Fox was thus deserted, on the 17th of December he returned to the charge. On that day Mr. Grey complained that the loyalists and high churchmen had been committing riots in Manchester and other towns in the kingdom. The Manchester riots, he said, had risen out of a loyal meeting held in that town, at which meeting he represented that Mr. Peel—the father of Sir Robert—declared that it was time for the people to rouse from their lethargy, as there were incendiaries in the country. He called upon Mr. Peel to name these incendiaries; and then called the attention of the house to a paper issued by the association against republicans and levellers, which was entitled “One Penny-worth of Truth from Thomas Bull to his Brother John.” Mr. Grey said, that this pamphlet contained some unfounded and libellous invectives against the dissenters; and that it was calculated to produce alarming effects, by exciting the people against them. He moved, that the said libellous paper should be delivered in at the table and read. In reply to his demand of Mr. Peel, that gentleman said that there was no truth in any part of the report to which Mr. Grey had alluded, except that “God Save the King” had been sung at the meeting: and he proved that, so far from exciting the people against their fellow-subjects, the resolutions of the committee of the Manchester Society were calculated to dissuade the populace from outrage and wrong. Many members opposed the motion; but Fox strenuously supported it. In the course of his speech, Fox criticised the loyal associations and subscriptions which had been set on foot, for the purpose of aiding in the prosecution of affected persons. He treated the associations as tending to hinder the improvement of the mind, and as a mobbish tyranny; and he compared them with Lord George Gordon’s mob; declaring, at the same time, that he had advised his friends in Westminister to sign the said associations, whether they agreed with them or not, in order that they might avoid destruction to their persons or their houses, or a desertion of their shops. Burke was very severe in his remarks upon this last assertion. He observed:—“This insidiuous advice will tend to confound those, who wish well to the object of the association, with the seditious against whom the association is directed. By this stratagem the confederacy intended for preserving the British constitution and the public peace, will be wholly defeated. The magistrates, utterly incapable of distinguishing the friends from the enemies of order, will in vain look for support when they stand in the greatest need of it.” Mr. Grey’s motion was negatived without a division.
Pitt was not in the house when these debates occurred; but on the 18th, having been re-elected for the university of Cambridge, he resumed his seat; and in doing so he referred to the recent discussions, by declaring his conviction of the facts stated, and his approbation of the arguments used in support of the address. To send an ambassador to France, he said, under present circumstances, would be incompatible with the dignity of the crown, and contrary to the interests of the public; counteracting and disclaiming those very principles on which the whole of our conduct was founded. The decided opinion expressed by all parties, that if war was necessary, it should be prosecuted with vigour, gave him pleasure; but, at the same time, he assured the house, that nothing consistent with the dignity of the crown, the safety of the country, and the security of Europe should be omitted by government to preserve the blessings of peace.
THE ALIEN BILL, ETC.
At this period many of our provincial towns were filled with Frenchmen. Most of these were royalists; but there were some who mixed with the royalists in order to serve the cause of the republic; and there were others who were professed republicans, and who were using their utmost efforts to seduce the people. As the English laws were not made for foreigners, on the 19th of December, Lord Grenville brought forward a bill in the house of lords, for subjecting aliens to certain regulations. Thus the bill proposed that all foreigners arriving in the kingdom, should give an account of themselves, and surrender such arms as they might have in their possession; that they should be obliged, in their removals from one part of the country to another, to use passports; that all emigrants, who received allowances from the British government, should be distributed in certain districts, where they would be more under the cognizance of the civil power; and that particular attention should be paid to such foreigners as had arrived within the present year, or as might afterwards arrive without obvious reasons. This bill, though opposed by several lords, passed the three readings in the upper house without a division, and was then sent down to the commons. It was there treated by Fox and his party as a measure contrary to the existing treaties between Great Britain and France; as a violation of the law of nations; and as an outrage on Magna Charta. Burke supported the measure as strenuously as Fox opposed it. Having commented in severe terms on the exultation which Fox had manifested on the success of the French, he then expatiated on the nature of French fraternization, and of that liberty which the revolutionists were so anxious to propagate throughout Europe, and which he denounced as a liberty without property, morals, order, government, and security. The apostles of liberty in France, he said, had destroyed the Bastille, while they had converted every man’s house in Paris into such a prison. He quoted the speech of M. Dupont in the convention, to show that Atheism was the first-fruits of French liberty: that fierce demagogue had declared that the religion of Jesus Christ was unfit to be tolerated in a republic, because it was a monarchical religion, and preached subjection and obedience to God; a declaration which was received by the convention with shouts of impious applause. Burke feelingly deplored the natural effects of a profligacy, which went to deprive man of happiness in life, and consolation in the hour of death. On the subject of the Alien Bill, Burke remarked, that he thought it calculated to save the country, for although the number of suspicious aliens might be small, it should be remembered that the horrid massacres in Paris in the preceding autumn had been perpetrated by a body of men not exceeding two hundred. Burke alluded to the fact that three thousand daggers had been ordered and manufactured in Birmingham, and it was on this occasion that he had recourse to a stroke of oratorical acting which has been often commented upon. Drawing a concealed dagger from his bosom, and throwing it down upon the floor of the house, he exclaimed:—“This is what you are to gain by an alliance with the French! Wherever their principles are introduced, their practice must follow. You must equally proscribe their tenets and their persons! You must keep their principles from our minds, and their daggers from our hearts.” The debates on the bill were renewed in its different stages: on the third reading Fox endeavoured to prove that the anxiety about a few French aliens in England was ridiculous; that no Alien Act could guard against the introduction of opinions; and that if dangerous principles were propagated in this country it must be by the English themselves, and not by foreigners. But all opposition was vain. The bill was carried by a great majority, as was also another bill to prevent the circulation in England of French assignats, bonds, and promissory notes. A third bill was passed to enable his majesty to restrain the exportation of naval stores, saltpetre, arms, and ammunition, after which Mr. Pitt moved an adjournment to the 23rd of January, which was unanimously accorded.
GEORGE III. 1792-1793