A History of England, Period III. Constitutional Monarchy

by J. Franck Bright

Weakness of the ministry shown in the Parliament. Feb. 4, 1834.

Of the great questions of the day there still remained the all-important one, the condition of the labouring classes, but it was to another Prime Minister and to a modified Cabinet that the honour of the introduction of the new Poor Law was to belong. In spite of their large majorities, no single measure of the Government had been passed without important modifications, no scheme had been introduced that did not bear upon it the marks of compromise, and afford a distinct proof of the inherent weakness of a Cabinet divided against itself. The speech from the throne in the opening of the year 1834 did not give any hope of a firmer and more united Government. The Duke of Wellington was not wrong in complaining that there was no definite promise of a single Government Bill, that the foreign policy of the Cabinet had not produced European peace, that in spite of its majorities the Church policy of the Government had failed, and that it had carefully avoided, even while vaunting the success which had attended it, to state whether it intended the Coercion Bill to be renewed in Ireland or not. Nor was it doubted that he was uttering the opinions of some at least of the Cabinet itself when he warned the Lords against the tendency visible in several of the late proceedings of the Government towards tampering with property and the introduction of the beginnings of the policy of confiscation.

Rejection of repeal, a Government victory.

In the Lower House both the strength and weakness of the Government were shortly to be displayed. O'Connell, who had talked so long about the repeal of the Union, and had thus kept up the agitation which was so lucrative to himself, was compelled at length to make good his promises and to introduce a substantive motion for repeal. A lengthened debate followed, but terminated in a most complete victory for the Government; the division showing a majority of 485 in favour of an amendment exactly contradicting O'Connell's motion. The central position occupied by the Government enabled it, when it occasionally joined heartily with one side or the other, still to command the House of Commons, but when questions arose of a more doubtful sort its weakness became visible. Measures for the relief of Ireland had been promised, and Mr. Ward, a private member, determined to bring these promises to a test, by introducing a motion (May 27) with regard to the difficult question of the Irish Church, which the ministers would gladly have left quiet. Mr. Ward's resolution stated that the Protestant Episcopal Establishment of Ireland Ministerial difficulty on Mr. Ward's motion on the Irish Church. much exceeded the spiritual wants of the Protestant population, that it was the right of the State and of Parliament to distribute Church property, and that the temporal possessions of the Irish Church ought to be reduced. This motion put the Government into the greatest perplexity; to uphold the direct negative was to resign its pretensions to be the party of progress; to accept it was to shock some of its most important members. The ministers determined to adopt a middle course, and appoint a commission of inquiry. They hoped thereby to induce Mr. Ward to withdraw his motion, because the question was already in Government hands, but they seemed at the same time to pledge themselves to act in accordance with the recommendations of the commission. Armed with this compromise, Lord Althorp went to the House to meet Mr. Ward's motion. But the seconder, Mr. Grote, had advanced but a short way in the speech when the Chancellor of the Exchequer rose and said, that since the beginning of the debate information had been brought to him which induced him to beg for a postponement. His personal influence was so great that the House at once granted his request. The news he had received was the resignation of Mr. Stanley, the Colonial minister, and of Sir James Graham, First Lord Resignation of the most conservative ministers. of the Admiralty, who regarded any interference with Church property with great abhorrence. They were followed by the Duke of Richmond, Postmaster-General, and by Lord Ripon, Privy Seal. The more conservative members of the Cabinet had thus openly retired from it. It might have been expected that Lord Durham, who had previously left it upon opposite grounds, would have now returned to office, and the Government have assumed a more distinctly radical character. He was, however, personally obnoxious to such members of the party of Canning as still remained in office, and his influence was dreaded by Lord Grey, who, though he continued as yet to hold the Premiership in accordance with the generally expressed desire of the Liberal party, sympathized at heart more with the Tories than with the Radicals. He expressed his feelings in his answer to an address which Lord Ebrington got up intreating him to retain his place. "In pursuing," he said, "a course of salutary improvement I feel it indispensable that we shall be allowed to proceed with deliberation and caution; and, above all, that we should not be urged by a constant and active pressure from without to the adoption of any measures the necessity of which has not been fully proved, and which are not strictly regulated by a careful attention to the settled institutions of the country both in Church and State. On no other principle can this or any other administration be conducted with advantage or safety." No difficulty was found in filling the vacant places; Mr. Spring Rice, who had distinguished himself in the debate on the Union, became Secretary for the Colonies, and Lord Auckland succeeded Sir James Graham.

Difficulties of Grey's position.

Under Lord Grey's leadership the Government was enabled to continue its course, because it was recognized at the time as the only possible Government; the Conservative feeling in England was far too strong to allow the success of a Radical Government with Durham at its head. On the other hand, on the great questions of the day it was impossible to go back. Sir Robert Peel clearly understood this position of affairs. He saw that a Tory Government would have no hope of permanence if it rested only on the support of the extreme members of the party. If the party was ever to be reconstituted it must loyally accept the changes which had been made, admit within its limits the more conservative-minded of the reformers, and take its stand on the great Conservative instincts of the nation—the love of the State Church, and the dread of any attack upon property. For the formation of a Liberal Conservative Government the time had not yet arrived, and the present Government of compromise was therefore allowed to continue. But the difficulties of the Premier, from the divergence of his opinions from those of his colleagues, soon became overwhelming. It was necessary to determine whether the Coercion Bill should be renewed or not. But it was possible to renew it in a softened form, and to omit the most objectionable parts—the suppression of the right of petition and the establishment of military courts. Such a course seemed advisable to Mr. Littleton, the Chief Secretary, and recommended itself also to the more liberal members of the Government, Lord Brougham and Lord Althorp. The mischievous activity of Lord Brougham led him to suggest to the Lord Lieutenant, Lord Wellesley, who had succeeded Anglesey, the advisability of officially informing the Government that he could do without these stringent clauses. Wellesley had already expressed himself privately to the contrary effect, but was overpersuaded, and followed the advice of Littleton and Brougham in his official despatches. These contradictory opinions from the chief of the Government were naturally very embarrassing to Lord Grey. To make matters worse, Littleton had attempted a personal reconciliation with O'Connell. Lord Althorp had known and approved of this step, but had warned Littleton against making any pledges. The Secretary unluckily allowed himself to be drawn into an admission that neither himself nor the Lord Lieutenant nor Lord Althorp approved of the renewal of the obnoxious clauses. To complete his blunder, he did not inform Lord Althorp what he had done, and trusted to a promise of secresy on the part of O'Connell, the most untrustworthy of men. So strong was Lord Althorp's opinion on the subject, backed as he believed it to be by that of Wellesley and of Littleton, that after being outvoted in the Cabinet, he in fact tendered his resignation, but was overruled by Lord Grey.

On the 1st of July the Premier introduced the Bill in its full form, asserting, as from Wellesley's private letters to him he had a right to assert, that it was considered necessary by the Irish Government. On this, O'Connell, forgetful of his promise, disclosed in the Resignation of Grey's ministry. July 1834. Lower House his conversation with Littleton, which was in fact a direct contradiction of Lord Grey's assertion, at the same time implicating Lord Althorp in the deception played upon him. The Government seemed convicted not only of internal division, but of duplicity. Lord Grey reiterated his assertion in the Upper House with regard to the feelings of the Irish Government as expressed to him, while Lord Althorp admitted that he disliked the clause, and that Mr. Littleton was justified in telling O'Connell that the question was unsettled at the time of their conversation. The divergence of opinion in the Cabinet was thus fully brought out, and Lord Althorp was made to appear as guilty at once of having held out false hopes to O'Connell, and of having waived his own opinions for the sake of retaining office. Nothing could have been more alien to his nature than this charge, especially as, far from having really pledged himself to O'Connell, he had particularly warned Littleton against committing himself. But there seemed no way of escape without rendering still more glaring the weakness of the administration. On this ground, Littleton's offer to resign, which he felt in honour bound to make, was rejected; but, when in their eagerness to embarrass Government the Opposition moved for the production of the private letters of the Cabinet, Lord Althorp, in disgust at his equivocal position and at the attempted introduction into Parliament of matters which he held to be wholly beyond its jurisdiction, determined to resign. Lord Grey, by no means wedded to office, and feeling that Althorp's personal influence was the main security of the Government, at once declared the administration at an end. The King had already shown, when giving an answer to an address from the Bishops, a strong feeling against any attack upon the property of the Church. This known division between the sovereign and his advisers, and the evident weakness of the Cabinet itself, rendered the resignation of the ministry less surprising than it otherwise would have been.

Lord Melbourne's ministry. July 16.

Seeing the impossibility of forming a distinctly Tory ministry, the King was persuaded by Lord Brougham to send for Lord Melbourne, whom he instructed to give effect as far as possible to his previously expressed wishes, and to form a combined ministry, admitting to office some Tories and some of those who had left office on Conservative grounds. The attempt was fruitless. Peel did not yet see his desired opportunity, and foreseeing the gradual reaction which must arise from the unsatisfactory character of the Whig administration, determined to await his time. The King was therefore compelled to consent to the reconstruction under Melbourne of the old ministry. There was very little change in the construction of the Cabinet. Lord Melbourne's own place in the Home Department was filled by Lord Duncannon (Ponsonby), Sir John Cam Hobhouse obtained a seat in the Cabinet as First Commissioner of the Woods and Forests, and Lord Carlisle surrendered the Privy Seal to Lord Mulgrave.

The change, such as it was, did not add to the strength of the ministry. The introduction of the Coercion Bill on the 18th of July, without the stringent clauses, seemed a confession that some of the ministers at all events were acting contrary to conviction, or that they had weakly yielded to Irish clamour. The Bill was however passed with a strong protest in the Lords. An attempt on the 29th of July again to settle the tithe question displayed still further the inefficiency of the ministry; they allowed themselves to be beaten in the Lower House upon an amendment of O'Connell, who, instead of the proposed land tax, suggested the immediate payment of the tithes, diminished forty per cent., by the landlord. In spite of their defeat, which so completely changed their Bill that out of 172 clauses 111 had to be removed, Church policy of Melbourne's ministry. they proceeded with it, but suffered a heavy defeat on the second reading in the Lords. Their Church policy was indeed throughout entirely ineffective. The feeling that the Church was in danger had begun to take hold not only of the Lords, who systematically resisted innovation, but of the people in England. The efforts of the Dissenters, excited to demand religious equality by the success of Irish agitation, were fruitless. Their petitions were indeed of a character to cause some fear. They begged for the separation of Church and State, for the exclusion of Bishops from Parliament, for the admission of Dissenters to all the privileges of the universities. On this last point a Bill was introduced. Largely signed petitions were sent in against it by the universities. All the leaders of the Conservative, or partially Conservative party, combined to oppose it, and though it passed the Lower House it was rejected in the Lords (Aug. 1). In the same way the efforts of Government to relieve Dissenters from the Church rates, and from the restrictions laid upon the right of dissenting ministers to celebrate marriage, being all conceived from a Church point of view, and assuming the form of concessions rather than the granting of rights, were distasteful to the Dissenters themselves, and came to nothing. The plan for the commutation of the English tithes met with the same fate. It was indeed a period of general ecclesiastical excitement; the introduction of the appropriation clause in the Irish Tithe Bill had closely touched the feelings of English Churchmen; the nature of the Church as distinct from an institution founded by and connected with the State began to be examined. A party in Oxford undertook to enlighten the nation upon the character of the Church in a series of tracts, which gained for the authors the title of Tractarians. In these they urged with great force all the tenets of what is now known as the High Church party—the doctrine of apolostic succession, the sole efficiency of the sacraments, the sacred nature of the priesthood, and the insufficiency of the Bible as apart from the explanations of Church tradition. Their principles rapidly spread. At the same time the Evangelical party lost several of its chief leaders and began to decline. And though three parties could still be traced, public opinion began to divide itself chiefly between the two great views of those who regarded the Church as an institution independent in itself, and beyond the reach of secular interference, and those Liberals who, attached as they might be to the Church as a political institution, regarded it as lying within the sphere of politics.