1826] DIVISION IN THE MINISTRY 1387 by Huskisson, and the decided preponderance of the more liberalminded members of the Cabinet, were regarded with Division in favour by all their colleagues. Personally distaste- the ministry. ful to many of them because of their want of aristocratic connection, the innovating character of their policy, and their views, which were closely assimilated on most points to those of the Whigs, separated them entirely from the representatives of the old Tory party. They seem to have had but one point in common their opposition to parliamentary reform. Lord Liverpool's Government had from the first been one of compromise. One of the greatest questions of the day, which had already caused the fall of more than one ministry, had been allowed to fall from the list of Cabinet questions, and it had been agreed that Catholic emancipation should stand entirely upon its own merits. But this was a point on which men felt very keenly, and there had thus arisen a complete division in the ministry; on the one side were ranked the followers of Canning, including such men as Huskisson, Wellesley, Robinson, Sturges-Bourne, and Lord Palmerston; and on the other the high Tory or Protestant party, at the head of which was Liverpool himself, Lord Eldon, and the Duke of Wellington, and, although he was regarded as less bigoted, Peel. How great the split between the parties was is made plain not only by the strong if decorous language to be found in Lord Eldon's correspondence, but by the more outspoken expressions of Palmerston in his private letters. In the election of 1826, though himself a member of the ministry, Palmerston had been opposed at Cambridge by Goulbourn (also one of the administration), and all the influence of the Tory section had been used against him. In a letter describing the effects of that election, he says, "As to the commonplace balance between Opposition and Government, the election will have little effect upon it. The Government are as strong as any government can wish to be, as far as regards those who sit facing them; but in truth the real Opposition of the present day sit behind the Treasury bench. It is by the stupid old Tory party, who bawl out the memory and praises of Pitt, while they are opposing all the measures and principles which he held most important, it is by these that the progress of the Government in every improvement which they are attempting is thwarted and opposed. On the Catholic question, on the principles of commerce, on the corn laws, on the settlement of the currency, on the laws regulating the trade in money, on colonial slavery, on the game laws, which are intimately connected with the moral habits of the people; on all these questions, and everything like them, the Government find support from the Whigs and resistance from their self-denominated friends." While again, speaking of the foolish obstruction to the Catholic claims, he writes of his colleagues in most unmeasured terms: “I can forgive old women like the Chancellor, spoonies like Liverpool, ignoramuses like Westmoreland, old stumped-up Tories like Bathurst, but how such a man as Peel, liberal, enlightened, and fresh-minded, should find himself running in such a pack is hardly intelligible." It is plain that a Government thinking so differently on the most important topics of the day must have been near its dissolution. It was held together in fact only by the tact and personal influence of Lord Liverpool; and Lord Liverpool. When, on the 17th February, the Premier was found struck with an apoplectic fit it was certain that a ministerial crisis must arise. Illness of Feb. 1827. Difficulties attending the formation of a new ministry. Necessity of a change in the corn laws. sary. The difficulty in the formation of a new permanent Government was likely to be increased by the two great questions which were expected to occupy the session. One of these was a change in the corn laws, and an attempt to bring them more into harmony with the new commercial views of Huskisson and his friends; the other the Catholic emancipation, on which already the existing Cabinet was so much divided. The constant repetition of temporary measures required by the existing state of the law, the fluctuation of prices, and the consequent suffering of the poor, proved to those who were not pledged to the interests of the landowning and agricultural party that some alteration in the arrangements with regard to corn was necesWith much care Canning and Huskisson, although both were too ill to allow of personal communication, had arranged a joint measure, by which foreign corn might be imported free of duty, to be warehoused and admitted to the market for home consumption, regardless of the price of corn, on the payment of duties varying in accordance with a certain scale; when wheat was at seventy shillings the duty was to be one shilling, and to increase two shillings with every decrease of one shilling in price. The Bill was passed on the 12th of April, during the interval it was thought decent to allow for the possible restoration of Lord Liverpool's health. It did not come on in the Upper House till after the new Government was formed, but it was there thrown out in favour of an amendment produced by the Duke of Wellington, declaring that foreign corn should not be taken out of bond till corn had 1827] THE CATHOLIC QUESTION 1389 reached sixty-six shillings. The object of the Bill, which was to supply foreign corn whenever the sale of it was remunerative, was thus entirely frustrated and the Bill abandoned. importance of the Catholic question. It was during the same period, while the Government was in abeyance, that the Roman Catholic question was Increasing brought on. The settlement of this question in one way or other had become almost a necessity. It has been seen how Pitt was compelled, by fear of the old King's health, to give up a cause which he undoubtedly regarded as just, and how the obstinacy of George III. upon the same point had ruined Lord Grenville's ministry. During Mr. Perceval's ministry, which was formed on the avowed principle of withstanding the claims of the Catholics, the dangers attendant upon the war afforded sufficient excuse for alleging that the time was inconvenient to move so critical a question; but during the whole of that period they had, by means of an organization and the establishment of a central Catholic committee, kept their claims before the world, waiting till a favourable time should come. Lord Liverpool had found it impossible, as already stated, to form a ministry unanimous on the point, and year alter year, as Bills in favour of the Catholics were introduced in the House, Castlereagh and Canning had been seen supporting them in opposition to most of their colleagues. In Ireland, meanwhile, the question had naturally become the watchword of parties, and, like every other political Disturbances question in that country, had assumed a national form in Ireland. and was leading to a division of races. Both the Protestant Orange Lodges and the Catholic Associations of White Boys had again sprung into existence, and so great was the disorder that in 1822 the Habeas Corpus Act had been suspended. At the same time, in agreement with the uncertain and half-hearted policy of Lord Liverpool's Government, Lord Wellesley, a favourer of the Catholic claims, was made Lord-Lieutenant, and Plunkett (in whose hands the chief management of Catholic parliamentary affairs was) Attorney-General, but yoked to Mr Goulbourn, who was a strong anti-Catholic, as Chief Secretary. The hopes of the Irish, not unreasonably raised by these appointments, were disappointed. Received upon Failure of his arrival with every sign of admiration and attach- administration. ment, before long Wellesley was publicly assaulted and 1822. pelted in the theatres. He had attempted, in the midst of the wild excitement of the passionate Irishmen of both parties, to follow a cool and impartial policy. His chief object was to suppress secret Wellesley's Formation of the Catholic Association. 1823. societies and to compel all parties to submit quietly to the law. By the use of very stringent measures, by the suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act, and by the Insurrection Act, which allowed him to establish where necessary something nearly equivalent to martial law, he had succeeded in weakening the secret societies and in lessening the amount of crime; he thus earned for himself the hearty dislike of the extreme Catholics. At the same time the restraint which he put upon the Orange societies and Protestant demonstrations roused the extreme Protestants to fury, so that riots took place in Dublin which could only be checked by the military. He thus laid himself open to the charges brought against him by the ultra-Protestants of England, who urged, with a show of truth, that he had proved himself inefficient, and that it was plain that lenity and conciliatory measures would not produce the expected effect. And now, seeing that their hopes in their Lord-Lieutenant were not realized, and wishing to gain favour with classes to whom secret societies were abhorrent, the Catholic party of Ireland, under the leadership of O'Connell, set on foot the great organization known as the Catholic Association, which, while it held aloof from secret societies, and kept itself as far as possible within the limits of the law, was inspired as completely with fanaticism as any of its predecessors had been. Its avowed object was the preparation of petitions to Parliament; but it held regular sessions, had its committee of grievances, ordered a census of the population, and exacted a tax known as the Catholic rent. The effect of this Association was for a time to alienate the Catholics of England, and to make the question a more distinctly national one, and by 1825 the Association had become so formidable that, by & large majority, a Bill was passed rendering it illegal and attempting to dissolve it. The Bill declared that political associations were incapable of adjournment for more than fourteen days, incapable of having corresponding societies, of levying contributions, or of requir ing oaths. The dissolution of the Association was only nominal, a new Association was immediately formed, and the Catholic body were advised to proceed by all political and legal means. The Catholics had in fact gained a very important step in compelling Parliament to recognize the existence of the Association. It was no longer possible to postpone the consideration of their claims, and in March 1826, Sir Francis Burdett brought in what was called a Relief Bill, of which O'Connell, entirely falsely, claimed to be the chief author. Rejection of the Catholic Relief Bill 1826. Besides 1827] CANNING'S MINISTRY 1391 the Bill for the relief of disabilities there were two subsidiary Bills, the one raising the Catholic franchise to £10 instead of £2, which was thought to be a sop to the Protestants, the other to supply a State provision for the Catholic clergy, by which it was thought the other party might be pleased. Freed from the dread of the Association, the English partisans of the Catholic claims used all their influence and eloquence in favour of the Bill, and it passed the Commons by a considerable majority. Its fate in the House of Lords was different. It there encountered an opposition verging upon the unconstitutional; the Duke of York, the heir to the crown, adopting all his father's old scruples, declared, in distinct allusion to his probable succession to the throne, that under no circumstances and in no position would he assent to such a Bill. He succeeded in obtaining its rejection by a majority of forty-eight. The Duke's action was highly popular; it seems pretty certain that the feeling of the majority of Englishmen was against the Catholics. The plea that the Coronation Oath stood in the way of the royal assent to such a Bill no longer found defenders except with the extremest Tories, but the feeling of race which had been excited, the fear, not wholly ungrounded, that a measure so anxiously desired by the priests must hide some considerable advantage to the Roman Church, and the occasional rash declaration of some furious partisan that obedience to the Papal See was superior to any earthly obedience, made the majority of those who were not guided by reason and principle desire to retain the disabilities which still existed. The effect of their defeat in the House of Lords was not to dishearten the Catholics, on the contrary, they took courage at their success in the Commons, and were only eager if possible to complete their triumph before the accession of the bigoted Duke of York should throw a fresh obstacle in their way. A Catholic petition Rejection of was therefore prepared, which Sir Francis Burdett pre- resolution. sented during the illness of Lord Liverpool, proposing at March 6, 1827. the same time a resolution that the affairs of Ireland required immediate and earnest attention. But an election had taken place since the last Bill had been introduced, and the anti-Catholic feeling had apparently gained ground in the new Parliament; in spite of all the support which Canning could give it, the resolution was rejected. It was the last defeat the champions of emancipation were destined to meet. While Canning was thus defeated on the two questions he had most at heart,-the improvement of the corn laws and the Catholic emancipation, he found himself called upon to undertake the duties of Prime Minister. Burdett's Canning Prime Minister. April 10, 1827. |