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him or in any man; and that he, like all stance, the great constitutional principle, others, must lay down his laurels and his that the king can do no wrong; but he greatness at the door of the office of the could not see how it followed from that secretary of state, and enter there, as a proposition, that the House ought to visit servant of the public, to give an account so severe a punishment upon lord Chatof what he had done, in the accustomed, ham as had been proposed, on account of well-known, constitutional, and official the errors which had been imputed to him. channel; thereby securing all the respon- He did not stand up to vindicate lord sibilities of advice, and securing the great Chatham; he thought that he had in some attributes of the sovereign against any in-degree been wanting in discretion; but fringement; avoiding the evils of a double government, and conveying to the responsible servants of the crown all the facts, on which their advice may be required.

he also thought that that noble person's errors had been greatly exaggerated and misrepresented. In what did his error consist? Was it in drawing up the Narrative; in presenting it, or in the request of secrecy? The secrecy appeared to have comprehended the chief part of the of fence; and yet what was that secrecy? Was there in the nature of the transaction any thing of that dark intrigue, or insiduous underhand attempt to slander the party he could not openly condemn? Nothing of it. He had presented his Narrative, accompanying it with a request of secrecy? but was that secrecy to be permanent? No, but temporary. He wished the House to look at the whole of the features of the transaction, and to judge from that view of it of the quo animo with which it was done. The main ingredient in his alledged criminally was the secrecy; but if his motive had been to attack the naval service, to wound it as it were behind its back, why did he suffer so long a lapse of time to intervene as that between the 15th of Oct, and the 15th of Jan.? Motives of that kind were generally immediate in their operation; but in this instance the person supposed to be influenced by such

Sir, I ask no more of the earl of Chatham than I should have demanded of the duke of Marlborough.-At all times, against all persons I should have contended for the doctrines which I have thus endeavoured to unfold and inculcate doctrines, which I again assert, embrace the sound principles of the constitution, not drawn from theory but from practice; from the most obvious and most certain sources; from lord Coke, sir William Blackstone, and the various authorities to which they refer-from the digest of lord chief baron Comyns (an invaluable abridgment of constitutional as well as common law; pointing out from undoubted authorities, the readiest way to sound knowledge on all subjects of this description ;) from the examination of the history of the country, in its early periods, when the principles were clear, though the form was not yet perfect; deduced from thence to the present time, through all the eventful periods of our history, confirmed at the Revolution, and handed down to the pre-feelings let them lie dormant for three sent period unimpaired until the present melancholy and unfortunate instance. On the most conscientious conviction, therefore, that I have delivered the true doctrine of the constitution, I feel myself bound to vote in terms of the second resolution: "That the earl of Chatham, by private communication to his Majesty, accompanied by a desire of secrecy, did unconstitutionally abuse the privilege of access to his Sovereign, and thereby afford an example most pernicious in its tendency to his Majesty's service, and to the general service of the state."

The Solicitor General said, that while he admitted most of the premises laid down by his hon. and learned friend, he could not equally concur with him in the conclusions he had drawn from those premises. There was no disputing, for in

months. This was an inconsistency not easily to be reconciled with the opinion, that lord Chatham was influenced by such motives. But an innocent motive had suggested itself; his laudable anxiety to stand well with his Sovereign. Which, then, of the two motives would the House in common charity abide by? As to the request of secrecy, he again reminded the House that it was only temporary secrecy that was required; and he would ask, what one object that kind of temporary secrecy could answer? Could he hope either to deceive his Sovereign or his country long by such an artifice; and might he not, on the other hand, have wished merely that it should be kept secret until that of the commander of the naval service had been also presented? But his lordship had of his own free motion, made

that secret paper public, and that act had been severely censured, as obtrusive upon the House, by a noble lord opposite. The step of secrecy had been equally animadverted upon, so that lord Chatham was blamed at one time for making public, and at another for making secret, the same paper. He thought the noble lord treated harshly, in the interpretation of his motives, and judged of with unbending rigour; he, for his part, would, were he upon his oath, give the same vote, which he intended upon that night to give. He declared in the solemnest manner, that he did, from the bottom of his heart, acquit lord Chatham of the bad motives that had been imputed to him by some gentlemen in this transaction. He remarked, that a gentleman had advised Charles 2d, to form the secret cabal; and that this gentleman's name happened to be Temple; and the noble lord opposite, perhaps,wished by his zeal on this occasion, to make some atonement for that transaction. But, the fact that Mr. Pitt, a minister, not chosen upon any system of favouritism, had continued in office for 18 years together, was a proof that the secret influence which had been so much complained of, did not exist. He concluded by observing, that though he did not altogether approve of the conduct of lord Chatham in this instance, he could not vote for resolutions which almost necessarily carried with them consequences highly penal.

Mr. Ponsonby observed, that the hon. and learned gent. opposite had talked a great deal about secret influence, and it appeared as if he thought that if lord Chatham was acquitted of having recourse to this secret influence, he was acquitted of every thing. But the question before the House really was, whether the act described in the resolution, admitted to have been committed by lord Chatham, was or was not unconstitutional; and whether it was or was not an act calculated to do mischief to the public service? The hon. and learned gent. however, had said, that he did not stand up to defend lord Chatham, nor to contend that his lordship had acted with perfect propriety; but he wished the hon. and learned gent. had told the House in what respect lord Chatham, in his opinion, had acted wrong. The Chancellor of the Exchequer too the other night said, that he did not rise to defend lord Chatham, and admitted that he had

acted wrong, Another hon. gent. ad

mitted that his conduct was erroneous and

objectionable, and the hon. gent. on the floor had allowed that his conduct was not right; but none of them seemed to be able to give a name to the kind of error or deficiency of which they imagined lord Chatham to have been guilty. He, however, would tell them why lord Chatham's conduct was erroneous, objectionable and wrong; it was because it was unconstitutional. This was the sole term by which his conduct could be properly described. The gentlemen who spoke against the resolution could indeed find no other word applicable to the conduct of lord Chatham,and yet they were afraid to acknowledge that it was unconstitutional. But the hon. gent. on the floor (Mr. Bankes) asked, where was the positive statute that constituted this an unconstitutional act? No one, however, had contended that there was any positive statute on the subject. If there had been any such statute in existence the proper definition of lord Chatham's conduct would have been that it was illegal, and that House would then have carried the matter before the House of Lords by impeachment. But an act might be unconstitutional, and yet not contrary to a positive statute, nor strictly illegal. An act was unconstitutional when contrary to the known principles and spirit of the constitution, although there was no express statute applicable to the case: and of this description was the conduct of lord Chatham.

Lord Chatham had the right to ap proach his Majesty as a peer, as a privy counsellor, and as a cabinet minister. Of that there could be no doubt. But he had no right to make use of his privilege of approach to his Majesty to present a Narrative of his conduct as the commander of an expedition, with a request of secrecy. It was not the making use of his privilege to approach his Sovereign, but the abuse of that privilege in the manner described that was unconstitutional. He would not dwell upon the point of secret influence, because he did not think it had much to do with the present question. But it should be borne in mind, that there were two parts of the conduct of lord Chatham to which the epithet of unconstitutional properly applied; 1st, in presenting his Narrative in the manner of a private paper, instead of a public document; and 2nd, in his having requested that the fact of his having done so should be kept a profound secret, not only from parliament and the public, but even from his own colleagues. -But, in order to render this proceeding

public service, and so, if alive, would he now have condemned his conduct in the present instance.-The hon. and learned gent. who spoke last, had stated, however, that a person clothed with no official character had yet taken upon him to advise King Charles the second to form the Cabal, and that this person's name was Temple. He recommended to the hon. and learned gent. to look again into the history of that period, and he would find that sir William Tem

tion of the Cabal, but had on the contrary advised his Majesty against it. He had undoubtedly advised the King to form the committee of privy council, which had overturned the cabal. This much he thought proper to say on this point for the sake of those, who had been accustomed to regard the memory of sir William Temple with respect, on account of the many valuable qualities and eminent virtues which he possessed. But the House was desired to excuse the conduct of lord Chatham, though erroneous and objectionable, because his lordship had not

unconstitutional, the hon. gent. on the floor said, that the advice must be followed up by some deed; and that with any advice given by lord Chathamn, or any other in an official capacity, no matter how pernicious (and he was surprized to hear the hon gent. say so,) the House had nothing to do.) He never heard any doctrine avowed of a more abominable and mischievous tendency. Suppose a man were to make use of his privilege of access to the King, to represent the House of Commons as a factious and unmanage-ple had not only not advised the formaable body of men, observing at the same time that his Majesty had at his disposal an army faithful and devoted to his serVice, and advising his Majesty, therefore, to employ this army to disperse the Commons, as Cromwell did, according to the doctrine of the hon. gent. the House of Commons had no remedy against a proceeding of this sort. They could do nothing till the mischief was actually done. The hon. gent. said that there were numerous editions of the book of the constitution. If there were, he protested that the edition of the hon. gent. himself was the worst he had ever heard of: and he ear-acted with a malignant intention. What nestly recommended to those who wished to study the contitution to look for it in some other edition. But the hon. and learned gent, over the way (Mr. Stephen) admitted, that the conduct of lord Chatham was erroneous and objectionable, would he then, with that impression, contend, that the House ought to pass it over,jesty that he had ill conducted the Expedi and do nothing? The learned and hon. tion? Or was it to shew that he had congent. had said, too, that the name of the ducted it well and properly? The House great lord Chatham had been introduced, could hardly doubt that the latter was the and his constitutional views held out in real object, and the Narrative delivered order to render the conduct of the son more to his Majesty in furtherance of that obconspicuously objectionable; and yet theject, necessarily implied that the admirał hon. gent. himself had conjured the House to be lenient to the son for the sake of the father and brother. The impropriety in the one view was, he apprehended, at least as great as in the other. He did not approve of the system of politics upon which Mr. Pitt had often acted; but however he might have differed with Mr. Pitt, he would in justice declare, that he believed in a case of this kind Mr. Pitt would have been the first to condemn even his brother, Gentlemen would recollect, that when lord Chatham was first lord of the admiralty, Mr. Pitt, being then minister, had not hesitated to advise the King to remove him, because he did not do the duties of it in the manner which Mr. Pitt thought best calculated for the

then, he would ask, were the motives of lord Chatham? He did not mean, however, to rest much on that, because the question respected lord Chatham's acts, rather than his motives. But still what were his motives? Was it his object to injure himself, and to persuade his Ma

had failed in his duty. Did lord
Chatham, then, who must have been
sensible of this, do right in not deli-
vering that Narrative to the first lord
of the admiralty, his colleague in office,
that the naval commander might be ap-
prized of what was urged against him?
But against this argument in favour of the
purity of lord Chatham's motives, he would
set the words of lord Chatham himself.
In his examination of the 22d of Febru
ary would be found the following question
and answer: "Was there any other nar-
rative, paper, or memorial, or memoran
dum of any sort delivered to his Majesty
on this subject by your lordship ?—I have
already stated that this paper was pre-
pared on the 15th of October;
I am very

nature of the offence which he had committed, and which demanded the censure of the House and on this part of the subject he would borrow something from the able and eloquent speech of his hon. and learned friend near him (Mr. Adam.) There were two grand principles which formed the foundation of the constitution; the complete irresponsibility of the so

ready to state, if it is wished, the reason why I did not deliver it theu: the reason I did not deliver it was, that I did not think it was right for me to state, in fact what would constitute my defence in case of any inquiry, whether civil or military; that was the reason I did not deliver it. I did deliver it on the 14th of February as my report of my proceedings."-He did not then think it right to deliver his Nar-vereign, and the complete responsibility rative to his Majesty when it was drawn of the ministers. These were the princiup, as it would constitute his defence in ples which rendered the British constitucase of inquiry, civil, or military, and only tion the most perfect system of free godelivered it on the 14th of February, as vernment. This was the true secret of the the report of his proceedings, of course, administration of the government of Great with a view to the inquiry actually going Britain. Nothing could be more directly on; and this he stated after he had in opposed to these principles than the confact delivered it on the 15th of January, duct of lord Chatham in the clandestine with the request that it might be kept delivery of this Narrative. The hon. gent. secret.-As to the motive of the noble lord, on the floor said, that he could not find many would, perhaps, and not without any where a list of the courtesies that some reason, be satisfied with the very might be properly conferred upon a cabicircumstance that secrecy was desired; net minister by his Majesty. But the for why should lord Chatham have desired hon. gent. might find in the spirit and that this delivery of the Narrative should practice of the constitution, the line bebe kept secret, except he was conscious yond which no cabinet minister ought to that he was doing something wrong? But pass in giving advice to his sovereign. A the House was not left to make this in- cabinet minister, privy counsellor, peer, ference, for it appeared from lord Chat- or any other person, might very properly ham's evidence that he did not think it be allowed to approach his Majesty if he right to deliver to his Majesty in this way pleased, and advise him to dismiss his what would constitute his defence in case ministers; but he ought not to do this or of inquiry, civil or military. There ap- give any advice on a public subject under peared to be something extraordinary in the seal of secrecy; nor refuse to make the memory of lord Chatham, beyond himself responsible for his advice. Did what was to be found in the memory of lord Chatham communicate his proceedany other man; for it appeared that having to his colleagues? No. Did he deliing presented a Narrative of his proceedings to his Majesty on the 15th of January, he requested to have it back again on the 10th of February, in order to expunge a certain passage, and had delivered it again on the 14th of February with the passage expunged; and when asked on the 27th of February what that passage was, he could not remember it! So that from the 15th of January to the 10th of February he recollected a passage which he wished to expunge; and yet in the interval between the 14th and 27th of February, his lordship had forgot this passage which had been before so strongly impressed on his memory. This was as extraordinary as the very extraordinary defence which was now set up in his lordship's behalf!

He contended therefore, that the proceeding of lord Chatham was most unconstitutional; and that there was no other word which could precisely express the

ver his Narrative through the medium of the secretary of state or the commander in chief? No. All was done secretly. When he delivered it in the second time, he was desired to give it to the secretary of state. Why was not this done at first? Because, it was specially requested that the transaction should be kept a profound secret. That House had often, before the revolution, censured particular individuals for conduct of this kind. But, it was to the constitution, as established at the revolution, that we owed the character of the people of this country. It was owing to that constitution that there was less caballing, less secret influence, than in any other European country; that even in political hostility there was more openness and candour; that this character was not confined to ministers and public men, but spread over the whole mass of the population. In the whole of the nation there was more openness and probity, and less

secret intrigue and duplicity than in any other European nation; and this we owed to the constitution. How happened it that, in other nations, there were so many secret cabals, and combinations of men smiling in your face, while stabbing one behind? It was owing to their want of the advantages of our inestimable constitution, the tendency of which was to render every thing in the shape of a public transaction fair and open, and which (till lately at least) had in a great measure that desirable effect. But what would be the consequence of such a proceeding as this was to be passed over without notice? Instead if that candid and open frankness which distinguished the higher as well as the lower classes of the community, we would sink to that degraded character which had been the ruin of so many nations of Europe; and now he must call upon the House to preserve that constitution inviolate, from which they derived so many blessings, and not act like the silly stupid Indian who threw away a pearl richer than all his tribe.

Mr. Canning said, he had not approached the House on this occasion without having searched his own mind for an excuse from voting on the present question, but after all that had been shewn to the House, he found it was impossible, and equally so, that he could give even the vote he intended to do, without, at the same time, offering his reasons for so doing. He should put out of view many of the topics which had been brought forward in the discussion of this question. He must beg leave to acquit the noble lord of any of those motives of malignity which had been so lavishly attributed to him. He could not think, that any man, gifted with such abilities, and enjoying the splendour of such a name, would be guided or influenced by such base and unworthy incitements. Highly, however, as he thought of his name and talents, he could not consent that the House should make him a splendid anomaly to the character and practice of the constitution. He knew the vote he should give would be but coolly received by the hon. gent. who brought forward the motion, because it turned on so narrow a principle, when compared with the aim and object of the hon. gent. himself. The hon. gent., however, might rest assured, that he could not receive it with more indifference than he (Mr. C.) gave it with reluctance. He was sorry this business of the Narrative

should have ever come before the House; because, as had been eloquently expressed by the right hon. gent. who spoke last, it was destructive of that bright responsibility in ministers, which formed one of the finest features of the British constitution. He regretted it, because it must be disadvantageous to the noble lord in the investigation yet to take place, as to his colleagues and himself -The first resolution detailed fairly and candidly the transactions as they took place; the second resolution characterised the noble lord's conduct, on which he should have a few words to say; but there was a third point of such consequence, that the House could not look over it, and which weighed very much on his mind. He should, therefore, expect to be informed, before he voted for it, how far this second resolution was intended to be followed up? If it was intended that the House should adopt any such violent and rigorous measures, in consequence of the noble lord's conduct, as an address for the removal of the noble lord from his Majesty's councils, and to disqualify him from ever being restored to them, then most certainly he would not vote for it. On the other hand, said he, shall this transaction be followed by a resolution of parliament, to take no notice of it? Such a proceeding he should almost as much deprecate as the other, The previous question, in such a matter, was what the House ought not by any means to countenance. It was highly important to lord Chatham that it should not take place, because it would deprive him of the means of shewing what degree of blame only was attachable to him. Instead of endeavouring to check this by a previous question, it would be better to have made an amendment of a medium nature.-The first resolution would have been better, in his opinion, if it had not been mixed with the evidence: he should have liked it better without it, but still he did not think the form of it unfair. He certainly was not prepared to go the length of the second resolution. In objecting to it, he was not, however, prepared to support the doctrine of his hon. friend (Mr. Bankes) that the transaction was not unconstitutional. With respect to the constitution generally, he should be content with that, which was to be found in the praise bestowed on it in good times, and the censure in bad one's; but he could not vote without knowing to what length they meant to follow the vote up; for

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